The statistic that 99% of US uranium is importd and 60% of enrichment services come from abroad is staggering when you consider nuclear provids 20% of our electricity. The fact that Russia historically controlled 44% of global enrichment capacity and still plays such a dominant role in the supply chain should be a wake up call. Its especially concerning that even with the ban in place, we're still importing Russian uranium on a case by case basis through waivers because we literally dont have the domestic capacity to meet demand.
Thank you for reading! Couldn't agree more - it's certainly a stark landscape. It wasn't always this way. Up until 1980, the U.S. was the leading producer of uranium.
We do need more domestic capacity for uranium and enrichment, but I will say some of the alternative avenues for fuel security are quite interesting: downblending weapons, further enriching depleted uranium tails and breeding plutonium.
I'm working to put some simple case studies together for the next essay to contextualize what some of these options would look like.
The statistic that 99% of US uranium is importd and 60% of enrichment services come from abroad is staggering when you consider nuclear provids 20% of our electricity. The fact that Russia historically controlled 44% of global enrichment capacity and still plays such a dominant role in the supply chain should be a wake up call. Its especially concerning that even with the ban in place, we're still importing Russian uranium on a case by case basis through waivers because we literally dont have the domestic capacity to meet demand.
Thank you for reading! Couldn't agree more - it's certainly a stark landscape. It wasn't always this way. Up until 1980, the U.S. was the leading producer of uranium.
We do need more domestic capacity for uranium and enrichment, but I will say some of the alternative avenues for fuel security are quite interesting: downblending weapons, further enriching depleted uranium tails and breeding plutonium.
I'm working to put some simple case studies together for the next essay to contextualize what some of these options would look like.