Tenex

The conversion services market has been hardening as the nuclear industry recognises the vulnerability of this sector. By Julian Steyn

The world U^sub 3^O^sub 8^ to UF^sub 6^ conversion services market was characterised by 'soft' demand and adequate supply until September 2003 when the operation of the Honeywell uranium conversion plant located in Metropolis, was disrupted by process leaks and was forced to shutdown. This disruption resulted in an immediate market hardening and in the industry-wide realisation that the nuclear fuel cycle front end, including conversion, is vulnerable to interruption at any time.

Metropolis, the only uranium conversion plant in the USA, experienced an event that resulted in being shutdown in September 2003. The plant was restarted after approximately eight weeks in late November 2003. It had just resumed full production when four weeks later, in December 2003, it was shutdown again by order of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), following another incident. On 26 March 2004, the NRC gave approval for restart of the first stage in the uranium conversion process at the Metropolis plant, feed preparation. At the end of April, the plant was restarted and began to slowly work its way back to production. However, as recently as 17 May 2005, the company announced that the plant is still coming back and would be increasing production at a steady pace over the next several months. It may be another year before it is back to full production.

The conversion services price rise received further negative impetus in November 2003, when Russia's Techsnabexport (Tenex) announced that it would no longer supply natural uranium (in the form of UF^sub 6^) to its former subsidiary, GNSS. GNSS promptly claimed that this action would deprive it of supply to meet its commitments to customers. Tenex later entered into separate arrangements to provide backstop supply for affected utilities.

On the positive side, on 16 March 2005, Cameco announced that it had reached a ten-year agreement with the UK company BNFL for the UF^sub 6^ toll conversion of uranium trioxidc (UO^sub 3^) produced at Cameco's Blind River plant in Ontario, Canada. The BNFL Springfields plant that had been scheduled to shutdown early in 2006 will now continue operating until at least 2016, and provide needed additional UF^sub 6^ capacity to the nuclear fuel industry.

The Figure on the next page shows that the sustainable capacities of the existing conversion plants when combined with the government and commercial inventories indicate, on the face of it, that the industry should be able to provide adequate primary and equivalent conversion services supply through about the middle of the next decade. However, the supply capability margins are relatively thin and, as already demonstrated by the Metropolis plant incident, interruption by any one of the producers or the inventory holders could cause problems for consumers. The interruption also highlighted the geographical issues associated with conversion services supply, particularly between Europe and North America. There is only one European primary supplier currently offering commercial conversion in a region that has a demand that is 50% greater than the indigenous primary capacity.

The Metropolis supply interruption made it clear that inventories of UF^sub 6^ cannot always be easily swapped out to provide separate conversion services to meet consumer short-term needs and that borrowing is much more difficult than it used to be in the 1990s. While the Metropolis shutdowns and the impending shutdown of the BNFL plant resulted in a significant market price rise and an overall hardening of the market during the past 18 months, the recovery of the Metropolis plant and the negotiation of the CamecoBNFL agreement should result in some softening over the next few years.

THE MARKET

The world reference case requirements for conversion services as UF^sub 6^, UF^sub 4^, and UO^sub 3^, that is, in all forms, are projected to rise gradually from 67,300tU in 2004 to 98,800tU by 2025. The annual reference case requirements for uranium as UF^sub 6^ for enriched uranium fuelled reactors, that is, UF^sub 6^-only, are projected to rise gradually from 63,200tU in 2004 to 93,800tU by 2025. The difference between the two projections represents projected requirements for natural uranium fuel, primarily UO^sub 2^, for Canadian and some UK reactors. US requirements are projected to remain relatively constant at approximately 20,000tU through 2025 for the reference case forecast.

The events at the Metropolis plant caused the North American spot market price, which was $5.00 per kgU as UF^sub 6^ at the end of October 2003, to run up to $7.7 5 by the end of June 2004. However, the seven-week labour strike at Cameco's Port Hope plant in the summer of 2004, and the then approaching shutdown of the Springfields plant, resulted in the price continuing to rise to $12.00 by the end of March 2005, where it has remained since. The European conversion services spot market price also rose from $6.75 to $12.00 during the same period. The reason for the North American and European market prices ending at the same level is due in large part to the recently enhanced ability to swap between market sectors at very little cost.

