The WNA reported in late 2024 that the USA ranks 14th in the world for the currently known uranium resources in the category up to $130/kgU ($50/lb U3O8), with 59,400 tU (reasonably assured resources, 2021), about 1% of world total. In the 1950s, the USA had a great deal of uranium mining, promoted by federal subsidies.
Peak production since 1970 was 16,800 tU in 1980, when there were over 250 mines in operation. This abruptly dropped to 50 in 1984 when 5,700 tU was produced, and then there was a steady decline to 2003, by which time there were only two small operations producing a total of under 1000 tU/yr, or about 5% of the uranium consumed by US nuclear plants. So, for the first step in the nuclear fuel cycle, the US must rely on imports of uranium from countries such as Canada and Australia. For some time the country's reactors also used downblended weapons-grade uranium from Russia (see section on Military surplus and other government stocks below).
As the price of uranium increased from historic lows, there was a revival in exploration and plans to reopen old mines. Exploration expenditure increased over 2007-08 to $50.3 million, but then dropped again with uranium prices. Since 2022, exploration activity has increased again, and decisions have been made to restart many mines.
Most US production has been from New Mexico and Wyoming. Some 40% of resources are in New Mexico and amenable to in-situ leaching (ISL). Resources on the western Colorado Plateau require conventional mining and milling, as does high-grade breccia pipe mineralization in northwest Arizona. Smaller resources are in Utah, Nebraska and Texas. Production potential is about 50% underground mining, 26% open pit and 24% ISL.
In mid-2009, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued a generic environmental impact statement (EIS) on ISL (or in situ recovery, ISR) mining in western USA. This streamlined the requirement for a supplementary EIS for each new mine.
Details of US uranium mining are in US Nuclear Fuel Cycle Appendix 1: US Uranium Mining and Exploration.
The US Energy Information Administration's (EIA’s) 2023 Uranium Marketing Annual Report said that 23,400 tonnes of U3O8e (equivalent) was purchased by US utilities in 2023, and 95% of this was from foreign sources. Only 1080 tonnes of US origin U3O8e (equivalent) was delivered in 2023.
- Canada provided 5970 t (25%), Kazakhstan 4820 t (21%), Australia 4810 t (21%), Russia 2740 t (12%), Uzbekistan 2220 t (9%), Namibia 700 t (3%), Niger 640 t (3%).
- Other sources provided about 960 t. During 2023, about 15% was purchased under spot contracts and the balance under long-term contracts or other arrangements, the overall weighted average price being $43.8/lb U3O8 ($113.9/kgU). Total US commercial inventory was 68,900 t U3O8e (58,500 tU).
In July 2018, the US Department of Commerce launched a Section 232 investigation* into whether the USA's reliance on uranium imports poses a threat to national security. Prior to that, the US Department of the Interior determined uranium to be a critical mineral. In July 2019, the petition was rejected.
* Under Section 232 of Trade Expansion Act of 1962 (as amended), investigations may be carried out to determine the effects of imports on the USA’s national security and give the President the ability to address any threats to national security by restricting imports through tariffs.
In September 2022 as part of the $47 billion in supplemental funding request in the Biden administration's short-term spending bill, $1.5 billion in funds was requested “for the acquisition and distribution of low-enriched uranium (LEU) and high-assay LEU (HALEU)… to reduce the reliance of the United States and friendly foreign countries on nuclear fuels from the Russian Federation and other insecure sources of LEU and HALEU.”
At the end of September 2022, in an amendment of the National Defense Authorization Act, a bipartisan group of US Senators introduced a ban on Russian nuclear fuel imports. The amendment would see the prioritization of domestic production of LEU and the acceleration of efforts to establish a domestic HALEU capability.
In October 2023 the Nuclear Fuel Security Act was approved by the House of Representatives’ Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy, Climate, and Grid Security. The Act aims to establish and expand critical US nuclear fuel programmes to boost domestic uranium mining, production, enrichment, and conversion capacity.
Prohibiting Russian Uranium Imports Act
In May 2024 President Joe Biden signed the Prohibiting Russian Uranium Imports Act. The legislation bans the import of Russian-produced unirradiated LEU as well as unirradiated LEU that has been swapped for banned uranium. The bill came into effect on 11 August 2024, and will last until the end of 2040. Waivers may be granted to allow the import of limited amounts of LEU until 1 January 2028 if one of the following criteria is met:
- The import is necessary to maintain the viability of a US nuclear energy company that is critical to the US nuclear energy fuel supply chain, or
- The import is intended to support an existing arrangement to provide fuel for a nuclear power plant in another country and thus minimize the likelihood of that country seeking a non-US fuel supplier.
The US Department of Energy (DOE) has committed to acquiring LEU generated from new sources of US domestic enrichment capacity. These can include new enrichment facilities or projects that expand the capacity of existing enrichment facilities. The DOE intends to sell the LEU to utilities operating US reactors to support clean energy generation and sever reliance on Russian imports.
In July 2024 Centrus received a waiver to allow it to import LEU from Russia for delivery to US customers in 2024 and 2025.
Conversion
The large Honeywell Metropolis Works plant (MTW) in southern Illinois converts uranium oxide, U3O8, to uranium hexafluoride, UF6. It is the only conversion plant in the USA. The facility was built in the 1950s under government contract to meet military conversion requirements, and began providing UF6 for civilian use in the late 1960s. Original namplate capacity was up to 15,000 tU/yr, but this was reduced to 7000 tU/yr in 2017 in light of global demand.
In November 2017 Honeywell announced that it was idling production at the plant, owing to global oversupply and a decrease in demand. The company stated that it did not expect demand to increase before 2020. In March 2020, the NRC renewed MTW's operating licence for an additional 40 years to March 2060. In April 2021 it was announced that the plant was to restart in 2023 following upgrade work.
ConverDyn, a partnership between affiliates of Honeywell and General Atomics, is the exclusive agent for conversion sales from Honeywell-MTW.
In December 2022 ConverDyn received a $14 million award for uranium conversion services from the DOE under its $75 million programme to create a domestic uranium reserve to boost energy security. The establishment of the reserve programme was recommended by a previous administration nuclear fuel working group tasked with a strategy to revitalize the U.S. domestic nuclear fuel cycle.
In January 2023 Western Uranium & Vanadium Corp announced that a new mineral processing facility is to be constructed at the Green River Industrial Park in Utah. The facility is expected to be licensed and constructed for annual production of 2 million pounds U3O8 (770 tU) and 6-8 million pounds of V2O5, with initial production expected to begin in 2026.
