How Can Nuclear Waste Be Recycled? From Storage to Fuel

Used nuclear fuel, commonly referred to as “nuclear waste,” isn’t what you think it is. Yes, it contains material that can remain highly radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. But it also holds vast amounts of recoverable energy, as well as valuable isotopes and metals. 

More accurately understood, the stockpile of used nuclear fuel we have in the U.S. isn't a waste problem. It's a vast, untapped energy resource.

Understanding that requires getting clear on what used nuclear fuel truly is, why storing it has been such a persistent challenge, and what it would take to turn the nuclear waste problem around. What follows covers all three, including what SHINE is doing to make recycling used nuclear fuel a commercial reality in the U.S.

What Most Nuclear Waste Actually Is

The World Nuclear Association reports that roughly 97% of nuclear waste by volume is low- or intermediate-level radioactive material—reactor components, tools, and protective clothing. This material decays to safe levels within decades. The remaining ~3% is used nuclear fuel, classified as high-level waste, requiring long-term isolation and accounting for most of the long-term radiological risk. 

The U.S. has accumulated more than 90,000 metric tons of high-level waste since the 1950s, with more added each year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Of course, that many tons of anything sounds like a lot. But in sheer physical terms, it’s remarkably compact. DOE data on used nuclear fuel storage volume show that you could fit our current stockpile onto a single football field at a depth of about 10 yards. 

That’s the waste profile of a fuel source roughly a million times more energy-dense than coal, one that has provided around 20% of our electricity since the 1990s.

How Is Nuclear Waste Stored in the U.S.?

In reality, that used nuclear fuel sits distributed at more than 75 secured sites around the country because the U.S. hasn't yet resolved where it should permanently go. 

Deep geological disposal in stable rock formations—granite, salt, clay—is scientifically well validated. In fact, the U.S. selected a site—Yucca Mountain, Nevada—and spent decades along with billions of dollars assessing it. But political opposition halted the project in 2010. The projected total cost of the Yucca Mountain facility, adjusted for inflation, would have exceeded $100 billion.

Finland is already proving the engineering for deep geological disposal actually works: Onkalo, the world's first permanent repository for used nuclear fuel, has completed trial runs and is on track to begin operations in 2026.

For now, the will, not the way, remains the obstacle in the U.S. But what if the need for such a large-scale, costly repository were no longer necessary? What if we moved toward a nuclear fuel cycle that could dramatically reduce, and potentially eliminate, the case for deep geological disposal?

Recycling the World’s Most Misunderstood Waste

Those metric tons of used nuclear fuel already in storage around the country are often described as waste. But the label misrepresents what that material really is.  According to the DOE, more than 90% of used nuclear fuel's energy potential remains, even after years of reactor use.

And that potential matters more than ever. The U.S. is entering a new era of electricity demand driven by AI data centers, new manufacturing investment, and the growing electrification of transportation and industry. 

Meeting that demand will require expanding nuclear capacity. As electricity generation increases, so will the volume of used nuclear fuel—and the reusable material it contains.

What’s the Hold-Up with Recycling Used Nuclear Fuel?

The case for recycling seems like a no-brainer. So why haven’t we been doing it? Short answer: It’s complicated.

The U.S. follows a “once-through” fuel cycle, meaning fuel is used once and then treated as permanent waste. That policy took shape in the 1970s, when the Ford and Carter administrations halted commercial reprocessing over nuclear proliferation concerns—specifically the risk that separated plutonium could be diverted for weapons use.

Those concerns continue to shape U.S. policy. But the tradeoff is getting harder to ignore: a growing and increasingly expensive waste management burden, along with the unrealized potential of recycling.

That dynamic, however, is beginning to change. For the first time in decades, federal initiatives, private investment, and bipartisan support are converging to make practical nuclear recycling at commercial scale a realistic near-term prospect. So how can this momentum translate into action? 

Where Recycling Is Already a Reality

Countries like France have been recycling used nuclear fuel for decades. Data from the International Atomic Energy Agency and World Nuclear Association show that the process can recover around 96% of reusable material, significantly reduce the volume of highly radioactive waste, and lower the need for fresh uranium by roughly 15–20%.

How SHINE Is Making Nuclear Waste Recycling a Reality 

While policy catches up, the technical work of making nuclear waste recycling real in the U.S. is already well underway. Here at SHINE, we’re developing a three-step process to work through used fuel systematically:

1. Recover what can be reused for fuel. Uranium and plutonium—about 96% of the total used fuel mass—would be recovered through a controlled aqueous process and fabricated into new reactor fuel. SHINE has partnered with Orano, the world's leading nuclear fuel recycling company, to bring this process toward commercial scale. 

Note that our approach keeps uranium and plutonium together in a single stream, significantly reducing the proliferation risks that have historically made reprocessing controversial in the U.S.

This recovered material has a destination: Advanced reactor designs now in development are specifically engineered to run on recycled fuel, creating a pathway from today’s used fuel to tomorrow’s reactor fuel supply.

Step 1 alone could reduce the mass requiring deep geological disposal from roughly 90,000 metric tons to around 3,000—a 97% reduction in the deep-storage burden. So what about the small percentage remaining? That’s what step 3 aims to address directly. But before that, step 2 focuses on another benefit of recycling.

2. Extract and repurpose high-value materials. Specific isotopes—such as strontium-90 and americium-241—as well as metals like rhodium can be recovered for use in medicine, manufacturing, and advanced power systems.

Those applications are already taking shape. Through a partnership with Zeno Power, SHINE is building a supply chain to provide strontium-90 for radioisotope power systems engineered for extreme environments—from the deep seabed to space. A partnership with Standard Nuclear extends that further, putting recovered strontium-90 and americium-241 to work in compact power systems as part of a broader domestic fuel recycling framework.

3. Transform the remaining fraction. After steps 1 and 2, only about 2% of the original used fuel volume remains in the form of highly radioactive material. But we’re not stuck with that either. Targeting just the minor actinides—long-lived radioactive elements—can result in a seven-fold reduction in deep storage volume.

SHINE and our project partners are developing a method enabling fusion-generated neutrons to transmute these long-lasting isotopes into shorter-lived, lower-activity forms, reducing the required isolation period from millennia to decades. That work is now in active development under ARPA-E's NEWTON (Nuclear Energy Waste Transmutation Optimized Now) program.

Turning a Liability into an Energy Resource

Decades of policy and public perception have treated used nuclear fuel as a permanent liability—expensive to manage, politically contested, and going nowhere. But the science and the economics increasingly suggest it doesn’t have to be this way.

What sits in storage around the country is a resource that can be recycled. That means reducing the storage burden, recovering immense value, and closing a fuel cycle the U.S. has left open for decades. The technical work is underway. The policy environment is shifting. The question isn't whether nuclear waste can be recycled. It's how quickly that transition happens.