The agency says that 41% of used nuclear fuel is in wet storage, “mainly the pools that cool … [it] after it leaves the reactor and other centralised pools. Another 31% is in dry storage which are the casks, buildings, and modular systems used for keeping spent fuel under dry conditions”.
The figures for the interactive map – which allows people to look by country, by region and by storage type – comes from the Contracting Parties to the Joint Convention, which is “the principal international legal instrument to address the safety of spent fuel and radioactive waste management on a global scale”. It is the second edition of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Global Spent Nuclear Fuel Inventory.
The data was submitted under the 2025 reporting cycle and the IAEA says it was supplemented by other publicly available information. The first edition, in 2019, did not include the interactive tool.
It reports that about 126,000 tonnes of heavy metal – the standard unit for the uranium and other heavy elements in power reactor fuel – has been reprocessed, which can allow its usable materials to be made into new fuel, reducing waste and the amount of natural uranium needed.
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Amparo Gonzalez Espartero, Technical Lead in the IAEA Division of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology, said: “By displaying information on worldwide spent fuel inventories in a structured manner, including reprocessed and stored spent fuel in different storage systems, the tool benefits technical analysis, and facilitates informed discussions on long-term spent fuel management strategies among countries and interested stakeholders.”
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