Plutonium generated by commercial reactors presents danger

This article summarizes a 1995 keynote address by Dr. Paul Cunningham, Program Director for Nuclear Materials at Los Alamos National Laboratory which highlights the growing plutonium problem. Plutonium production for weapons use has ceased in the US and the former Soviet Union, but the production in commercial reactors, where it is considered a waste product, continues. The amount of plutonium already existing in spent reactor fuel is 5 times as large as the amount both countries have for their weapons. One solution is to use plutonium to generate power