Nuclear facilities in Iran

Iran's nuclear program comprises a number of nuclear facilities, including nuclear reactors and various nuclear fuel cycle facilities.

Anarak Anarak, near Yazd, has a nuclear waste storage site.

Arak

The Arak area in northwestern Iran has several industrial complexes, some with ties to the nuclear program, in particular the IR-40 reactor under construction and a heavy water (aka deuterium oxide D2O) production plant, both nearby to the north-west of the city of Arak. In the late 1990s, one of these complexes may have manufactured a high-explosive test chamber transferred to Parchin, which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has asked to visit. The Arak area is also thought to hold factories capable of producing high-strength aluminum rotors for IR-1 centrifuges. The design of the reactor in Arak is very similar to those used to make plutonium-239 for the production of nuclear weapons, and the reactor itself was said to have been capable of producing enough plutonium for two nuclear weapons per year. Arak was one of the two sites exposed by a spokesman for the People's Mujahedin of Iran in 2002. In August 2006, Iran announced the inauguration of the Arak plant for the production of heavy water. According to Iran this reactor is intended to replace the life-expired 1967 Tehran Nuclear Research Center research reactor, mainly involved in the production of radioisotopes for medical and agricultural purposes. The spent fuel of the reactor contains plutonium suitable for making the core of a nuclear bomb; which would be lighter, cheaper and more powerful that than that made of highly enriched uranium. In 2009, Iran granted the IAEA access to the facility, but did not allow them to see its detailed plans, thereby keeping its purpose unclear. It was assessed by the P5+1, charged with negotiating with Iran over their nuclear program, that the completed reactor was capable of producing 9–10 kg of weapons-grade plutonium, enough for up to two nuclear weapons, annually. Between 2011 and November 2013 the IAEA was denied access to the heavy water plant which had become operational. In 2014, under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the Arak reactor was to be redesigned and deemed incapable of producing large amounts of weapons grade plutonium. This was to be achieved by modifying the calandria, a metal lattice which holds specialized tubes that contain the fuel assemblies and allow the heavy water to go through them, holding natural uranium fuel which is best suited to produce weapons-grade plutonium. The modification involved filling the tubes with cement and installing a newly designed core that would not operate on natural uranium. The new design would operate on low-enriched uranium and would allow the reactor the continued production of radio isotopes for medical purposes without making weapons-grade plutonium as a by-product. In January 2016, Iran reported that they had removed the original calandria from the core of the reactor, but Iranian officials stated that only the "cavities, and not its heart" had been filled with concrete. Also in January 2016, Iran propagated a photo-shopped image of the reactor completely filled with cement, even though it had explicitly refused to carry out such an action, and this caused great confusion as to what had been done. Despite the preventative procedures, in February, and again in November of that same year, Iran exceeded its allowed limit of stockpiled heavy water. Iran also transferred over 80 metric tonnes of Heavy Water beyond its borders to Oman, thereby maintaining control over these resources without technically breaching the agreement. In 2017, the facility was renamed the Khondab Heavy Water Research Reactor. In January 2019, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI), Ali Akbar Salehi gave an interview on Iran’s Channel 4 TV in which he stated that Iran had covertly imported a second set of tubes, identical to those which were filled with cement, allowing Iran to build a duplicate of the original calandria for the Arak reactor. Iran notified the IAEA that it intended to bring the reactor online in 2026. On 19 June 2025, the site was hit in an Israeli air strike which ensured that Arak could not again be usable for nuclear development. On 27 March 2026, the facility was again hit in an Israeli air strike.

Ardakan The possible existence of a nuclear-related facility near Ardakan (also spelled Ardekan or Erdekan) was first reported in July 2003, by the National Council of Resistance of Iran. In September 2003, Mohammad Ghannadi-Maragheh, Vice President for Nuclear Fuel Production of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), said that the facility was a uranium mill, with an annual capacity of 120,000 metric tonnes of ore and an annual output of 50 metric tons of uranium. Iran told the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that the facility would be hot tested July 2004, producing 40 to 50 kg of Yellowcake, but as of 2008 Iran had provided no further information to the IAEA on its operation. In March 2026, the Ardakan yellowcake production plant was damaged in an Israeli airstrike.

Bonab

The Atomic Energy Research Center at Bonab is investigating the applications of nuclear technology in agriculture. It is run by the AEOI.

Bushehr

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