RU Rosatom completes the first-ever program for operation of nuclear fuel with minor actinides - For the first time in history, humanity has successfully experimented in burning away hazardous nuclear waste with a half-lifetime of over 2,000,000+ years into electricity

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Beloyarsk Nuclear Power Plant, Zarechny (near Yekaterinburg), Sverdlovsk Oblast, Russia Hosts the BN-600 (right) and the BN-800 reactors (center), the only two commercially operational breeder reactors in the world as of 2026. A breeder reactor uses fissile material (nuclear fuel), in this case, weapons-grade plutonium (P-239), to generate even more P-239.​	Worker checking fuel assemblies for the BN-800 reactor. Three fuel assemblies had only minor actinides (hazardous nuclear waste such as neptunium-237, which has a half-life of over two millions years), the rest of the fuel assemblies use mixed oxide (MOX) fuel, which basically consists of the fissile material P-239 with non-hazardous uranium nuclear waste.​	The BN-800 reactor (which burns the minor actinides). The products of burning the minor actinides are fission products (hazardous waste that is now only 30-100 years old), plutonium P-238 (not weapons-grade, but a good power generator for satellites), electricity, and neutrons. Studies are being prepared on how much the actinides are burned away that determines how effective the system is to be used industry-wide.​

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22 April 2026 | Link (Rosatom article in English, archives don't work) | Link (TVEL article, in Russian) | Archive (TVEL article archived through GhostArchive)

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Unit 4 of Rosatom’s Beloyarsk NPP has successfully completed the world’s first program of pilot operation in a commercial reactor of uranium-plutonium MOX fuel with the addition of so-called minor actinides – the most radiotoxic and long-lived components from spent nuclear fuel.

Three trial fuel assemblies containing americium-241 and neptunium-237 were loaded into the BN-800 fast neutron reactor core in the summer of 2024. Since that time, they have successfully undergone a full cycle of operation across three fuel micro-campaigns. After cooling in the spent fuel pool, the irradiated assemblies will be dispatched for post-irradiation studies.

The utilization of minor actinides through "burning" in power reactors is a key element in the development of fourth-generation nuclear power industry. These elements - neptunium, americium, and curium - make-up a small share of spent fuel mass, but contribute heavily more to its radioactive toxicity and residual heat release. Isotopes of minor actinides are extremely long-lived (half-lives reaching hundreds of thousands of years), and it is their presence that determines the duration and conditions for radwaste isolation from the environment.

As part of closing nuclear fuel cycle, Rosatom has already gained experience in re-involving regenerated uranium and the major actinide - plutonium - back into the nuclear fuel cycle. However, it is precisely the extraction from SNF and subsequent utilization of "minors" that can resolve the principal environmental challenges associated with radioactive waste management. According to scientists, eliminating minor actinides could achieve radiation equivalence between the original uranium feedstock and the nuclear waste destined for isolation hundreds of times faster. In the long term, this will significantly reduce both the volume and range of radioactive waste requiring deep geological disposal.

The most efficient method for minor actinide utilization is "burning" in a nuclear reactor. The technologies which are currently under developed in Russia, would enable burning of minors in several ways. In particular, fast neutron reactors are suitable for this purpose as they provide transmutation of minor actinides into more stable or short-lived isotopes. Russia has advanced expertise in such installations: over 40 years of operation with the BN-600 at Beloyarsk NPP, as well as the world’s most powerful fast reactor, BN-800, which has been in commercial operation since 2016. Furthermore, at Beloyarsk NPP, construction is planned for the first serial high-capacity fast reactor, BN-1200M.

"Burning minor actinides in a commercial reactor is not a one-off experiment, but a long-term strategy. Before scaling this solution to an industrial level, we are demonstrating the very technological feasibility, that this idea actually works. At the next stage, we intend to increase the content of minor actinides in trial oxide MOX fuel assemblies. In addition, we plan to add minor actinides to nitride uranium-plutonium fuel for fast reactors, and also to test heterogeneous burning of 'minors.' In this case, minor actinides are not 'blended' into uranium-plutonium fuel matrix, but are placed in separate fuel rods or assemblies, which will be installed in specific zones of the reactor," commented Alexander Ugryumov, Senior Vice President for Research and Development at TVEL (the managing company of Rosatom's Fuel Division).