The UF^sub 6^ conversion services spot and long-term market volumes in 2004 were approximately 5.0 million kgU and 35.0 million kgU, respectively. Approximately three-quarters of the spot volume was for UF^sub 6^. Spot market volume during the first half of 2005 was slightly greater than in all of 2004. Again, almost three-quarters of the volume was for UF^sub 6^. Traders and converters, in the ratio of about two to one, made up about half of the volume during the first half of 2005.

The reduction of enrichment production m the USA resulting from heavy reliance on Russian HEUderived enrichment has impacted the international conversion services market flow, particularly for ConverDyn. When the planned LES enrichment plant is brought into operation in the USA later in this decade then the prospects for the domestic conversion market could brighten.

PRIMARY SUPPLIERS

The world currently has five major commercial primary suppliers of conversion services, one or more of whom can transform uranium mine concentrates into either UF^sub 6^, ceramic grade uranium dioxide (UO^sub 2^), or uranium metal. Two of these suppliers are in North America, two are in Western Europe, and one is in Russia. The suppliers are: BNFL, Cameco, Comurhex, ConverDyn, and Russia's Rosatom, formerly Minatom. Rosatom has not exported conversion services as such in the past, instead exporting limited quantities of enriched uranium product (EUP) containing equivalent conversion services to Western Europe, the USA, and East Asia. However, the Russians have recently begun entering the conversion services market in the USA and Europe.

The status of the five major suppliers is as follows:

BNFL

BNFE subsidiary Westinghouse operates the 6000tU per year UF^sub 6^ Line 4 Hex plant located at Springfields, near Preston, Eancashire in the UK. On 9 February 2001, BNFE announced that it planned to stop production at Springfields after 31 March 2006. It made this decision based on the fact that fuel production for its Magnox nuclear plants is expected to end during the next several years, when its Magnox stations will then be approaching shutdown. At the time it was thought that operation of the Springfields plant for UF^sub 6^ production alone would not be economical after the Magnox fuel production ends. However, on 16 March 2005, Cameco announced that it had entered into a 5000tU per year UO^sub 3^ to UF^sub 6^ ten-year (at least) base-quantity toll conversion agreement with BNFL, an agreement that gave Sprmgfields a new lease on life.

Cameco Corporation

Cameco operates the 18,000tU per year Blind River, Ontario, UO^sub 3^ plant, the product of which is converted to UF^sub 6^ at the company's Port Hope, Ontario plant which has a nameplate capacity of 12,500tU as UF^sub 6^ per year. Overall UF^sub 6^ and UO^sub 2^ production in 2005 is expected to be 13,000tU. It is estimated that overall production at Port Hope in 2004 was 9500tU, down about 29% compared to the previous year due to a labour strike, summer vacations, and production rescheduling. It is estimated that UF^sub 6^ production in 2004, which was about 7500tU, may increase to approximately 11,000tU in 2005.

The Port Hope plant is licensed to produce 2800tU per year as UO^sub 2^ to meet the conversion requirements of natural uranium-fuelled heavy water reactors in Canada and South Korea. Cameco is also one of the three Western companies that has UF^sub 6^ supply from the March 1999 Russian HEU feed commercial marketing agreement; the other two companies are Cogema (see Comurhex below) and RWE Nukem.

After March 2006 approximately 5000tU UO^sub 3^ will be shipped annually from Blind River m Canada to Springfields in the UK. Cameco has filed a licence application to expand the capacity of its Blind River UO^sub 3^ facility from 18,000tU to 24,000tU. Cameco's UF^sub 6^ capacity from 2006 onward, including the BNFL addition, will be 18,500tU.

Comurhex

Comurhex, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cogema, a division of Areva, operates the Malvesi UF^sub 4^ plant whose product is converted at the Pierrelatte UF^sub 6^ plant. Production of UF^sub 6^ in 2004 was reported to have been about 14,000tU, up from 11,000tU in 2003. The Malvesi plant also produces uranium metal. There are indications that the sustainable output level of the plant is in the range of 13,000tU to 14,000tU per year. There has been less incentive to expand plant capacity since Cogema began taking delivery of significant quantities of UF^sub 6^ under the March 1999 Russian HEU feed commercial marketing agreement. However, Areva management has indicated that the question of expanded capacity for the future is on its agenda. One alternative may be a phased refurbishment and modification of the Malvesi plant over the next five to ten years so that it can ship UO^sub 3^ to Pierrelatte for fluorination. Expansion could be included in this option.

