Opening address

The depth of technology covered in the papers to

this Conference is impressive proof of the

mature state of the fast reactor system and that

it has probably the strongest development base

of any energy producing system - nuclear or non

nuclear.

In 1977 the twenty-first anniversary of the

large scale production of electricity from the

Calder Hall thermal reactors has justifiably

been celebrated. Electricity was first produced

five years earlier from a fast reactor in

America in December 1951, and that has been

followed by long and satisfactory operation of

fast reactor power plants of increasing size in

Britain, France and Russia, Unfortunately these