"We expect that the quantity of minor actinides included in the fuel matrix will be substantially reduced, but this will be confirmed by further post-irradiation studies. These results would confirm the concept of minor actinides burning technology and define its role and significance within the balanced fuel cycle. It is anticipated to reduce the amount of radioactive waste for final isolation multiple times. The fourth-generation power units will contribute to enhancing the environmental safety and energy potential of nuclear power by allowing the use of spent fuel instead of its storage. Over approximately 60 years of operation, such installations will be capable of utilizing about four tons of minor actinides, which is more than several thermal reactors can produce," noted Yuri Nosov, Director of Beloyarsk NPP.

The qualification program for MOX fuel with minor actinides is being conducted in strict coordination with the Federal Service for Environmental, Technological, and Nuclear Supervision (Rostekhnadzor), which has confirmed the safety of operating these innovative assemblies.

Reference​

• Minor actinides are a group of transuranic elements formed in nuclear fuel during reactor operation, excluding plutonium. The principal minor actinides include neptunium, americium, and curium. These elements do not occur naturally and are produced solely as a result of nuclear reactions. Minor actinides are characterized by high radioactivity and toxicity, as well as the presence of isotopes with long half-lives, which makes them hazardous components of radioactive waste.
• Generation IV Energy Systems refer to a new generation of nuclear energy systems that incorporate a range of technologies unified by a common outcome: significantly higher fuel utilization efficiency, enhanced safety, improved energy efficiency, and a reduction in the volume of spent nuclear fuel, among other benefits (according to the classification adopted by the IAEA). The deployment of such systems is capable of fundamentally transforming the nuclear power industry, primarily through a new level of safety, an expanded fuel nomenclature, and a substantial reduction in radioactive waste. Russia is one of the global leaders in the development of Generation IV technologies: pre-design work has commenced at the Beloyarsk NPP for the construction of the BN-1200M power unit, and in the Tomsk region, for the first time in world practice, a nuclear power plant with the BREST-OD-300 reactor and an on-site closed nuclear fuel cycle are being created on a single site.
• Fast Neutron Reactors are a type of nuclear reactor in which the coolant is not water but liquid metal. The key advantage of such reactors is their ability to efficiently utilize secondary products of the fuel cycle (in particular, plutonium) for energy production. Moreover, due to their high breeding ratio, fast reactors can generate more potential fuel than they consume, as well as "burn up" (i.e., utilize for energy generation) highly active transuranic elements (actinides). For comparison, in thermal neutron reactors, which form the basis of modern nuclear power, only about 1 % of uranium is utilized, while the remaining 99 % is sent for interim storage or disposed of as radioactive waste.

 

[The Punished Mitch]

I really hope this winds up being legit. A provable way to draw down nuclear waste, in any form, is a good step forward.

Hopefully this leads to some more favorable politics around nuclear in the West.

It won't. The general impoverishment of the Western world is a feature not a bug. Aliens could gift us unlimited clean energy and you would still be expected to eat the bugs and live in the rented and shared coffin apartment.

 

[The Cheese Aisle]

What kinds of emissions are generated from this waste being burned?

 

[Disdainer of the Plebs]

Cool that they’re doing this, but given Russia’s track record with nuclear safety, I have concerns.

that's actually a photo from some of the early work done at Mayak

Ah, yes Mayak! The Russian Los Alamos. The very place that had many of the aforementioned nuclear incidents, (one being the third worst in history, after Chernobyl and Fukushima, nobody knows how many really happened because Beria had all the witnesses shot) and home to the most radiologically polluted place on earth, Lake Karachay.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayak

What kinds of emissions are generates from this waste being burned?

It’s not being literally burned like you would burn coal. They’re using the neutrons produced by by fissioning plutonium to break apart the waste material into shorter lived or less/non radioactive elements and isotopes.

 

[AN/ALR56]

Will it release along the T-14 tank and SU-57 that will win the Ukraine war any day now?
If it wasn't Russia I might even believe it.