Enrichment
Three uranium enrichment plants – at Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Paducah, Kentucky; and Portsmouth, Ohio – were built by the federal government in the 1940s and 1950s for defence purposes and operated for about 25 years. From 1969 to 1992, the US Department of Energy (DOE) and its predecessor agencies sold some of the plants’ enrichment services commercially under full-cost recovery contracts that required utility customers to pay for the plants’ future decommissioning. These fees were collected once, and then further fees were levied from 1992 for decommissioning.
The USA currently has one operating enrichment plant owned by Urenco, with a capacity of 4.9 million SWU per year, compared with US requirements of about 15 million SWU/yr.
The US nuclear industry has asked the DOE to provide a source of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU, up to 20% U-235) for advanced reactors. Eleven developers of such reactors estimated in 2020 that they would need a total of about 2000 tonnes of HALEU above 10% enriched by 2035. Annual requirements grow progressively to 500 tU in that period.
In October 2023 the Biden administration requested $2.2 billion from Congress to enhance domestic enrichment capabilities for LEU and HALEU.
Urenco USA (formerly National Enrichment Facility)
Urenco USA (UUSA) has a centrifuge enrichment plant at Eunice, New Mexico. It uses 6th generation Urenco technology from Europe, and was planned by the Louisiana Energy Services (LES) partnership – comprising Urenco, Exelon, Duke Power, Entergy, and Westinghouse. Construction of the $1.5 billion plant was licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in mid-2006 when as agreed the three utilities then passed their share to Urenco, and the company is now a subsidiary of Urenco USA. Utility support for the venture – initially amounting to $3.15 billion in orders – was crucial in persuading the NRC that further US enrichment capacity was required beyond that provided and envisaged by USEC.
The NRC approved commercial operation in mid-2010, with phase 1 capacity of 1.6 million SWU/yr (21 cascades of TC-12 centrifuges) being reached in 2012. Phase 2 of 2.1 million SWU/yr was inaugurated in August 2012 with the commissioning of the first new type of centrifuge, and completion to 3.7 million SWU then licensed capacity was reached in April 2014. Phase 3 began operation in 2015, taking capacity to 4.8 million SWU/yr but with the second part of phase 3 deferred until market conditions improve. A new TC-21 centrifuge design with 60% greater capacity is being used in phases 2 &3, and the plant is licensed to enrich to 5.5% U-235 and is capable of 6%. HALEU of 18-19% U-235 – for new designs of small modular reactors – would require a further cascade.
Earlier in November 2012 it was reported that Urenco had approached Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco) to invest in phase 2-3 of the plant, which would have had strategic significance for Korea in relation to its nuclear agreement with the USA. Kepco buys 2.9 million SWU/yr of enrichment services from several international sources. This did not proceed.
The plant provides one-third of US enrichment demand from 63 cascades in operation and is a major step forward in underwriting new US nuclear generating capacity and in ensuring security of fuel supply, with flexibility of operation enabling more energy input to produce more fuel from the same natural uranium feed if required.
NRC approval for a licence amendment to increase capacity to 10 million SWU/yr was granted in March 2015. This expansion would involve three phases, with three new separation building modules additional to the present two, and other plant.
Earlier in May 2014 Urenco applied to the NRC for a licence amendment to allow it to use high-assay tails (c 0.4% U-235) as feed in part of the new plant expansion applied for in 2012, and this was also approved in March 2015.
In February 2019 the company said it was planning production of high-assay LEU (HALEU), beyond 5% but under 20% enriched. Initially this would be to 6% or less, requiring no more than a licence amendment, but eventually to higher levels for small reactors. It is considering construction of a dedicated HALEU plant for this, particularly to supply a new generation of small reactors. Two US facilities already produce high-enriched-uranium – well above 20% – for naval fuel. However, being foreign-owned and using non-US technology, the Urenco USA plant would be ineligible to supply enrichment services for US defence purposes. In May 2020 the NRC approved a licence amendment for the plant to enrich to 5.5%.
In March 2023 it was announced that Urenco would supply enriched uranium to Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation to manufacture fuel for its Micro-Modular Reactor, Urenco’s first supply of enriched uranium product (EUP) for use in an advanced nuclear reactor. The EUP would be produced and supplied from Urenco USA's enrichment facility in New Mexico. The first batch of EUP is scheduled for delivery in 2025.
In July 2023 Urenco announced it would increase capacity at its Eunice plant by 700,000 SWU/yr, setting a target for the first new cascades to be in operation in 2025.
USEC and Paducah old plant
This was the last gaseous diffusion plant still operating in the world, having been commissioned in 1952 for military use. It began providing enriched uranium for civilian reactors in the 1960s. Originally government-owned, USEC became a private sector corporation in 1998, and leased its two large enrichment plants from the DOE. In 2001, it consolidated its enrichment operations at the Paducah site in Kentucky after closing the older Portsmouth facility at Piketon, Ohioa. Both plants were very energy-intensive and costly to run.
The Paducah plant had a capacity of 8 million SWU/yr, compared with the 12.7 million SWU/yr required by the 104 then operational US reactors. Its final role was under a complex May 2012 agreement where USEC enriched about 9000 tonnes of DOE high-assay depleted uranium tails at Paducah to provide about 480 tonnes of low-enriched uranium for two US utilities – TVA and Energy Northwest. With other work, this will required about 5 million SWU and extended USEC’s electricity supply agreement with TVA for about a year. The Paducah plant closed at the end of May 2013 after more than 60 years operation. USEC said that “We will continue to meet our customers’ orders from our existing inventory, purchases from Russia under the historic Megatons to Megawatts program, and our transitional supply contract with Russia that runs through 2022.”
About 115,000 tonnes of depleted uranium hexafluoride remain on the site and at Portsmouth, Ohio. In November 2013 the DOE announced that it had selected a proposal from Global Laser Enrichment to build a plant to enrich most of this (see below). In the same announcement, the DOE said it would enter negotiations with Areva (now Framatome) to process off-specification uranium hexafluoride as blend stock for domestic nuclear fuel. This would be carried out using Areva's existing nuclear fuel fabrication facility in Richland, Washington.
The DOE said that the GLE and Areva projects represented "an important next step" in planning for potential future uses and clean-up efforts at Paducah as well as reducing the costs to the taxpayer of the clean-up operation.
Fluor had a three-year $420 million DOE contract to clean up the Paducah site from 2014, then in May 2017 DOE awarded a $1.5 billion contract to Four Rivers Nuclear Partnership LLC for the continued deactivation and remediation (D&R) of Paducah and clean-up of the 1400 ha site. Four Rivers is a CH2M-led company with partners Fluor and BWX Technologies. The D&R contract is valued at $750 million for five years, followed by three-year and two-year option periods together worth about $750 million.
