41.   Fast breeder reactors use plutonium as fuel and produce more plutonium than it consumes.

42.   Hanford, where the government for years produced plutonium for warheads, has posed a particularly perplexing cleanup challenge.

43.   In exchange, it must freeze its nuclear facilities, suspected of producing plutonium for atomic bombs, and eventually dismantle them.

44.   India considers the reactor dangerous because it will produce plutonium, the main component for atomic weapons.

45.   Iran has reportedly asked China for a heavy water research reactor which might enable Iran to produce the plutonium necessary to make a nuclear device.

46.   It also produces more plutonium than it uses.

47.   It is the only country in the world developing fast-breeder technology, in which reactors both consume and produce plutonium for fuel.

48.   It says the French agreed to supply enriched uranium and cites foreign reports as saying that it also supplied a plant for producing plutonium.

49.   It had been suspected by American analysts of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons before the United States and North Korea agreed last October to have the reactor replaced.

50.   Japan eventually hopes to produce much of its energy through fast breeder reactors, which produce more plutonium than they burn.