Areva ready to deal with spent nuclear fuel at Fukushima plant: new CEO+

TOKYO, Sept. 8 Kyodo -
The new chief of French nuclear giant Areva said Thursday that the company is ready to contribute to the process of handling spent nuclear fuel left inside the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi power plant, while hailing the performance of its water decontamination system being used to stabilize the plant.
''We are ready to respond to all kinds of requests from (plant operator) Tokyo Electric Power Co. and the Japanese government to make the Fukushima site safe,'' Luc Oursel, who is visiting Japan for the first time as chief executive officer of Areva, told a press conference in Tokyo through an interpreter.
''I believe we can provide our know-how for the collection and management of the spent nuclear fuel inside the storage pools of the Fukushima plant,'' he added.
But discussions on the matter with the Japanese utility have not gone into details, Oursel said, noting that Tokyo Electric sees it as an issue to be dealt with in the medium term.
Areva has played a pivotal role in containing Japan's nuclear crisis, triggered by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, as part of the plant's water treatment facility has been developed by the company.
The system is designed to remove radioactive materials from massive quantities of highly contaminated water accumulating at the crippled plant as a side effect of initial emergency operations to cool the overheating nuclear reactors. The water is now being recycled as a coolant for the reactors.
Oursel stressed that the system was activated swiftly, although such work usually takes one year, and that it has been able to decontaminate water in a successful manner.
Asked about a plan by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. to take a stake in Areva, Oursel acknowledged that while there have been talks on the matter, they stalled because the French government, Areva's major shareholder, was reluctant about the idea.
==Kyodo
2011-09-08 23:12:40