Fuel cycle technical options for controlling nuclear proliferation

One near term alternative might be enhanced burn-up and improved conversion ratios in light water reactors (LWR's). A second possibility might be use of heavy water reactors. The Tandem Fuel Cycle Concept is discussed. Under this concept, spent fuel from LWR's would be reclad and used directly to fuel natural uranium heavy water reactors, eliminating the need for chemical separation of plutonium from the spent LWR fuel. Another possible alternative to reprocessing is coprocessing, sometimes called ''fission product stripping.'' This procedure would chemically separate both plutonium and uranium from waste products in the spent fuel, but the plutonium and uranium would not be separated from each other. The plutonium and uranium mix could then be recycled as fuel for nuclear power reactors. Combining coprocessing and the tandem cycle is another alternative