
WASHINGTON, Oct 22 (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Energy expects to begin announcing by December 31 which companies will take about 19.7 metric tons of surplus Cold War-era plutonium for processing into nuclear reactor fuel, a document showed on Wednesday.
Reuters reported in August that the Trump administration planned to offer plutonium to companies as a potential fuel for reactors. The plutonium would be offered to industry at little to no cost, but they will be responsible for transportation, designing, building, and decommissioning DOE-authorized facilities to recycle, process and manufacture the fuel.