While others disagree on theoretical grounds and state that dependable high, non- fizzle level yields, can be achieved, arguing that it would be "relatively easy" for a well funded entity with access to fusion boosting tritium and expertise to overcome the problem of predetonation created by Pu-240, and that a remote manipulation facility could be utilized in the assembly of the highly radioactive gamma ray emitting bomb components, coupled with a means of cooling the weapon pit during storage to prevent the plutonium charge contained in the pit from melting, and a design that kept the implosion mechanisms high explosives from being degraded by the pits heat.
The degree to which typical Generation II reactor high burn-up produced reactor-grade plutonium is less useful than weapons-grade plutonium for building nuclear weapons is somewhat debated, with many sources arguing that the maximum probable theoretical yield would be bordering on a fizzle explosion of the range 0.1 to 2 kiloton in a Fat Man type device, that is, assuming the non-trivial issue of dealing with the heat generation from the higher content of non-weapons usable Pu-238, that is present, could be overcome, as the premature initiation from the spontaneous fission of Pu-240 would ensure a low explosive yield in such a device, with the surmounting of both issues being described as "daunting" hurdles for a Fat Man era implosion design and the possibility of terrorists achieving this fizzle yield being regarded as an "overblown" apprehension with the safeguards that are in place. Thermal-neutron reactors (today's nuclear power stations) can reuse reactor-grade plutonium only to a limited degree as MOX fuel, and only for a second cycle fast-neutron reactors, of which there is less than a handful operating today, can use reactor-grade plutonium fuel as a means to reduce the transuranium content of spent nuclear fuel/nuclear waste.
Reactor-grade plutonium is found in spent nuclear fuel that a nuclear reactor has irradiated ( burnup/burnt up) for years before removal from the reactor, in contrast to the low burnup of weeks or months that is commonly required to produce weapons-grade plutonium, with the high time in the reactor(high burnup) of reactor-grade plutonium leading to transmutation of much of the fissile, relatively long half-life isotope 239Pu into a number of other isotopes of plutonium that are less fissile or more radioactive.
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