Storage of spent nuclear fuels: concepts and safety challenges. Report established in response to a request by the parliamentary inquiry commission on nuclear installation safety and security

This report aimed at identifying challenges associated, in terms of nuclear safety, with a strategy of management of irradiated nuclear fuel (also called spent nuclear fuel) only based on warehousing in pools (or under water) or on dry warehousing. Thus both warehousing concepts have been examined as they exist in France and abroad, along with their safety challenges. After a presentation of some contextual aspects (fuels used in the French nuclear fleet, strategies implemented in France and abroad for spent fuel management, stages of fuel management in France), this report state some generalities about storage facilities. Then, the authors address underwater storage with a description of the different concepts, a discussion of safety functions, a presentation of on-site and centralised underwater storage practices, a discussion of stakes and limiting factors of underwater storage. The next part addresses dry storage with descriptions of its different concepts (in blockhouse or in wells, in silo, in packagings) applied either in an on-site or in a centralised way. Stakes and limiting factors are as well discussed