2.1 Types of waste: the nuclear fuel chain

UK is expected to be at least £3 billion (US$3.8 billion).3 In France, the only remaining country separating plutonium in large quantities for commercial use, reprocessing remains required by law.

While plutonium in some cases may appear as a resource in the short term, it is currently almost exclusively re-used in fuel only once as mixed oxide (MOX) fuel; here plutonium re-use simply leads to another form of spent nuclear fuel. In addition, spent MOX fuel is more radioactive and difficult to manage than the spent fuel produced using uranium-only fuel. In other words, reprocessing both postpones the waste issue and makes it more complex.

Managing the various products of nuclear reactions, whether formally categorized as waste or not, is politically and socially contentious and involves potentially high hazards.

The point here is not to adjudicate on the status of plutonium or other materials. It is rather to recognize that the issue of managing the various products of nuclear reactions, whether formally categorized as waste or not, is politically and socially contentious and involves potentially high hazards. While this chapter covers the range of waste products resulting from nuclear reactions, the special importance of spent fuel is that it is 100 million times more radioactive than fresh fuel.4 It is therefore necessary to give particular attention to spent fuel waste.

Nuclear waste arises (‘arisings’ is a term widely used in this context) at all stages of the nuclear fuel chain, often also referred to as the nuclear fuel cycle. While it is possible to use thorium as a primary nuclear fuel, in practice uranium is overwhelmingly the dominant source of fuel for nuclear power. All the waste described and classified here ultimately stems from the ways in which uranium is currently used in electricity production. There is thus no consideration of the types of waste that would arise if nuclear fusion were ever a serious power source.

The sequential stages of the nuclear fuel chain are as follows (see Figure 1):

1. Uranium mining, milling, enrichment and fuel fabrication.

2. Irradiation of nuclear fuel in power or research reactors (nuclear fission).

3. Management of spent fuel, whether or not reprocessed.

4. Reactor decommissioning

The activities in stage 1 are often referred to as the ‘front end’ of the fuel chain. Stages 3 and 4 are often known as the ‘back end’ of the fuel chain.

3 Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) 2010, Plutonium: credible options analysis (redacted), viewed 11 June 2019, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/ 457827/Plutonium_-_credible_options_analysis_2010__redacted_.pdf 4 Open University 2011, ‘Inside Nuclear Energy Science’. Short Module, ST174, Milton Keynes.