Two ships that left Britain in late April will arrive Friday at a special port for a nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture and will return to Britain loaded with plutonium-uranium mixed oxide (MOX) fuel in early July, according to sources familiar with the shipping plan.
The ships will transport the MOX fuel, currently stored at Kansai Electric Power Co.'s nuclear plant in Takahama, to British Nuclear Fuels PLC (BNFL), the British manufacturer of the fuel.
The voyage will face flotillas of protesters who warn of the threat of terrorist attacks on the ships carrying the plutonium-mixed fuel.
The shipment is to be conducted in the wake of a scandal in which BNFL falsified manufacturing data for MOX fuel shipped to Kepco in 1999.