I guess it's not that simple. Say you have a factory that made Plutonium triggers and that same factory was pretty awful at following safety and containment protocol. Now that Plutonium is in very low levels within the actual soil of where the now decommissioned plant resides. Do you mine that soil for the Plutonium, or do you make all that soil nuclear waste?

In Colorado, we've decided to open up the area as a Wildlife Refuge.

http://e360.yale.edu/features/rocky_flats_wildlife_refuge_co...

Plutonium triggers have nothing to do with nuclear power. The nuclear bomb industry has a horrific environmental record, which isn't surprising considering what they were building.

If the plutonium is valuable fuel instead of waste, then a commercial operation has a good incentive to hold on to it, even aside from the regulations that commercial power has to deal with.

Yes, after a few hundred years you've got a pretty good source for weapons grade plutonium

No, the point is the plutonium is gone because you've fissioned it in your reactor.