Spent Fuel Storage

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With the operation of nuclear power plants also comes the responsibility of storing high-level nuclear waste in the form of spent fuel assemblies. Every 12-18 months the

reactor undergoes a refueling outage, where 30-40% of the fuel assemblies in the core are discharged and replaced with fresh fuel assemblies. The spent fuel discharged from the core during the refueling outage must be safely stored with appropriate cooling, shielding and criticality safety. The discharged fuel is placed in spent fuel storage racks in the spent fuel pool (SFP) until it is completely filled, and then the spent fuel assemblies are placed in dry storage casks on the nuclear plant premises (but outside the reactor buildings). This chapter addresses the storage of spent fuel in the SFP and dry storage casks.