1.   --At Hanford, scientists hope to combine the surplus plutonium with reactor-grade uranium to create a mixed-oxide fuel known as MOX.

2.   Hanford and Savannah River are competing to earn the right to eliminate the surplus plutonium from dismantled nuclear weapons.

3.   It will take a good two decades or more to get rid of the surplus military plutonium in each country.

4.   Russia has pledged to convert a similar amount of surplus plutonium into power-plant fuel.

5.   Scientists are proposing many new methods and machines meant to rid the world of surplus plutonium, including new reactors, annihilators and special ways to discard it.

6.   The Energy Department plans to build a multibillion-dollar facility at Savannah River to convert the surplus plutonium into fuel for nuclear power plants.

7.   The main proponent of the theory, Dr. Charles D. Bowman, is one of scores of scientists hunting for new ways to rid the world of surplus plutonium.

8.   The so-called dual-track strategy would encase some surplus plutonium in glass and the rest would be burned as fuel in commercial nuclear power plants.

9.   But he said Russia still appears intent on stockpiling civilian plutonium as well as some of its surplus military plutonium for eventual use in civilian reactors.