Orano - Annual Activity Report 2025 192 4 SUSTAINABILITY STATEMENT Environmental information 4.2.5.3 Innovating to preserve resources and protect health Orano has placed the preservation of its resources at the core of its corporate purpose, with a strong focus on product and service innovation. Policies and actions relating to circularity in products and services Orano has always been a player in the circular economy throughout the nuclear fuel cycle by: ● designing and operating spent fuel processing and recycling plants; ● optimizing the use of its products to limit the use of raw materials and preserve the work and energy that went into producing them; ● by using its innovation and R&D skills to develop new activities around circularity. On the strength of this experience, Orano not only reinforces this conduct for its current activities but also studies services, processes, and solutions to extend this strategy to other fields of activity in which Orano has a legitimate claim. These guidelines are part of the group’s strategy, validated by the Chief Executive Officer, who monitors its proper execution. 50 years of expertise in resource recycling As the world leader in processing and recycling, Orano relies on its recognized expertise to provide its customers with efficient, safe, and responsible management of spent nuclear fuel. Orano retrieves recoverable materials (uranium and plutonium) from spent fuel to recycle them and manufacture new fuels, such as MOX, for nuclear reactors. Recycling can retrieve up to 96% recoverable material from spent nuclear fuel: 1% plutonium and 95% uranium. The remaining 4% are fission products, i.e. non-recoverable final waste. This first stage is carried out in the Orano la Hague plant. In a second stage, Orano produces a recycled fuel, i.e. MOX. MOX fuel is used to supply nuclear power plants (France, Japan, the Netherlands). Depending on customer requirements, the assembly that combines plutonium and depleted uranium contains between 3% and 12% plutonium. In France, 10% of nuclear electricity is currently produced using MOX fuel, i.e. almost 8% of electricity (all sources combined). The proportion of nuclear electricity generated from recycled materials could increase to 25% with the recycling of uranium contained in spent fuel (MOX). This figure could technically reach 30% thanks to MOX 2, a new type of fuel that will enable the multirecycling of nuclear fuels. Within this same recycling process, the group places special importance on the responsible use of materials and consumables used in operations. Through the processes of extracting and separating recyclable materials (uranium and plutonium) in la Hague, chemicals that are used during the operations (in particular nitric acid and solvents) are recovered and reused. R&D focused on the preservation of resources and health All of the group’s developments are supported by a Research and Development policy to support its long-term commercial and technological positioning, in compliance with applicable regulations, directives and processes, in the areas with the highest development potential. At December 31, 2025, Research and Development expenses amounted to 212 million euros, i.e. 4% of the period’s revenue, up from 2024. Studies cover projects in the fields of nuclear and medical R&D and the recovery of strategic metals. Around 70% of R&D efforts focus on low-carbon activities or products. Orano works with the ecosystem of players, in France and abroad, who develop new concepts for nuclear reactors such as Small Modular Reactors (SMR), Advanced Modular Reactors (AMR), and Molten Salt Reactors (MSR), in response to global low-carbon energy needs and for even safer nuclear power. This innovative molten salt reactor technology using fast-spectrum chlorides would make it possible to use, as fuel, both the plutonium contained in the spent fuel from the current fleet of 3rd generation reactors, but also materials contained in spent fuel and considered until now as waste (minor actinides). They would thus make it possible to reduce the volume and radiotoxicity of nuclear waste. Coupling this technology with the recycling of uranium and plutonium in light-water reactors already in use in some countries, via the processing of spent fuel in a plant such as Orano la Hague, would enable us to go even further in terms of safety, material recovery, and nuclear waste reduction. Orano does not design reactors but aims to support the ecosystem of start-ups developing these new MSR-type reactor concepts, supplying them with a fuel whose properties will enable a satisfactory level of safety and a competitive production cost to be achieved, while providing engineering, transport, casking, management of their spent fuel, etc. Orano also wants to provide them with a unique experience in the design and operation of chemical industrial facilities, to accelerate the emergence by 2030 of this new innovative nuclear industry that can reduce the volume and radiotoxicity of nuclear waste. Business innovation to accelerate the group’s growth: inventing the value creation models of tomorrow The group uses its unique skills, world-renowned expertise, cutting-edge technologies, and materials to explore and develop new models in the following areas: circular economy of rare and strategic resources, transition and modernization of industrial models, control, and reduction of the impact of complex materials, health ecosystems, carbon neutrality, and reduction of the environmental footprint. A portfolio of potential new activities is being developed with a view to: ● developing services based on usage, such as DN30 nuclear material transport casking, which is offered for lease to electric utility customers rather than for sale. In 2025, the development of the sharing group for DN30 casking continued, moving from marketing to the ramp-up of operations;
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NzMxNTcx