Policy and licensing / Brazil

Brazil: SMR policy and licensing

Selected federal, state, territory, and national measures whose official text was opened. This is not a complete list of laws, rules or programmes for any jurisdiction. A jurisdiction without a page here is not a finding that it has no policy, and these pages do not rate or prefer any jurisdiction. Nothing here implies that a project is eligible for, or approved under, any measure.

Laws, rules and executive directives

• Brazil: Federal Constitution art. 225 § 6, location of nuclear power plants defined by federal law · In effect
  Constituição da República Federativa do Brasil de 1988, art. 225, § 6º (read with art. 21, XXIII, a, and art. 49, XIV) · Assembleia Nacional Constituinte (Federal Constitution of 1988) · affects: Siting
  Brazil's 1988 Constitution requires that power plants operating with a nuclear reactor have their location defined in federal law before they can be installed, and makes all nuclear activity subject to National Congress approval within a Union monopoly over nuclear installations and ores. It designates no site itself.
  Not approved or pending: No federal law defining the location of any new nuclear power plant was reviewed, and none is recorded here. Pending constitutional amendment proposals on the nuclear monopoly or on state consent to plant siting were not verified. Whether a given SMR or microreactor needs a siting law is not established.
• Brazil: Law 14.222/2021 creating the National Nuclear Safety Authority (ANSN) · In effect
  Lei nº 14.222, de 15 de outubro de 2021, Diário Oficial da União de 18 de outubro de 2021 · Congresso Nacional (sanctioned by the President of the Republic) · affects: National reactor licensing, Licensing review fees
  Brazil's Law 14.222/2021 split the National Nuclear Safety Authority (ANSN) from CNEN and gives it competence to issue licences and authorisations for site selection, construction, commissioning, operation and decommissioning of nuclear installations. Most provisions take effect with the decree approving ANSN's structure. It licenses no reactor itself.
  Not approved or pending: Establishes no licence for any project. The compiled current texts of this Act and of Law 6.189/1974 were unreachable, so later amendments are not verified; Decree 11.142/2022 (named by ANSN as approving its regimental structure) was not read, so the date the deferred provisions took effect is not recorded; ANSN regulatory norms were not reviewed.

Bills, proposed rules and consultations

• None recorded in this pilot.

Funding and support programmes

• None recorded in this pilot.

Recorded applications and decisions for tracked projects and designs in Brazil

Project and design permissions are separate from the general measures above.

Construction applications and decisions

• Reported IEN request to construct the UCRI critical unit — UCRI critical unit for the Brazilian microreactor programme at IEN
  Construction permission sought · Application received · ANSN · submitted 2 Dec 2025
  CNEN reports an IEN letter to ANSN dated 2 December 2025 seeking construction permission and use of Argonauta facilities for the critical experiment. This is a reported submission; the letter, acceptance and a permission decision are not recorded.
  Sources: CNEN: reported licensing request for the UCRI critical unit

What this review has read for Brazil

As of 18 Oct 2026. Bounded review concluded with access gaps. A bounded review of three national source classes, not a complete list of laws, rules or programmes. Coverage for every reviewed country.

• Controlling reactor licensing framework: Evidence read. Law 14.222/2021 was read in its original Diário Oficial text in the Senate legislation database together with the ANSN legal-basis page; the Planalto compiled texts of this law and of Law 6.189/1974 refused connections, so later amendments are not verified.
• Siting restrictions or rules: Evidence read. Articles 225 § 6, 21 XXIII and 49 XIV of the Federal Constitution were read in the Supreme Federal Court's annotated compilation; no federal law locating a new nuclear plant and no pending amendment proposal was reviewed.
• Directly relevant support measures: Access blocked. The MCTI and FINEP website searches returned pages whose results did not render without scripts, so no official SMR or microreactor funding text was opened; press reports of a June 2025 MCTI and FINEP subsidy contract for microreactor technologies remain unmatched to an official document.

Sources read (5):

• legis.senado.leg.br/norma/35051463/publicacao/35051906 · checked 2026-10-18
• www.gov.br/ansn/pt-br/acesso-a-informacao/base-juridica-da-estrutura-organi… · checked 2026-10-18
• portal.stf.jus.br/constituicao-supremo/artigo.asp?abrirBase=CF&abrirArtigo=225 · checked 2026-10-18
• portal.stf.jus.br/constituicao-supremo/artigo.asp?abrirBase=CF&abrirArtigo=21 · checked 2026-10-18
• portal.stf.jus.br/constituicao-supremo/artigo.asp?abrirBase=CF&abrirArtigo=49 · checked 2026-10-18

Sources that could not be read (4):

• www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/_ato2019-2022/2021/lei/L14222.htm · checked 2026-10-18 · not readable: Remote end closed connection without response; WebFetch ECONNRESET. The original text was read from the Senate legislation database instead.
• www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/leis/l6189.htm · checked 2026-10-18 · not readable: Remote end closed connection without response (three attempts, https and http); WebFetch fallback on the Planalto L14222 page returned ECONN
• www.gov.br/mcti/pt-br/search?SearchableText=microrreatores · checked 2026-10-18 · not readable: Page loaded but search results did not render without scripts.
• www.finep.gov.br/busca?searchword=microrreator&searchphrase=all · checked 2026-10-18 · not readable: Redirected to /search; page loaded but no results rendered without scripts.