ConverDyn

ConverDyn, a general partnership of affiliates of Honeywell and General Atomics, is the exclusive agent for conversion services provided by the Metropolis Works plant in Metropolis, Illinois. Over the past few years work has been done to increase the plant's full sustainable capacity to 13,000tU per year. In spite of the plant's sixmonth shutdown late in the year, it produced approximately 7000tU during 2003. Even though the plant was not restarted until the end of April 2004, it produced 6100tU in 2004. Looking ahead, ConverDyn anticipates producing 11,000tU in 2005 and 13,000tU in 2006. It expects to be fully recovered from its 2003-2004 problems by 2008, with normal working inventories at the three major Western enrichers.

Rosatom

Russia's Rosatom is understood to have conversion plants in three locations: Angarsk, Tomsk and Irkutsk. While the physical annual capacity of the three-plant system has been variously reported to range from 10,000tU to more than 20,000tU, it is estimated that 2004 production was only about 4500tU. This is based on estimates of uranium feed that is coming primarily from Russian and Ukrainian mines, and from analyses of Russian uranium enrichment production levels. While Russia has not historically sold either conversion services or UF^sub 6^ in the Western markets, except as it is contained in EUP, there are reports that it is now beginning to do so. It is reported that several US utilities are discussing conversion of Kazakh and Uzbek uranium in Russia.

Other suppliers

China is capable of meeting its own current internal annual demand for UF^sub 6^ of about 1500tU. Annual capacity is expected to be increased to 2000tU by the end of the decade, and to 5000tU by 2020. There are also small conversion facilities operating in Argentina, India, Brazil, and South Korea. The total annual capacity of these small plants is currently about 700tU.

INVENTORIES

There are substantial inventories of UF^sub 6^-equivalent (UF^sub 6^e) uranium currently being held by governments, utilities and suppliers in the USA and the rest of the world. There is also projected to be UF^sub 6^e supply from recycle savings, enrichment plant underfeeding, and from enrichment tails upgrading in Russia. These sources could collectively provide UF^sub 6^ supply amounting to at least 18,000tU per year through about 2015, declining to 13,000 by 2020, and almost none by 2025.

A summary list of the world total estimated UF^sub 6^e inventories at the beginning of 2005 is given in the Table on this page. The inventory estimates do not include enrichment plant underfeeding and Western European and Russian tails that could be upgraded in Russia using that country's surplus enrichment capacity. The commercial stocks given above assume that approximately half of the Western world's utility-owned uranium inventories are in UF^sub 6^e form and less than six months into the fuel cycle pipeline. The commercial inventories given above do not include material that is believed to be held by Russia because such quantities are speculative and include material in many forms, some of which may not meet Western fuel specifications. Although some materials such as uranyl nitrate will not need to be converted to UF^sub 6^, they will displace demand for UF^sub 6^. The Russian HEU includes the blending of HEU with reprocessed uranium in Europe, a programme that will also displace a total of about 10,000tU of UF^sub 6^ demand over the next 20 years.

SUPPLYAND DEMAND BALANCE

The Figure shows the 2005 World Nuclear Association (WNA) world conversion services requirements projection based on the reference case uranium forecasts presented at the World Nuclear Fuel Cycle joint conference in San Antonio in April 2005 organised by the WNA and Nuclear Energy Institute. The WNA uranium forecast was adjusted by subtracting the world's natural uranium reactor requirements projected by Energy Resources International. World conversion services requirements are projected to rise from their current level of 63,200tU to 93,800tU by 2025.

It can be seen that conversion plant sustainable primary capacity is projected to rise from its current level of about 45,000tU to approximately 50,000tU by the end of the decade, and to 60,000tU by 2025. The difference between these levels and requirements is projected to be made up by Russian HEU-derived UF^sub 6^e, inventories in all forms including US HEU, tails upgrading in Russia, and recycle savings supply.

The sustainable capacities of the existing conversion plants when combined with the government and commercial inventories in all forms, indicate that the industry should be able to provide adequate actual and equivalent conversion services supply through about the middle of the next decade. However, the supply capability margins are relatively thin, and as already demonstrated, an interruption by any one of the producers or the inventory holders could cause problems for consumers. The 2025 shortfall is approximately 24,000tU, an amount that corresponds to two large conversion plants.

Julian Steyn, Energy Resources international Inc., 1015 18th Street, NW, Suite 650, Washington, DC 20036, USA

Copyright Wilmington Publishing Ltd. Sep 2005
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