Two scenarios are followed around the world for the fuel cycle back-end: reprocessing or the direct disposal of spent fuels. For small countries, the selection between one of these scenarios may be possible after a “wait and see” period as well. The decision of a country is an outcome of the strategic decision of the country on the management of the spent nuclear fuels. No such decision has been made in Hungary to date yet, thus theoretically any of the options can be selected. Considering the present conditions, the direct disposal seems to be more practical. The substantiation and development of the fuel cycle back-end strategy is the responsibility of our Agency.

The putting of Paks Nuclear Power Plant into operation created a new situation, since the operation and dismantling of the power plant significantly contributes to the source term of the high-level wastes of Hungary. It is known from the beginning that all problems of managing this sort of waste should be solved independently by the country, irrespective of how the management of spent nuclear fuels, which can be classified into the same category from professional point of view, is done.

For the disposal of HLW, preparations shall be made for the construction of a repository in a stable deep geological formation within the country. According to the uniform international position, such repository could also be used for the direct disposal of spent fuels and also for the receipt of the fuel reprocessing wastes. No decision has been made yet in Hungary as to which scenario, i.e. reprocessing or direct disposal of the spent fuels should be selected for the fuel cycle back-end. The substantiation and development of the fuel cycle back-end strategy is the responsibility of our Agency. Our animated film prepared to present the conception plan for the final disposal is available here.

The spent fuel assemblies are stored at present on the site of Paks Nuclear Power Plant, in the Interim Spent Fuel Store.

The data on the quantity of spent fuels are known from the annual data supply provided by Paks Nuclear Power Plant. According to these data, the number of spent fuel assemblies to be generated during the operation of the power plant and to be loaded into the Interim Spent Fuel Store is 11 266, including a total heavy metal content of app. 1307 tU. These data are based on the assumption of 30 year operation period and do not include the number of spent fuel assemblies, which have been finally returned before to Russia (the Soviet Union).