For more than 30 years, Connecticut Yankee has stored its used nuclear fuel assemblies in a spent fuel pool located on the plant site. The fuel will remain stored at the site until the Department of Energy (DOE) meets its legal obligation to remove it.

After an extensive analyses and comparison of fuel pool and dry cask storage, CY chose the dry cask option for storing its 1019 spent fuel assemblies.  The location for the new fuel storage facility, which is on CY's 500-plus acre NRC-licensed property about three-quarters of a mile from the reactor site, was selected from eight carefully researched areas.

The passive nature of dry cask storage is less costly to electric ratepayers who fund CY's decommissioning and fuel storage activities, and the NAC-MPC fuel storage and transport system chosen by CY will prepare the fuel for eventual shipment to a federal facility.

The secluded location of the dry fuel storage facility is tucked in a slight valley between natural ridgelines and out of sight of nearby rivers. 

Construction of the reinforced concrete storage pad and vertical concrete and steel storage containers that hold the fuel was completed in 2002. Transferring the fuel from wet to dry storage  began in the first quarter of 2004 and was completed March 30, 2005 (shown above).