Sea Transport of Plutonium by the Akatsuki Maru

The dedicated plutonium transport ship Akatsuki-Maru which left Cherbourg port in France in November. 1992 and then sailed down the Atlantic with the Japanese Maritime Safety Agency's E. cort Vessel, safely arrived at a port in Tokai in Japan in January the following year after a 30,000-kilometer non-stop voyage of a little Jess than 2 months around the Cape of Good Hope and via the Indian Ocean, the Tasman Sea. and the Pacific. The transport was planned and carried out by Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corporation (PNC) according to a policy for the transport of returned pluwnium defined hy the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan by which the sea transport should conform to the Annex 5. Guidelines for the International Transportation of Recovered Plutonium, Implementing the Agreement between Japan and the US pursuant to Article ll of the Agreement for Cooperation Concerning Pea~eful Uses of Nuclear Material. It was a large-scale international project with close cooperation among the governments and related organizations of the countries concerned including the United States, France, the United Kingdom. and Japan, extending over a relatively long period if the preparatory stage is included. The successful completion of this transport was due substantially to the cooperation and understanding of these countries and others.