France has about 30 nuclear generating plants and they reprocess their fuel. Why do we in the U.S.not do this

Question

this, instead accepting all the problems of long-term storage a spent fuel rods??

Answer 1

Pure economics, it costs too much to reprocess and has a zero payback.

If you could openly market reprocessed fuel rods.... different story.

Answer 2

Because politicians who are opposed to nuclear power completely block any legislation which could conceivably make nuclear power more practical.  They see it as a slippery slope--if they allow reprocessing, then next thing you know we'll be extending the operating lives of old plants and building new ones.  They just want nuclear power to go away.

Sooner or later, we'll have to process all the waste.  it's inevitable.  But in the meantime, it will just sit in barrels on site where it is produced.