Questions and Answers on Nuclear Waste
Question: How can Australia handle all the nuclear waste from several nuclear power plants?
Answer: Australia already manages radioactive waste and spent fuel and has the expertise and capability to enhance its facilities to handle increased amounts of nuclear waste from a nuclear energy program
Australia has been dealing with radioactive materials for decades. In fact, we already manage low- and intermediate-level nuclear waste from activities like operating the OPAL research reactor at Lucas Heights (which produces medical isotopes), as well as from hospitals, universities, and industry. This includes things like gloves, tools, filters, and equipment that has been used in things like x-rays and handling medicine.
The federal government has established the Australian Radioactive Waste Agency (ARWA), which is responsible for safe and secure long-term management and disposal of Australia’s radioactive waste. We have dedicated waste storage buildings, strict handling protocols, and continuous monitoring overseen by ARPANSA (the nuclear regulator). In short, we’re already managing nuclear waste safely.
Australia manages the spent fuel from the research reactors at Lucas Heights near Sydney. The HIFAR reactor operated from 1958 until it was replaced by the new OPAL reactor in 2007. The spent fuel from HIFAR was sent overseas for reprocessing and casks containing solidified intermediate level waste were returned to be managed in Australia.
Australia’s track record shows that we have the expertise, facilities, and regulatory framework to handle the nuclear waste from nuclear plants responsibly.
Question: What would Australia do with a lot of nuclear waste?
Answer: The amount of spent fuel from nuclear power plants is small in volume, which means that it can be managed in specialised facilities. Once removed from the reactor, spent fuel will be stored in an engineered facility at the reactor for about 10 years and then either be recycled to reclaim unburnt fuel or declared to be waste and put in a deep engineered geological disposal facility.
About 30 tonnes of spent fuels is removed from a typical 1,000-megawatt nuclear reactor each year. The spent fuel is a solid ceramic material which contained high levels of radioactivity and emits high level of radiation. The radioactivity is contained in the fuel element and the radiation controlled by shielding. Modern reactors have spent fuel storage facilities to store spent fuel taken from the reactor core.
Australia will benefit from overseas experience in managing spent fuel from nuclear power plants. We’ve already been managing the nuclear waste from our research reactor.
Here’s what happens with the OPAL reactor’s used fuel
- After it has been used to make lifesaving medical isotopes, the spent fuel (which is very radioactive initially) is cooled in a storage pool for a few years on-site.
- Then, Australia sends this spent fuel overseas for reprocessing to recycle it. Countries like France and the UK remove usable uranium and plutonium from our spent fuel, which can then be reused in other reactors.
- The remaining waste by-product from this process is reduced in volume and immobilised (turned into a solid glass or ceramic form) and shipped back to Australia as intermediate-level waste
- Those waste residues are safely stored at ANSTO in high-integrity steel canisters (called TN-81 casks).
This system has worked very well: waste casks have been returned to Australia in 2015 (from France) and 2022 (from the UK) without any issues.
Australia has contributed to cutting-edge waste management technology by the development of Synroc (short for “synthetic rock”), an Australian-invented method of locking up radioactive waste in a durable ceramic matrix. This technology can encapsulate high-level waste into a rock-like form that won’t leak or break down – effectively imitating how nature traps radioactive elements in minerals for millions of years.
ANSTO is building a Synroc facility to treat waste from nuclear medicine production, and the same tech could be applied to future nuclear waste.
Question: What do we do with nuclear waste in the long run?
Answer: Globally, recycling and long-term storage options are emerging.
Some people do say that no one knows what to do with nuclear waste. But the reality is that every country that uses nuclear power successfully manages its nuclear waste. There are well-established, safe solutions at each step of the process, and many nations have been using them for decades.
First, nuclear waste is cooled in a pool for 5-10 years, and then it is moved into large steel and concrete containers stored either at the reactor site or a central facility
Dry storage casks are a proven technology used around the world; they passively keep the fuel safe and isolated, with no power or cooling systems required.
Some countries recycle their spent fuel.
Countries like France, the UK, Russia, and Japan have chosen to reprocess it. You can extract valuable uranium and plutonium parts from the spent fuel and make new reactor fuel from those materials.
The leftover waste from reprocessing is typically mixed into molten glass and poured into stainless steel canisters, which solidify into glass logs. Vitrified waste won’t dissolve in water, so it traps the radioactivity inside the glass.
Some countries store or dispose if nuclear waste deep underground, returning it to where the uranium came from.
There are permanent disposal solutions ready for use. Finland is leading the world with the first-of-its-kind deep geological repository for spent nuclear fuel. Finland’s repository is built to safely contain nuclear waste for tens of thousands of years in this facility called Onkalo. They encapsulate nuclear waste and bury it about 430 metres underground in stable bedrock.
Sweden is not far behind with a similar repository approved, and France and Canada are in advanced stages of site selection and design for their own. Even the United States, which doesn’t have a commercial spent fuel repository yet, has safely operated the WIPP deep geological repository in New Mexico for long-lived intermediate waste (defence-related) since the 1990s.
The technical solutions exist and have been proven. We know how to permanently isolate nuclear waste in deep geological formations so that it poses no risk to people or the environment.
The track record is impressive: nuclear waste in storage has never harmed the public. Vitrified high-level waste has been transported across oceans and placed into secure storage without incident. The “nuclear waste problem” has effective solutions at every level.
Australia can confidently draw on these international examples. If we embark on nuclear energy, we won’t be starting from scratch. We’ll be standing on the shoulders of proven, safe practices worldwide.