(Just The News)−A growing number of energy companies are looking to nuclear recycling as a way to address waste management concerns while strengthening domestic fuel supply.
Ed McGinnis, the former assistant secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy told the Joint Natural Resources and & Environment committee that by recycling spent nuclear fuel, the United States can dramatically reduce waste, increase energy security, and create high-paying jobs.
McGinnis is also the CEO of Curio, a nuclear technology firm, and has partnered with major U.S. utilities to explore the feasibility of recycling the massive stockpile of spent nuclear fuel currently sitting in storage. According to McGinnis, this process could reduce waste volumes to just 3% to 4% of the original material while extracting valuable resources.
Curio hopes to help revive America’s nuclear energy capacity with its recycling process. By reprocessing spent uranium fuel, the company can extract plutonium, which McGinnis touts as a superior energy source due to its higher power density and reduced weight requirements.
“You can get a reactor that’s a third the size of a uranium-based reactor,” McGinnis said, adding that without recycling, plutonium remains locked within spent fuel and inaccessible for future energy production.
A major impediment to nuclear cost-effectiveness is the current waste model. Nuclear waste is stored onsite and is managed by utilities, like Entergy, and doesn’t leave any room for recycling and can be a ratepayer burden.
U.S. nuclear power plants store their spent fuel by first cooling it in pools for several years before transferring it to reinforced concrete dry casks. These casks, sitting on storage pads near reactors, were meant to be temporary until the federal government retrieved the waste — a process that was supposed to start in 1997 but never materialized.
“That is what triggered the lawsuits by utilities to recoup taxpayers’ money,” McGinnis said.
Jody Montelaro, Entergy’s vice president of public affairs, said that the U.S. Department of Energy is currently reimbursing Entergy for the storage costs. Curio aims to change the current process by recycling spent fuel, extracting valuable materials, and reducing waste to just 3% to 4% of its original volume, which McGinnis says the federal government could handle much easier.
While McGinnis acknowledged that federal regulations remain a challenge, he added that there is “a lane to go forward” and are already working with utilities. The main hurdles are state and local approvals, as well as public communication to ensure communities understand the benefits.
“This is not your grandfather’s reactor,” McGinnis said. “These are state-of-the-art, environmentally friendly, and economically robust solutions.”
Curio’s proposed facilities, expected to be operational within five to seven years, are projected to generate over 3,000 jobs, the majority of which will be trade-based positions with salaries ranging from $80,000 to $140,000 per year.
“These are generational jobs,” McGinnis emphasized.
The facility is estimated to generate more than $400 million annually in direct tax revenue, further contributing to local economies. Notably, Curio has pledged not to seek Louisiana’s Industrial Tax Exemption Program, a tax exemption offered to most large-scale industrial projects.
Beyond job creation and waste reduction, McGinnis highlights Curio’s partnerships with four national laboratories and industry leaders such as Orano, the world’s largest nuclear recycler. Orano, which operates major recycling facilities in France, has designated Curio as its lead recycling partner in the U.S.
The U.S. is largely reliant on foreign-supplied nuclear fuel, with major sources including Russia, Canada and Kazakhstan, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. EIA notes that the U.S. has nuclear fuel production capacity insufficient for domestic needs, with domestic mining now accounting for about 5% of the fuel used in U.S. reactors.
Louisiana, home to one of the nation’s largest and oldest nuclear fleets, stands to benefit significantly from Curio’s model. The state’s existing infrastructure, transportation corridors, and workforce make it a strong candidate for future nuclear investment.
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
But even as it seems nearly impossible to make a living, there are blessings that should not be disregarded. By highlighting strong sponsors who share our America First worldview, we have been able to make lifelong connections and even a bit of revenue to help us along. This is why we enjoy symbiotic relationships with companies like MyPillow, Jase Medical, and Promised Grounds. We help them with our recommendations and they reward us with money when our audience buys from them.
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Even our faith-driven precious metals sponsor helps us tremendously while also helping Americans protect their life’s savings. We are blessed to work with them.
Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
