Oct 30 - Dominion Post

KIWI geologists are helping Japan tackle a hot problem -- where to store nuclear waste.

Teams from GNS Science and from the United States are assessing whether waste from nuclear power plants could be stored safely underground in earthquake- prone Japan.

About 50,000 44-gallon drums of nuclear waste are placed at present in secure sites above ground.

GNS principal scientist Kelvin Berryman said: "The aim is to find sites that are geologically stable for a long period."

Japan had a lot of quakes, just like New Zealand, so Kiwi expertise was valuable, he said. Scientists from Switzerland, Britain and United States were looking at volcanic hazards.

The early stage of the project involves evaluating how to choose potential sites. That phase should be finished in 2009 and will be followed by several years of assessing possible deep-storage sites. No sites were yet being investigated.

Dr Berryman said it could be 20 years before any nuclear waste was stored underground in Japan.

GNS Science was contributing geological expertise only, and had no direct involvement with Japan's nuclear energy industry. It made "a few hundred thousand dollars" a year from the work, which was mostly done in New Zealand using geological data.

The waste would stay highly radioactive for up to 3000 years and be stored up to 400 metres underground.

Dr Berryman said the Japanese nuclear industry was busy looking for "volunteer sites". "So far they haven't had much luck."

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