USEC/Centrus and Russian HEU
USEC was the agent for supply to USA of blended-down Russian uranium from weapons stockpiles (see Megatons to Megawatts section of US Nuclear Power Policy paper and Military Warheads as a Source of Fuel). This arrangement, supplying about half US demand from 1994, finished in 2013, and involved about 5.5 million SWU/yr.
USEC in March 2011 signed a further contract with Tenex for supply of low-enriched uranium from 2013 to 2022, ramping up to about half of earlier levels from Russia, with an option to match those levels. The 2011 contract covers the supply of 21 million SWU to USEC/Centrus, worth $2.8 billion. The new supplies will come from mined uranium enriched in Russia, rather than recycled weapons. A renewed supply of Russian uranium to the USA was not unexpected, but the particular arrangement allowed for USEC's new American Centrifuge Plant (see below) failing to proceed, though most of the new supply is directed at USEC customers outside the USA. USEC said the 2011 contract was complementary to its "ongoing efforts to deploy the American Centrifuge Plant". However, it also involved a feasibility study on deploying Russian centrifuge enrichment technology in the USA. USEC/Centrus purchases the SWU as LEU and delivers a corresponding amount of natural uranium to Tenex for the uranium component of the LEU, so like its predecessor, the contract yields no net uranium for the USA. In December 2015 the 2011 agreement was modified to reflect lower enrichment demand and extended to 2026 for delivery of the balance of the contracted SWU (17 million over 2016 to 2022). In July 2024 Centrus received a waiver under the Prohibiting Russian Uranium Imports Act to allow it to import LEU from Russia for delivery to US customers in 2024 and 2025.
From 2009, Russia’s Tenex signed a number of contracts with US utilities to supply enrichment services and enriched uranium product. To mid-2010 the contracts totaled some $3 billion, covering supplies to 2020. This Russian supply was in addition to that of 4.4% low-enriched uranium supplied through USEC having been blended down from Russian weapons material which supplied about half of US annual needs to 2013. (see section below on Military surplus and other government stocks and Megatons to Megawatts section of US Nuclear Power Policy paper).
USEC/Centrus American Centrifuge Plant
In April 2007, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensed construction and operation of USEC's American Centrifuge Plant in Piketon, Ohio. The American Centrifuge technology had been developed over many years by USEC, based on work by the Department of Energy (DOE) in 1970s and 1980s. The plant was constructed on the same Portsmouth site where the DOE's experimental plant operated in the 1980s, involving 1300 centrifuges as the culmination of a very major R&D programme. It is also the site of USEC's large Portsmouth diffusion plant which is now closed. The prototype lead cascade started operation in September 2007 and the test program with it to April 2010 refined the design of the AC100 centrifuge machines (which are much larger than the European Urenco centrifuges) to the "value-engineered AC100 machine", or ACR100 Mod 1, intended to be deployed in the commercial plant, and expected to deliver 350 SWU/yr per machine. An AC100 lead cascade started operation in March 2010 with plans to increase to 40-50 machines later in 2010. By the end of 2010, the company had spent $1.95 billion and required "additional capital beyond the $2 billion in Department of Energy loan guarantee program funding that it has applied for and USEC's internally generated cash flow." It said that another $2.8 billion was required from "financial closing of a loan guarantee", despite the benefit of using existing infrastructure.
The full plant was expected to commence commercial operation in 2010, and achieve full 3.8 million SWU annual capacity at the end of 2012. However, by July 2009 the project was suspended due to the DOE refusing to award a $2 billion loan guarantee, and asking USEC to withdraw its application. USEC refused to do this, and in July 2010, it resubmitted its loan guarantee application to the DOE, pointing out that $200 million commitment by Toshiba and Babcock & Wilcox in May 2010 to support the ACP also strengthened its credentials3. Some of this was paid, but a stand-off then ensued pending loan guarantee, which was never issued.
The schedule in February 2011 was: begin commercial operations in May 2014; reach 1 million SWU/yr capacity in August 2015; and achieve annual capacity of about 3.5 million SWU in September 2017. In March 2012 USEC said its immediate RD&D program, dependent on government funding after May, was to “support building, installing and operating a 120-machine cascade and related support systems that will be replicated in 96 identical cascades in a full commercial plant.” This demonstration cascade was completed in April 2013 and became operational in October 2013 as “the centerpiece of the RD&D program with DOE”. By December it had completed 20 machine-years of operation of 340 SWU. USEC then obtained funds from the DOE under a cooperative RD&D program 80% funded by the DOE for this purpose, and extended to September 2014.
In November 2013 USEC said: "Despite the technical progress being made by the RD&D program, if funding is not in place at the end of the RD&D program or if USEC determines there is no longer a viable path to commercialization of ACP, we could make a decision to demobilize or terminate the project in the near term”. USEC said that its “prospects for adequate liquidity in 2014 are uncertain.”
With USEC (now Centrus) unable to proceed with the project, the intellectual property and the demonstration cascade reverted to the DOE under the terms of the cooperative agreement. In April 2014 the DOE said that in the light of commercial deployment of ACP being not viable at present, its Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee was taking over management of the project. The American Centrifuge Technology Demonstration and Operations Agreement between Centrus and ORNL ran to September 2015, backed by $97.2 million federal funding. It was then extended again for 12 months, with 60% reduced funding. Centrus said that this funding “excludes continued operations of America’s only operating cascade of advanced uranium enrichment centrifuges in Piketon,” which will therefore close down "after an investment of more than $2.6 billion in the project". In February 2016 Centrus announced that it had “completed operations of its demonstration cascade” of ACP at Piketon but would maintain its NRC licence. In March 2016 Centrus signed the US Centrifuge Technology Advancement contract with UT-Battelle, LLC, as operator of ORNL. The contract ran for six months. In September 2016 it signed a further contract with UT-Battelle "for maintaining and advancing gas centrifuge uranium enrichment technology" over 12 months.
Earlier in March 2014 USEC applied for Chapter 11 reorganisational bankruptcy, a measure to enable it to restructure its debt while it continued operations. In its petition to the court, USEC listed assets of about $70 million and liabilities of $1.07 billion. The company emerged from bankruptcy at the end of September 2014 with the new name of Centrus Energy. About half of its workforce of 1300 have been working on the ACP project. The DOE notified Centrus in September 2015 that funding would be reduced below the level needed to keep the cascade operating. In mid-2016 Centrus commenced decontamination and decommissioning of the Piketon ACP plant, and expected this to continue through 2017.
Oak Ridge is where the ACP was originally developed to the 1980s. The DOE and NNSA said: “The government’s interest is in preserving and advancing the AC100 technology for possible future deployment for a national security mission.” The timeline for this is 2038 – see later subsection on Defence enrichment needs. The NNSA is effectively now the keeper of US enrichment technology. The domestic uranium enrichment capability is required because the USA can only use uranium for national security (defence) purposes that has been enriched by US-origin technology, hence excluding Urenco and SILEX. It is not clear that the USA needs any more HEU, but a related question is replenishment of tritium in nuclear warheads. This has been sourced from TVA’s Watts Bar 1 since 2003.