Would be cool if actually true, but until reproduced elsewhere: DOUBT

SU-57s is bombarding ukraine with cruise missiles since 2024 at least.

https://united24media.com/latest-news/russia-arms-su-57-with-new-naval-zircon-class-missile-a-hypersonic-threat-no-one-can-stop-10428

T-14 is useless in ukraine when most of the tanks are now used as mobile artillery, there is no advantage to it, a T-55 with a drone spotter to lob artillery on a ukrainian trench is just as good and 10x cheaper.

 

[Male Idiot]

Now only if Germany did the sane thing and buried the hatchet with Russia and got this cool thing to save the eu exonomy by going nuclear.... oh lol nooo.

 

[Otterly]

If we hadn’t been completely neutered by the so called green lobby we could be doing this right now. We could have cheap abundant power, which would mean we could massively increase our food security (greenhouses) and heavy industry.
All these so called environmentalists - they make things a million times worse. I am a certified tree-hugging nature lover, I am very very much for genuine environmentalism, and I detest how issues like this have been used. Nuclear power is the future (unless the zero point stuff works bit it’s basically sci fi right now.)
‘Oh bit the waste we bury!’ You mean like the fucking windmill blades? Windmills destroy an area - they create a huge updraft that sucks the moisture out of rhe soil and destroys it. They can’t be dismantled and recycled. They’re a blot on the landscape and they massacre wildlife. The current year ‘environmentalist’ lobby should all the turned Into (non peat based) compost
Regarding ‘why actinides are bad mmmkay’ @Diana Moon Glampers i am wracking my brain but i am sure I’ve read they have some weird effects in the body. They have a long half life so it’s not that they’re going to fry you instantly, but the do other things.
I think they have the usual heavy metal toxicity but also stuff on top of that. I think I remember something about it being a combination of them ending up in the body for almost life, and some weird binding properties to specific molecules or something . I’ll go look it up so I’m not spouting too much rubbish.

 

[SCV]

I've been screaming this into the void for years and years now. The amount of "nuclear waste" as most people conceptualize it (that is, glowing green goop from the simpsons intro) is minuscule and you can reprocess that to get 95% back so only 5% is actual "waste". People just deliberatly call the napkins used in the break room at the nuclear plant "low level nuclear waste" to scare idiots. And the real "waste" can also be dealt by making more energy. We could've had this shit in the 80's after france when full nuclear if they had only continued pushing forward and the rest of the west got on board.

But no. Muh Chernobyl. Muh 3 mile island. Green retards aka useful idiots (which are actually funded by Russia in some cases unlike whatever the Dems are screeching about this week) can't internalize that nuclear power doesn't produce CO2, doesn't have intermittency issues, and including disasters (yes, even Chernobyl) has released less radiation per kw/h than coal. Instead Russia a shithole that has been at war since this project started are the ones making progress. Fucking shameful.

You might say that's not that big of a deal. But even now electricity in france is cheap (and would be much cheaper if they didn't sell it to other countries with retarded greens in power) and they have a super low CO2 output. You might say... so what? Well I am entirely convinced everything would just be better at a civilizational level if energy was cheap and abundant. In an impossible-to-overstate way.

I'm just going to rattle off some examples from the top of my head if energy was "too cheap to meter".
-All water shortages solved because the problem with desalinization is the energy cost.
-Everything that's worse because it needs to save power instantly isn't. Headaches, sleep disruption and bad CRI from your LED bulbs? They're sitll incandecent. "But they heat up your house in the summer" I hear you say. So turn up the AC, it doesn't matter!
-Induction roadways are foolish because they have like 10% efficency and need to power millions of cars? Who cares! Do it! (don't there are other reasons this is retarded)
-Recycling a lot of things is hard / not profitable. Just fucking vaporize everything into plasma. You have the power, literally.
-Think we put too much CO2 into the air and want to reverse it? Great! Spend all that energy making hydrocarbons out of water and CO2 in the air and pump it back into the ground! Divert a little for the cars.
-Even without anything new cheap energy makes everything cheaper. The aluminum smelter costs less to run. From-air-deasel for farming, construction, and anything that uses heavy machinery is almost free. Shipping things much cheaper. EVERYTHING is cheaper.
-All the incredible shit that would've been invented with 40 years of uber cheap power I can't even imagine.
Your rant here

 

[Otterly]

All the incredible shit that would've been invented with 40 years of uber cheap power I can't even imagine.

