How and where is nuclear waste stored in the US?

Photo: Dry spent fuel casks on concrete pad at a nuclear power plant site – November 15, 2007. Photo credit: Nuclear Regulatory Commission via Flickr. Photo Usage Guidelines. Article by Gerald Frankel. The Conversation – April 14, 2025.

Around the U.S., about 90,000 tons of nuclear waste is stored at over 100 sites in 39 states, in a range of different structures and containers. For decades, the nation has been trying to send it all to one secure location. A 1987 federal law named Yucca Mountain, in Nevada, as a permanent disposal site for nuclear waste – but political and legal challenges led to construction delays. Work on the site had barely started before Congress ended the project’s funding altogether in 2011. […]

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