Kansai Electric Power to Continue MOX Fuel Use at the Takahama NPPs

The transport vessel Pacific Heron, carrying MOX fuel, arrived at Kansai Electric Power's Takahama Nuclear Power Plant in Fukui Prefecture on November 17. The ship departed from Cherbourg in northwestern France on September 7 and reached Japan after a roughly two-month voyage via the Cape of Good Hope and the South-West Pacific route.

According to Kansai Electric Power, the vessel loaded with 32 MOX fuel assemblies berthed early in the morning on the 17th, and unloading operations began shortly after 10 a.m. All work was completed by around 6:30 p.m. the same day. This is the seventh MOX fuel shipment to the Takahama plant, and the first since November 2022. The fuel was fabricated by France's Orano.

The transport casks are cylindrical carbon-steel containers measuring approximately 6.2 meters in length, 2.5 meters in outer diameter, and weighing around 108 tons. The vessel is equipped with multiple safety measures, including an automatic collision-avoidance system, a double-hulled structure, and an established emergency communication framework. Radiation measurements of the transport casks conducted by the company showed a dose rate of 0.03 mSv/h on the surface and 0.008 mSv/h or lower at a distance of 1 meter-well below national limits. Surface contamination levels were also less than half of the regulatory limits. The company stated that it had "verified compliance with all legal standards."

MOX fuel is produced by mixing plutonium recovered through the reprocessing of spent fuel with uranium.

Kansai Electric Power is also moving forward with plans to ship approximately 200 tons of spent fuel to France between FY2027 and FY2029 as part of a program to demonstrate the reprocessing of spent MOX fuel.