Trump Nuclear Orders Show Renewed US Interest in Waste Recycling

A recent series of executive orders reveal the Trump administration is interested in building out the country’s nuclear waste reprocessing and recycling capabilities, but attorneys and industry insiders say launching those facilities is still a long way away.

The US engaged in commercial nuclear reprocessing in the 1960s and 1970s, but high costs and nonproliferation concerns led to it being abandoned by the 1980s. Now, President Donald Trump is telling the Energy Department to coordinate with other departments to compile a report on the issue within 240 days.

“I think that this section of this executive order that we’ve been looking at on strengthening the domestic nuclear fuel cycle does have enormous potential to lead to a working policy in our country for handling spent nuclear fuel, be it through reprocessing or disposal,” said Jane Accomando, who advises nuclear energy companies and their partners at Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP.

The report is expected to include a range of information on how to manage waste and possibly reuse it. That includes a proposed national policy to support the management of spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste; an evaluation of the reprocessing and recycling of spent nuclear fuel from government reactors; and suggestions for how to dispose of waste from recycling or reprocessing.

The executive orders come as the Trump administration seeks additional resources to meet increased energy demand stemming in part from the rise of data centers and artificial intelligence. All four orders in general aim to increase the use of nuclear energy. However, more use also comes with more waste.

Nuclear fuel recycling “isn’t a solution to the waste problem, but it is an element of a solution, and it’s an element that has been missing now in the US for a long time,” said Sam Thernstrom, CEO of the Energy Innovation Reform Project.

Lack of American Reprocessing

There are no commercial reprocessing facilities currently in the US, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. One country that embraced the practice is France, which has at least 50 nuclear power reactors.

The NRC defines reprocessing as when spent nuclear reactor fuel is separated into nuclear materials that can be recycled for use in new fuel and material that would be discarded as waste.

“Right now, all the reactors that we have in the United States, none of them are currently licensed to handle a mixed oxide fuel that you would get from recycling like the French or the Japanese,” said Paul Dickman, chair of the external affairs committee at the American Nuclear Society, which supports reprocessing. The country’s current reactor fleet uses uranium-based fuel, while recycling creates plutonium-based fuel, he said.

The plutonium that comes out of reprocessing is a national security issue because it can be used to make nuclear weapons—conflicting with America’s historical stance of nonproliferation.

Accomando said there wasn’t much interest expressed from potential applicants for reprocessing facilities in 2021 when the NRC was considering a rulemaking on the issue. The nuclear industry enters into collection and disposal contracts with the government, so “why would they pay to reprocess that fuel when they’ve already paid to dispose of it,” she said.

It’s also expensive to build the infrastructure needed for reprocessing, which will additionally take many years, Dickman said.

“If anybody thinks that tomorrow you’re going to be starting to reprocess, the answer is no,” he said.

With Republicans looking for additional power sources and Democrats pushing for those that don’t release carbon emissions, the idea of bolstering nuclear energy has become more popular.

The executive orders are “creating aspiration and a policy path for people to want to start recycling—but on the other hand, you know, the practicalities of that are daunting,” Dickman said.

“Regardless of what you do, you still need to have a disposal system,” he said.

Storing Spent Fuel

Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, the Energy Department was tasked with building a deep geologic repository for the disposal of high-level waste and spent nuclear fuel. However, the proposed geologic repository, Yucca Mountain in Nevada, became the subject of political controversy and progress was stymied—making interim storage the go-to policy.

“There’s no movement in the administration or in Congress to revive Yucca Mountain,” which “we had always thought that was a good site,” said Jay E. Silberg, partner at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP.

“I personally believe Yucca Mountain was as safe as safe can be,” said Thernstrom. That being said, “waste disposal sites, waste storage sites, should be sited in places in communities that welcome them, and the political process of siting Yucca Mountain broke down.”

The executive order seems to be pushing for a different approach.

“The advantage of reprocessing is that you ultimately reduce the volume of material that needs to go into a repository,” said Dickman. He added that ANS believes “the residual energy in spent fuel is an asset and should be used,” but “it’s not a straightforward problem.”

The first step is looking into what’s actually achievable.

“I think it’s important that what this is really calling for is just, you know, it’s a recommendation, a review, an evaluation,” Accomando said of the report.

Whatever the report concludes, disposal will be a critical piece of the puzzle.

“If you had reprocessing, you could use some of the existing spent fuel, but you would still have a lot out there,” said Silberg.

“I don’t think we would ever be able to take care of the entire inventory of existing spent fuel without some place to put it,” he said. “I think we need the permanent disposal, even with reprocessing, because of the high level waste.”