Combination of physical and chemical separating procedures through which uranium and plutonium (in the form of chemical compounds) are retrieved from spent fuel elements and the high-radioactive waste is separated. On a large technical scale mainly the so-called PUREX method is used for reprocessing (Plutonium Uranium Reduction Extraction Method).

Between 1971 and 1990, in Germany,spent fuel elements were reprocessed for test purposes in a pilot plant (Karlsruhe reprocessing plant, WAK). Reprocessing operations were discontinued at the end of 1990. The facility was decommissioned andis presently being dismantled.