Japan: AREVA signs a contract to supply MOX fuel to Kansai

4/28/2008
Press release

A ceremony was held in Avignon (France) between AREVA, Nuclear Fuel Industries* and a leading Japanese utility, Kansai, following the MOX fuel supply contract it awarded on March 31st, 2008.

  • Through this contract, AREVA will supply the utility with 16 MOX fuel assemblies for units 3 and 4 of the Takahama nuclear power plant, located in Fukui Prefecture (Japan).
  • The plutonium recovered from the treatment of Kansai’s spent fuel at AREVA’s La Hague plant will be recycled at its MELOX facility and sent back to Japan in the form of MOX fuel assemblies**.
  • According to Jürgen Krellmann, Executive Vice President of AREVA’s Recycling Business Unit for the MOX fuel business, “this commercial success confirms AREVA’s position as the world’s leading manufacturer of MOX fuel and demonstrates the confidence Japanese utilities have in our technology and unique know-how.”
  • This contract follows the renewal of Japan’s recycling program. In 2006, AREVA signed agreements to supply MOX fuel to three other Japanese utilities: Chubu, Kyushu and Shikoku.

Since 1995, AREVA’s MELOX facility, has been fabricating MOX fuel assemblies for nuclear power plants in various countries, including France, Germany, Switzerland, Japan and the United States. Made with a mixture of uranium and plutonium oxides, MOX fuel recycles plutonium recovered from used fuel. With more than 1,300 metric tons of heavy metal produced to date, MELOX is the world’s leading producer of MOX fuel.

* NFI is the fuel vendor selected by the Japanese utility, KANSAI, for this contract
**4 MOX fuel assemblies provide electricity for 250,000 people a year

Presse Office
Fleur Floquet-Daubigeon
Julien Duperray
Ludovic Boursin
T: 01 34 96 12 15
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press@areva.com

Invetor Relation
Isabelle Coupey
isabelle.coupey@areva.com
T : +33 1 34 96 14 85
Manuel Lachaux
T : +33 1 34 96 11 53
manuel.lachaux@areva.com