In June 2019 the DOE awarded a $115 million contract to American Centrifuge Operating (ACO), a subsidiary of Centrus Energy, to demonstrate the production of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), above 5% enrichment of U-235. The project involves construction of a cascade of 16 of the very large AC-100M centrifuges in Piketon, Ohio, where these machines were developed, to produce some 19.75% enriched uranium by June 2022. It should also demonstrate the capability to produce HALEU with existing US-origin enrichment technology, providing the DOE with a "small quantity" of it – understood to be less than one tonne per year – for use in research and development "and other programmatic missions". A number of new small reactor designs require HALEU and their developers are anxious to see a supply chain for it established. A government website said that ACO was the only source capable of executing the contract activities to meet the requirements of the DOE's HALEU Demonstration Program. In June 2020 the NRC accepted an application from Centrus to enrich at up to 20% at Piketon and said that it expected to take a year to complete the review.
In mid-2021 it was licensed to produce HALEU up to 20%. In November 2022, the DOE awarded Centrus $150 million of cost-shared funding to finish the cascade, complete final regulatory steps, begin operating the cascade, and produce up to 20 kg of HALEU by the end of 2023 – this was delivered in November 2023. It was then expected that production would continue in 2024 at a rate of 900 kg of HALEU per year. However in February 2024 it was announced that delays in the supply of 5B cylinders from the DOE would prevent the delivery of this amount of material in 2024.
Eagle Rock Enrichment Facility
In mid-2007, Areva announced that it proposed to build a 3.3 million SWU/yr $2 billion centrifuge plant in the USA to supply domestic enrichment services. It submitted a licence application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for this Eagle Rock Enrichment Facility in December 2008 and the NRC issued the licence in October 2011. Construction was to commence in 2012 at Idaho Falls, near the Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory, and operation was envisaged early in 2014, ramping up to full capacity in 2018. Areva Enrichment Services LLC, the owner and operator, signed a procurement & construction contract with URS in February 2011. It would be similar to Areva's new French plant (Georges Besse II). In 2009, Areva notified a planned doubling in capacity to 6.6 million SWU/yr, with the first stage being 3.3 million SWU/yr. In May 2010, DOE granted it a $2 billion loan guarantee. However, in December 2011 Areva announced that it was putting the project on hold as it seeks an additional investor, and in May 2013 the projected timeline became indefinite. In March 2017 Areva Nuclear Materials asked the NRC to terminate the licence "since the facility will not be constructed." (Areva Nuclear Materials is now Orano USA.)
Global Laser Enrichment: Paducah & Wilmington
In 2006 Silex Systems in Australia and GE Energy received US government approval for development in the USA of the third-generation SILEX (Separation of Isotopes by Laser Excitation) uranium enrichment process using laser technology. This approval cleared the way for development and eventual full commercial production under a licence agreement with Silex. It provided for GE (now GE Hitachi, GEH) to construct in the USA an engineering-scale test loop, then a pilot plant or lead cascade, and expanded to a full commercial plant. GE was funding the development and making a series of payments to Silex. GE then said: "Commercialisation of the SILEX enrichment technology is a crucial part of GE's long-term growth strategy for the nuclear business." SILEX was rebadged as Global Laser Enrichment (GLE) which became the name of the project company. In mid-2008 Cameco bought into the GLE project, paying $124 million for a 24% share, alongside GE (51%) and Hitachi (25%).
GLE is now operating the test loop at Global Nuclear Fuel's (GNF's) Wilmington, North Carolina fuel fabrication facility. (GNF is a partnership of GE, Toshiba, and Hitachi.) In April 2010, GLE announced the completion of the first phase of the test loop programme and that technology validation would continue as designs for the commercial facility evolved and economic feasibility was verified. Further tests and ongoing activities accumulated performance, operating reliability and lifetime data on the technology, to assist the engineering design programme for the first planned commercial production plant. In April 2016 GE and Hitachi notified their intention to exit GLE. In February 2019 Silex Systems and Cameco agreed to buy out the GEH 76% share in GLE for $20 million on a deferred payment basis, so that Cameco holds 49% of GLE and Silex 51%. Cameco has an option to purchase an additional 26% of GLE. The agreement calls for Silex and Cameco to pay $300,000 per month to complete construction of the prototype enrichment facility, known as the Wilmington Test Loop, which has been partially built by GEH. Final US government approvals were granted in January 2021. Silex said the restructuring would "provide an ideal path to market for GLE and for the continued commercialisation of the SILEX technology in the US.”
Wilmington: In mid-2009, GEH submitted the last part of its licence application for a commercial GLE plant at Wilmington. In February 2012 NRC found that its programs for the physical protection of special nuclear material and classified matter, material control and accounting provided an adequate basis for both safety and safeguards of facility operations. A full licence to construct and operate a plant of up to 6 million SWU/yr at WIlmington was issued in September 2012. GLE will now decide in the light of commercial considerations on whether to proceed with a full-scale enrichment facility there. The project, licensed to enrich natural uranium up to 8% U-235, could be operational in about two years, ramping up to annual capacity of 6 million separative work units (SWU) in the first stage, and double that eventually. However, attention has turned to Paducah, and in July 2014 Silex reported that GLE was slowing down its activities at Wilmington.
Paducah: Silex Systems reported in November 2012 that there was a proposal for GLE to build an additional laser enrichment pant at Paducah, to enrich high-assay DU tails (above 0.34% U-235) owned by the DOE to produce 2000 tU/yr at natural uranium level (0.7% U-235). There is about 150,000 tonnes of these at Paducah and Portsmouth (among a total of 550,000 t tails). In August 2013 GLE submitted a proposal to the DOE to establish a "$1 billion" laser enrichment plant at Paducah, and in November the DOE announced that it would proceed with contract negotiations to this end, for enrichment of high-assay tails there. In January 2014 GLE told the NRC that it expected to apply for a licence to build, own and operate the Paducah Laser Enrichment Facility (PLEF). Negotiations with the DOE continued into 2016, and in November an agreement was signed with the DOE for it to sell about 300,000 tonnes of high-assay tails, justifying construction by GLE of the plant in the early 2020s. GLE expected licensing to take 2-3 years. The PLEF would become a commercial uranium enrichment production facility under an NRC licence, producing about 100,000 tonnes of natural-grade uranium over 40 years or more. The DOE would dispose of the reduced-assay balance. The estimated size is 0.5 to 1.0 million SWU/yr, since purchases of depleted uranium may not exceed 2000 t/yr natural uranium equivalent. In June 2020 the 2016 GLE agreement with the DOE was extended, and Silex said that commercial operation at 2000 tonnes of natural-grade uranium as UF6 per year was expected in the late 2020s.