Sorry, that sounds too much like human freedom.

 

[Stoneheart]

Sorry, that sounds too much like human freedom.

trump will save us with his Fusion company-

 

[MadStan]

Nuclear reactors cost a lot of money, and take a long time to build. Nuclear power generation is primarily driven by private investment. By and large there is little to argue with in terms of the viability of the planet investing in nuclear, but to put it into perspective, the cost to completely make the planet nuclear powered is more than investing in renewables too.

The primary barrier is the will for private investment to see a lesser ROI than other investments. Example: Would you take an ROI of 5% PA over and ROI of 7% PA over 20 years? Most wouldn't.

I'd support a global effort to see governments write a check to secure global power generation but if they do that, then you'll thwart private research and investment. It is a tricky subject, but ironically, almost everyone will agree a secure source of energy is a brilliant thing to have, its just how to do it that most can accept.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Israel and Saudi Arabia, who give us absolutely nothing

Israel has a ton of inventions in medical, agricultural and hi-tech fields.

 

[regalterry]

What kinds of emissions are generated from this waste being burned?

Leftist screams.

Israel has a ton of inventions in medical, agricultural and hi-tech fields.

Yes, we are all aware you harvest organs and fetuses, steal land and technology.

 

[Guiron]

Now only if Germany did the sane thing and buried the hatchet with Russia and got this cool thing to save the eu exonomy by going nuclear.... oh lol nooo.

Germany seriously dropped the ball when it came to abandoning nuclear; the reports of barges full of coal rumbling down rivers to power stations because they didn't have enough fossil fuels to meet demand after the nuclear plants shut were as amusing as they were disappointing.

But yeah, news like this is genuinely cool stuff - if it can be scaled up, it will eliminate one of the last major obstacles to making nuclear energy 100% sustainable. I'll be keeping an eye on this, as I'm sure it will be experimented on, expanded and improved over the next few years or so.

 

[NoReturn]

What kinds of emissions are generated from this waste being burned?

It sends out anti-aging particles so eventually people working in the space are all walking around in oversized lab coats and too-big hardhats.

 

[The Cheese Aisle]

It’s not being literally burned like you would burn coal. They’re using the neutrons produced by by fissioning plutonium to break apart the waste material into shorter lived or less/non radioactive elements and isotopes.

Oh, neat, thank you. My knowledge of nuclear stuff is basically watch hour long youtube videos of the blue glowy thing happen from cleaning out reactors to which my reaction is always "cool".

 

[Snekposter]

Oh, neat, thank you. My knowledge of nuclear stuff is basically watch hour long youtube videos of the blue glowy thing happen from cleaning out reactors to which my reaction is always "cool".

Atomic physics is the closest you'll ever get to alchemical transmutation. Its incredibly neat stuff when you actually dig down into it.

 

[Falcos_Commisar]

So, theoretically, this could solve the energy crisis AND get rid of nuclear waste?

Hot damn, that's fucking awesome.

Breeder reactors have been a thing for decades.

 

[nelly98]

Russians are built for

americium

 

[Tealeaf]

Nuclear reactors cost a lot of money, and take a long time to build.

no they don't. Nuclear reactors are remarkably simple and just boil water. Steam turbine generators are how most power gets churned into the grid. Hell you could just reuse existing turbines from gas, oil and coal plants with a cheeky nuke boiler. Co2 free in 3 years.

Nukes are expensive because of pandering to the idiot hysteria that prevents doing cheap and effective power plants around technically simple reactors.

 

[Ly Erg]

‘Oh bit the waste we bury!’ You mean like the fucking windmill blades? Windmills destroy an area - they create a huge updraft that sucks the moisture out of rhe soil and destroys it. They can’t be dismantled and recycled.

From what I've read so far on the subject is that there possibly has been some sort of idea on the development on being able to recycle blades? I know there has been ideas thrown around at the very least repurposing them for other stuff. However looking it up I'm getting mixed results on how long the blades last and it's all just over the place to get a proper estimate.

The rest you stated is already known however, most current day environmentalists don't really give a shit about it.