Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers has approved the state economic programme for the management of used nuclear fuel until 2025, which will end the need to export it to Russia. This government decision was announced on 11 August by Prime Minister Denis Shmygal. "The programme was developed on the basis of a profile directive of the European Union, and its main goal is safety in the nuclear energy sector, as well as the energy independence of Ukraine," he wrote in his Telegram channel.

The key point of the programme, he said, is the construction and operation in the exclusion zone of the Centralised Storage Facility for Spent Nuclear Fuel (CSFSF) which will take used fuel from the Rovno, South-Ukraine and Khmelnitsky NPPs. "Prior to that, Ukraine exported used nuclear fuel from its three nuclear power plants to Russia, and this cost Energoatom about $200 million annually. Now these funds can be directed to the technological development of our nuclear power plants," he explained.