The Paducah GLE plant would serve a different market to that proposed for Wilmington, and would become a new source of secondary supply. In the long term it would compete with new mines, rather than other enrichment plants.
At the end of 2013, the DOE had about 13,000 tonnes of natural uranium, which it was bartering at the rate of 2400 t/yr to pay for decommissioning and clean-up of its Portsmouth and Paducah facilities. The proposed Paducah Laser Enrichment facility would provide a continuing source of such material beyond 2018.
Russian proposal
The contract signed in March 2011 between Techsnabexport (Tenex) and USEC Inc. for the delivery of uranium enrichment services during 2013-2022 gave effect to a memorandum of January 2010 on the establishment of a joint venture in the USA to build a uranium enrichment plant based on Russian centrifuge technology. Tenex and USEC were undertaking a feasibility study on this, as a possible alternative to USEC American Centrifuge project. The main contract was for the supply of 21 million SWU to USEC over 2013-2022, worth $2.8 billion. See above subsection on USEC and Russian SWU.
Defence enrichment needs
The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) needs a reliable supply of unobligated low-enriched uranium for LEU at 19.75% enrichment for research reactors, as well as for defence purposes, notably tritium production and HEU for naval reactors. There is no source of this at present, but in August 2015 the NNSA reported that it had enough unobligated LEU to get to 2038. By then it needed a plant of about 400,000 SWU/yr and favoured reviving the ACP technology in some form to provide this. Hence it is providing $32 million per year R&D at Oak Ridge to this end, with Centrus as contractor.
Decommissioning of old enrichment plants
The three original diffusion uranium enrichment plants – at Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Paducah, Kentucky; and Portsmouth, Ohio – were built by the federal government in the 1940s and 1950s for defence purposes and operated for 42, 60 and 47 years respectively. From 1969 to 1992, the DOE and its predecessor agencies sold some of the plants’ enrichment services commercially under contracts that required utility customers to pay for future decommissioning and decontamination. Fees were collected for this but not set aside, and in 1992 the Energy Policy Act assessed utilities an annual fee of $150 million for 15 years, pursuant to which some $2.6 billion was paid. The administration’s 2014 budget proposed levying further tax of $2.4 billion over 10 years on nuclear utility customers, which would have been the third time a fee for the same programme was assessed. In July 2013 the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners contested this.
Decommissioning of the Oak Ridge site was completed in October 2020, and the site was transformed into an industrial park.
Deconversion
Deconversion of the depleted uranium hexafluoride (UF6) that remains as a byproduct after enrichment has not so far been undertaken on a large scale in the USA, and in fact for legal reasons depleted uranium is, in the USA, sometimes considered as a waste. There is about 765,000 tonnes of depleted UF6 in the USA.
Uranium Disposition Services LLC (UDS), a joint venture of Areva, EnergySolutions, and Burns & Roe, was awarded a $558 million contract by the DOE in 2002 to design and build deconversion plants at Portsmouth, Ohio and Paducah, Kentucky. The contract ran to August 2010. The plants use a process developed by Areva which it employs at Richland, Washington and Lingen, Germany. The 13,500 t/yr Portsmouth plant was completed in mid-2010 and the 18,000 t/yr Paducah one in 2011. Operational testing and reviews were undertaken on both by EnergySolutions as managing partner. At Portsmouth about 250,000 t depleted UF6 is stored, with another 75,000 t shipped from Oak Ridge, and at Paducah some 440,000 t depleted UF6 is stored. Aqueous HF was a commercial by-product.
Then Babcock & Wilcox Conversion Services won a five-year $428 million contract from the DOE in December 2010 for uranium deconversion operations at both Portsmouth and Paducah, using these UDS plants. B&W Conversion Services (later: BWXT Conversion Services) is a joint venture of B&W Technical Services Group and URS set up in 2011 to operate the two DOE deconversion plants. B&W is the majority partner. Deconversion proceeded at about 20,000 tU/yr to 2016.
In September 2016 Mid-America Conversion Services (MCS), a joint venture of Atkins, Fluor and Westinghouse was awarded a $318 million, five-year contract to take over operation of the UDS plants at Portsmouth and Paducah from 2017. It was among five bidders for the contract. Atkins had been involved in building the plant. The DOE approved MCS to operate the UDS plants in February 2017. Products will be depleted uranium oxide for reuse or disposal and aqueous hydrofluoric acid for industrial use.
In December 2009, International Isotopes (INIS) subsidiary Fluorine Products Inc applied for a licence to build and operate a 6,500 t/yr deconversion plant and fluorine extraction facility 35 km west of Hobbs, New Mexico, and 70 km by road from the Urenco USA enrichment plant at Eunice. In April 2010, INIS signed a five-year agreement to provide toll deconversion services for DU tails from Urenco, from 2014. In October 2012 the NRC issued a licence to build and operate the $125 million plant, but in August 2013 the project was put on hold.
INIS hoped to start production in 2014, subject to raising $75 million capital. Initial capacity is for about 300 type 48Y cylinders, containing 3600 tonnes of UF6 per year, increasing to about 575 (6950 t) in 2016. However in mid-2014 the company said that the project remained on hold until "additional uranium enrichment capacity comes on line that can provide us with additional opportunities to contract for deconversion service of that material." Some 1300 to 2300 tonnes of anhydrous hydrofluoric acid (HF) with 450 tonnes of fluoride gas will be produced per year for sale by INIS, and the depleted uranium belonging to the enrichment companies will be stored as more stable U3O8. In-mid 2010, the first part of a $65 million loan guarantee application by INIS was approved by the US Department of Energy (DOE), and the company has been invited to submit the second part of its application2
UUSA’s licence amendment in March 2015 to 10 million SWU/yr enrichment capacity provides the potential for 1000 cylinders of depleted UF6 per year arising from that source alone. However, the following month INIS said that “while we remain optimistic, at the present time we cannot predict if or when the plant will be built.”
Preceding this proposal an agreement was signed in 2005 between LES (UUSA) and Areva to make use of the latter's technology in deconverting LES' DU tails. Areva NC has operated a small deconversion plant in association with its Richland fuel fabrication plant in Washington state.
Uranium fuel fabrication
The USA has three main fuel fabrication facilities to convert enriched uranium oxide into solid pellets for fuel rods. They are operated by Framatome (formerly Areva), Westinghouse, and Global Nuclear Fuel.
Westinghouse has a 1500 t/yr fuel fabrication plant for PWR and BWR fuel at Columbia, South Carolina.
