One of the world's largest suppliers of nuclear fuel, Areva, has said that a facility to recycle nuclear waste could be ready in the U.S. by 2025.
Speaking to journalists at a press breakfast in Washington, Jacques Besnainou, chief executive officer of the firm, reportedly said: "We're hoping that we can start planning for such a facility by 2015."
While the company, headquartered in Paris, already recycles nuclear waste across Europe, there has been ongoing controversy over the proposed site in the U.S.
Plans to revive an abandoned facility at the Yucca Mountain in Nevada had funding withdrawn in 2009 by President Barak Obama, who instead commissioned the 15 member Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future to conduct a review of policies in the country and recommend a new plan.
At the end of May the committee released its draft report, which said "decades of failed policies, missed deadlines and a climate of distrust have seriously eroded confidence in the nation's ability to manage these materials responsibly".
The report outlined reasons for establishing consolidated interim storage on a regional and national basis, which it said could "reduce the cost and security burdens associated with storing nuclear fuel with high-level wastes at numerous dispersed sites".
However, Besnainou reportedly said that the proposed recycling plant - which Bloomberg reported could cost $20 billion to $30 billion - would postpone debate over reviving the abandoned Yucca Mountain facility.
Nuclear waste and its storage and disposal has been centre of debate over the last few months following Japans's earthquake and subsequent tsunami affecting nuclear reactors at four sites along the eastern coast.
Last week saw the U.S. Department of Energy award a $417 million radioactive waste contract to the Idaho Treatment Group (see Waste Management World story).
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