Global Nuclear Fuel-Americas, owned by GE, Hitachi and Toshiba, has a 1500 t/yr plant at Wilmington, North Carolina.
In 2009, Areva's 35-year-old Richland, Washington fuel fabrication plant was the first to receive a 40-year licence extension from the NRC. It has 1200 t/yr capacity. In 2010, Areva and Mitsubishi Nuclear Fuel announced a 50-50 joint venture – US Nuclear Fuel – to manufacture APWR fuel at the Richland plant. This has apparently not proceeded.
BWX Technologies’ Nuclear Operations Group subsidiary Nuclear Fuel Services (NFS) manufactures fuel for the US Navy at Erwin, Tennessee. It also downblends HEU.
MOX fuel fabrication
CB&I-Areva MOX Services (30% Areva, now Orano) was constructing the Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) at the US Department of Energy's Savannah River Site in South Carolina as part of the NNSA's Plutonium Disposition Program (see section below). The plant is based on Orano's Melox plant in France, but is more complex. The plant is designed to dispose of at least 34 tonnes of weapons-grade plutonium and convert it into useable fuel at the rate of about 3.5 t/yr, turning it into over 150 MOX fuel assemblies.
Construction of the plant began in 2007 under an onerous and complex regulatory regime set up by the DOE, and it was due to start operation in October 2016 and produce the first MOX fuel assemblies in 2018, for both PWR and BWR reactors. The cost estimate then escalated from $4.9 billion to $7.7 billion with operation beginning late 2019. The NRC extended the construction licence to 2025 to allow for a lower rate of funding. The cost escalation was initially blamed on approval of estimates before design was complete, and led to the plant facing shutdown in 2014 due to funding cut-off. The Energy Secretary in April 2014 said that NRC concerns had caused major changes in the plant’s design from the French original. Funding has been $420 million in FY 2015 for the fissile materials disposition program including this plant, then $345 million for FY 2016, followed by $340 million for FY 2017. In May 2017 Areva said that $5 billion was required to finish construction, making a total cost of $10 billion, with commissioning in under ten years. In May 2018 CB&I MOX Services was acquired by McDermott.
In early 2016 the DOE sought to terminate the project and "downblend” the plutonium instead, so that it could be disposed at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico. But Areva reminded the DOE that, according to their Plutonium Management and Disposition Agreement and 2011 amending protocol, the USA and Russia must change their surplus plutonium at the isotopic level to render the nuclear material unattractive for weapons use. "Though considerations have been raised about pursuing other non-proliferation options, none of the other methods change the plutonium's isotopic structure, so would require renegotiations with the Russians," Areva said. Russia made it plain that the downblending option would amount to a violation of the 2011 protocol, and in October 2016 Russia unilaterally cancelled the agreement.
In May 2018 the Energy Secretary said that he was terminating the project and proceeding with downblending the plutonium at Savannah River for disposal at WIPP. NNSA formally terminated the contract with CB&I Areva MOX Services in October 2018, and NRC terminated the permit for the plant in February 2019. NNSA expects that the diluted material would be in about 113,000 drums of 200 litres each, shipped over 2026 to 2050. "The department's independent cost estimate concluded that the remaining dilute and dispose lifecycle cost is $19.9 billion. The department estimated the remaining lifecycle cost of the MOX fuel programme to be $49.4 billion." The DOE is also "exploring whether any of the plutonium currently in South Carolina can be moved elsewhere for programmatic uses."
Simultaneously the under-secretary of defence for acquisition and sustainment, and the DOE under-secretary and NNSA administrator, said: "An evolving and uncertain geopolitical landscape calls for the United States to recapitalise its defence plutonium capabilities." They propose the MFFF be converted to produce or recondition plutonium pits, the core of nuclear weapons, at the rate of 50 per year.
In February 2010 the NNSA signed an agreement with TVA to evaluate the use of this MOX in its Sequoyah and Browns Ferry power plants, moving up to possibly 40% core load. Duke Energy has used four mixed oxide test fuel assemblies incorporating this weapons-grade plutonium (fabricated in France) at its Catawba 1 nuclear power reactor. This was to prepare for possible use of MOX for 20-40% of the cores of the Catawba and McGuire reactors from about 2010, using the fuel fabricated at MFFF.
Recycling reactor-grade plutonium in reactor fuel has been prevented in the USA by the banning of used fuel reprocessing (see below). However, Global Nuclear Fuel - Americas, a joint venture of General Electric, Toshiba and Hitachi, was preparing for licensing and production of MOX fuel for use in commercial BWR reactors by 2026.
Military surplus and other government stocks
As noted above (USEC and Russian SWU) almost half of the uranium used in US nuclear power plants from 1994 to 2013 came from Russian weapons-grade military uranium, downblended in Russia. Under this programme, by the end of 2013, 500 tonnes of high-enriched uranium (HEU) had been downblended into 15,259 tonnes of low-enriched uranium (LEU, average 4.4% U-235) for reactor fuel, representing some million SWU supplied for about $8 billion (paid by electricity consumers). The programme recycled about 20,000 warheads. According to Tenex, its total revenue was $17 billion, including hard currency gains and the cost of natural uranium component as contra supply.
On the US side, 174 tonnes of military high-enriched uranium was initially declared to be surplus and available for civil power generation. Much or all of this has been downblended by Nuclear Fuel Services in Tennessee, and the first fuel fabricated from it has been shipped to Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) power plants.
In 2005, the Department of Energy's (DOE's) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announced that it was committing 40 tonnes of off-specification HEU in the USA to its Blended Low Enriched Uranium (BLEU) programme, with the fuel produced going to TVA power plants. To February 2012 about 22.7 t HEU had produced 301 t LEU (4.95% U-235), using natural uranium for blending.
In June 2007, the NNSA awarded contracts to Wesdyne International and Nuclear Fuel Services (NFS) to downblend 17.4 tonnes of HEU from dismantled warheads to yield about 290 tonnes of LEU, 230 t of which will be part of the new American Assured Fuel Supply programme.b The programme comprises 230 t of LEU at power reactor grade, equivalent to six reloads for a 1000 MWe reactor, according to NNSA. This LEU is available for use in civilian reactors by nations in good standing with the International Atomic Energy Agency that have good nonproliferation credentials and are not pursuing uranium enrichment and reprocessing technologies, and now also to US utilities. The fuel – worth some $500 million – would be sold at the current market price.
In June 2009, NNSA awarded a further contract ($209 million) to NFS and Wesdyne for 12.1 tonnes of HEU, to yield some 220 tonnes of LEU by 2012. This batch of LEU was to provide fuel supply assurance for utilities which participate in the DOE's mixed-oxide fuel programme utilising surplus plutonium from US weapons. To cover the cost of the project, Wesdyne would sell a small part of the LEU (about 60 t) on the market over a three- to four-year period. (The scheme is consistent with international concerns to limit the spread of enrichment technology to countries without well-established nuclear fuel cycles. Russia has agreed to join the initiative.)
In March 2008, the DOE announced a policy for dealing with uranium which was surplus to defence needs. The 2008 inventory, totaling nearly 72,000 tonnes of natural uranium equivalent, was diminished by 2013, when the DOE issued a uranium inventory management plan update:
The DOE 2008 plan showed a total of 22,700 tonnes of its uranium entering global markets before the end of FY2017, but with no more than 10% of US annual requirements being delivered to the market in any one year – apart from an allocation for the first cores of newly built US reactors.c This 10% guideline was removed in the 2013 revision to the plan. Transactions over 2008 to 2013 included: 4300 tU to USEC in payment for the clean-up of the Portsmouth enrichment plant, downblending of much HEU, 9082 t DU as UF6 to Energy Northwest, disposal of much unsaleable off-spec material, and an addition of 47.6 tonnes LEU to inventory in 2012 from enrichment of Russian natural U.
In 2014 DOE confirmed that it would release 2705 tonnes of natural uranium equivalent annually to 2021, the same amount as in 2013, equivalent to 14% of US demand. It is mostly held as UF6. In 2016 it is releasing 2100 tU – 1600 tU as natural UF6 and 500 tU as LEU from downblending by NNSA contractors, Wesdyne, which was ongoing. Much of this will be to pay for Paducah and Portsmouth clean-up.
The stock of natural UF6 could provide 1927 tU/yr for 7.5 years. After that, re-enrich the 73,500 tU in tails (av 0.375%) from the US stock of 464,000 tU in DUF6 (including 295,000 tU at Paducah). The natural U value produced (@ $50/lb) is $3.4 billion, and it needs 14.7 million SWU to process and reduce tails to 0.20%.
The 114,000 tU of high-assay tails is DOE’s largest remaining uranium asset in 2016.
In April 2016 NNSA awarded a $241.5 million contract to BWX Technologies’ subsidiary NFS to downblend the last 10.4 tonnes of surplus HEU by 2019 to LEU, this being 1966 tonnes of natural uranium equivalent. In September 2018 TVA awarded NFS a $505 million contract to downblend 20.2 tonnes of HEU over 2019 to 2025 for LEU reactor fuel for Watts Bar 1 (approx. 4.4% U-235). The fuel is intended for use in the NNSA's Production of Tritium in a Commercial Light Water Reactor (CLWR) programme, where tritium is produced in TVA reactors using tritium-producing burnable absorber rods. TVA has been producing tritium for NNSA at Watts Bar 1 since 2004.
By 2016 there were a number of small modular reactor designs coming forward with a variety of fuel needs, some of them requiring LEU at almost 20% enrichment. The US Nuclear Infrastructure Council (NIC) called for some of the downblending of HEU to create a “domestic strategic reserve” of high-assay LEU (HALEU), about 19.75% U-235. This would provide a small stockpile of fuel as a resource which would otherwise be very difficult to obtain (since civil enrichment plants normally cannot go above 5%). Others mentioned off-spec naval fuel as being a source of this. A reserve of 20 tonnes was suggested.
The NIC said that the only supply of fuel for many advanced reactors under development would otherwise be foreign-enriched uranium. “Without a readily available domestic supply of higher enriched LEU in the USA, it will be extremely difficult to conduct research on advanced reactors, potentially driving American innovators overseas.”
In June 2018 the US Senate approved a proposal for a pilot programme to recycle used naval fuel for use in advanced reactors. There are currently no US-based commercial facilities capable of producing high-assay LEU.
In a submission to the DOE in September 2016, Urenco USA called for any government uranium stocks released to be at 19.75% enrichment, not around 5%, so as to avoid further depressing the already weak market. Uranium Producers of America (UPA) also suggested that the DOE-NNSA should be downblending HEU to levels between 5 and 19.75% LEU for research and advanced reactor fuel, thus minimizing the impact of DOE LEU below 5% on the commercial market.
See also information page on Military Warheads as a Source of Nuclear Fuel.
Plutonium disposition
In addition to the HEU surplus, the US government has declared 61.5 tonnes of weapons-grade plutonium to be excess to the needs of the US defence program. Of this, the government agreed under the 2000 US-Russia Plutonium Management and Disposition Agreement to dispose of 34 tonnes by 2014, incorporating it (with depleted uranium) into mixed oxide (MOX) fuel. A 2010 protocol to the agreement confirmed MOX for light water reactors as the sole disposal option for the USA, while Russia was to dispose of the material as MOX in fast reactors.
Construction of a MOX fuel fabrication plant at the DOE Savannah River site in South Carolina was authorised by NRC early in 2005 and began in August 2007 when funding became available. The MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) is being built by CB&I Areva MOX Services under a $2.7 billion contract to the DOE's National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which will own the plant. (Most MOX plants use fresh reactor-grade plutonium comprising about one-third non-fissile plutonium isotopes; this uses weapons plutonium with more than 90% fissile isotopes.) The project includes a facility for plutonium pits dismantlement and metallic plutonium conversion to oxide which is complex and has delayed progress. It also includes a waste solidification building. The MFFF is expected eventually to produce about 1,700 MOX fuel assemblies from the 34 tonnes of weapons-grade plutonium under the Russia-US agreement – or more, should the government decide to dispose of some or all of the balance of its 61.5 tonnes surplus plutonium in this way. NNSA has said that it was considering options for a further 14.4 tonnes of surplus military plutonium, most of which could become MOX but with about 2 tonnes going to geological disposal in New Mexico.
However, early in 2014 the project was excluded from the DOE budget request for NNSA due to cost escalation, so faced being shut down while 60% complete. The timeline for operation had already gone out to 2019 and the cost estimate had blown out to $7.7 billion. NNSA's strategy for plutonium disposition is under the terms of the 2000 bilateral agreement with Russia, whose 60 t/yr MFFF at Zheleznogorsk started up in 2014. Another MOX plant at Dimitrovgrad has been expanded to similar capacity. The USA will then be in default on its bilateral agreement, while Russia has fulfilled its side. However the US Energy Secretary said that the USA remained committed to the agreement, and would assess alternatives to the project. Meanwhile CB&I Areva MOX Services is continuing to build it. In December 2014 the House passed a bill authorising $341 million for the plant, and this was followed by $345 million for FY 2016 and $340 million for FY 2017.
In April 2014 NNSA issued a report comparing alternative options for plutonium disposal. It said that the total cost of building and operating the Savannah River MOX plant would be over $31 billion, while burning the MOX in fast reactors would cost $58 billion, and immobilising it in ceramic or glass and storing it at the Idaho National Laboratory would cost over $36 billion. Downblending it and storing it at WIPP in New Mexico would cost only $16 billion. In March 2016 NNSA announced a decision to dispose of six tonnes of surplus non-pit plutonium at WIPP, after preparation including dilution at Savannah River, where it is now stored. The 6t is part of 13.1 tonnes of surplus plutonium for which a disposal pathway had not been decided.
In October 2016 the Russian President unilaterally announced cancellation of the 2000 Russia-US agreement to reduce each country’s weapons-grade plutonium by 34 tonnes, primarily due to which the Savannah River MOX plant is being built.* He cited NNSA inclination or requests to dispose of the US plutonium in other ways than MOX. A draft bill was introduced to Russia’s parliament, with an explanatory note saying that there were both political and technical reasons to cancel the deal, even though it could be renewed under certain conditions related to relaxing US sanctions. The presidential decree said the main reason for cancellation is "the emergence of a threat to strategic stability as a result of US hostile actions against Russia." The Nuclear Energy Institute then called on Congress to provide money for completing the Savannah River plant, since "allowing Russia to forgo its international obligation has significant national security implications for the United States and its allies.”
* At the opening ceremony for Russia’s MOX plant at MCC Zheleznogorsk in September 2015, Rosatom had compared its achievement in building its MOX plant for military plutonium in four years for RUR 9.3 billion ($142 million), with the US MFFF costing $7.7 billion over eight years to then, it being still incomplete.
As well as Duke Energy using four test fuel assemblies at its Catawba 1 reactor, weapons-grade plutonium in MOX test assemblies has been burned at the Saxton prototype reactor in the mid-1960s, and some MOX was burned in other US plants before 1977.
See also information page on Military Warheads as a Source of Nuclear Fuel and re plutonium, under Non-proliferation in the US Nuclear Power Policy paper.
Using enrichment tails
The US government owns some 700,000 tonnes of depleted uranium tails from past enrichment. In 2005 a pilot program treated over 8000 tonnes of these. In 2011 ConverDyn and Urenco USA formed a partnership to offer its services to DOE in utilizing more of these DU tails. The Competitive American Tails Upgrade Partnership (CATUP) will use the two companies' conversion and enrichment facilities in conjunction with its own natural uranium inventories to provide low-enriched uranium to the market while reducing the DU stockpile. CATUP's natural uranium concentrates would be converted to UF6 at ConverDyn's plant and exchanged for depleted UF6 from the DOE stockpile. This would then be cleaned up by CATUP, enriched by Urenco and sold.
Reprocessing used fuel
In 1977, the US government called a halt to the reprocessing of used fuel from commercial reactors as part of its stance against nuclear proliferation. The country has some experience with reprocessing oxide fuels as part of its military program, and has also built three civil reprocessing plants. The first, a 300 t/y plant at West Valley, New York, was operated successfully from 1966-72. However, escalating regulation required plant modifications which were deemed uneconomic, and the plant was shut down. The second was a 300 t/y plant built at Morris, Illinois, incorporating new technology which, although proven on a pilot-scale, failed to work successfully in the production plant. It was declared inoperable in 1974. The third was a 1500 t/y plant at Barnwell, South Carolina was built but not commissioned due to the changed government policy. It is now demolished. In all, the USA has over 250 plant-years of reprocessing operational experience, the vast majority being at government-operated defence plants.
One of these is the H-Canyon plantd at the DOE Savannah River site in South Carolina. This facility is the last such US plant able to treat used HEU fuel and similar materials that is still operational. From 2011 it is treating used HEU fuel from the USA and overseas research reactors which have been converted to LEU or shut down under the Global Threat Reduction Initiative. In 2014 it started a program to reprocess aluminium-clad and aluminium alloy used fuel from research reactors such as Oak Ridge’s High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR) and to downblend the uranium product for use in power reactors such as TVA’s*. The uranium separation part of this came online in August 2016, and the downblending plant is expected to start in 2018. Actinides and fission products will be vitrified for disposal. The vitrification plant at Savannah River had produced 7200 tonnes of vitrified wastes over 20 years to 2016, in about 4000 stainless steel canisters.
* In 2016 the plant had about 1000 fuel bundles and 200 HFIR cores to treat. In 2018 it was starting to downblend 120 HFIR cores for use in TVA reactors, notably Browns Ferry.
Several shifts in energy policy beginning in 2002, however, increased the likelihood of a resumption in reprocessing. In June 2005, the report accompanying the $31 billion energy and water funding bill approved by the Senate Appropriations Committee emphasised the need for new nuclear energy technologies. The DOE's Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative (AFCI) would receive $85 million to develop fuel cycle technologies for Generation IV reactors including reprocessing and using fast neutron reactors to destroy long-lived components of wastes. A major driver for reprocessing was the reduction in the volume of high-level wastes, possibly obviating the need for any expansion of the planned repository at Yucca Mountain. In July 2005, with passage of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the "recovery of the energy value from spent commercial fuel" became an explicit objective of the AFCI.
The shift on reprocessing was given further impetus by the government and industry commitment to develop of advanced nuclear reactors. In late 2005, the American Nuclear Society issued a position paper stating that "the development and deployment of advanced nuclear reactors based on fast-neutron fission technology is important to the sustainability, reliability, and security of the world’s long-term energy supply."4 An initial $50 million for "integrated spent fuel recycling facilities" focused largely on fast reactors was committed by the US Congress in 2006. The US industry body, the Nuclear Energy Institute, has said that the US nuclear industry needs to plan for recycling used fuel to reduce the long-lived radioactivity arising from it so that in a relatively short time high-level wastes become no more toxic than the original uranium ore. This means recycling and burning all the long-lived actinides, which is most efficiently done in fast neutron reactors.
The development of new reprocessing technology became a central element in the government's 2006 proposal for a Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) to reduce the risk of nuclear proliferation (see information page on International Framework for Nuclear Energy Cooperation). Under this proposal, the US and other developed countries would develop proliferation-resistant recycling technologies and provide nuclear fuel to developing countries that promised not to engage in enrichment and reprocessing activities. GNEP attracted criticism, but it brought increased attention to the possibilities of reprocessing. Nevertheless, financial support for GNEP disappeared and by 2009, under Barack Obama's Democratic administration, the DOE removed its GNEP website and did not refer to the program in its budget request for FY 2010.5 In June 2009, the DOE cancelled the programmatic environmental impact statement for GNEP "because it is no longer pursuing domestic commercial reprocessing, which was the primary focus of the prior Administration's domestic GNEP program."6
Despite the lack of US government support for GNEP as such, research activities under AFCI have continued. A DOE-funded demonstration project involving several versions of the UREX+ process for spent fuel was underway at the Argonne National Laboratory. The DOE was also exp
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