The search for secure sources of HALEU fuel sent a shockwave through the commercial and governmental advanced nuclear reactor network this week when the U.S. company TerraPower signed an agreement with South Africa’s ASP Isotopes for the commercial production of the high-density fuel.
ASP has traditionally been known for producing medical isotopes. But in early 2024 it spun-off a wholly owned subsidiary, Quantum Leap Energy. The business model for QLE is to produce HALEU fuel using proprietary uranium enrichment technology.
At the very least, the deal with TerraPower can be viewed as a hedge against potential supply adequacy and delay associated with the U.S. government’s recent decision to invest $2.7 billion in four companies to produce HALEU – Centrus, Orano, Urenco, and a mystery company, General Matter.
These awards are in addition to recent contracts the Department of Energy has signed for HALEU deconversion that will allow the enriched uranium to be converted to fuel.
A previous cost-share investment with Centrus was designed to provide 900 kilograms of HALEU fuel per year. The Nuclear Energy Institute has estimated that there may be a requirement for a total of 3,000 metric tons of HALEU by 2035.
DoE also has created a HALEU Consortium that will track advancements on the fuel and work in concert with its members.
The need for assured supply of HALEU fuel has been underscored by a spate of deals between advanced reactor developers and Silicon Valley, industrial, and other corporate giants.
Currently, HALEU is produced in Russia. But the U.S. ban on imports of uranium products from Russia, as well as an unwillingness to rely on adversarial nations for the fuel, has sparked a flood of government cash for new uranium enrichment services.
X-energy’s TRISO-X has broken ground on the first advanced nuclear fuel facility at Oak Ridge. Other advanced reactor companies, like Oklo, are exploring the processing of spent fuel to produce the equivalent of HALEU fuel without relying on new enrichment.
An adequate and sustained HALEU fuel supply is central to the goal of widely deploying advanced reactors for climate, geopolitical, energy security, and power purposes. These objectives have been consistently identified as high priorities by Biden administration officials.
The goal of the U.S. government’s actions on HALEU has been to build a secure supply chain in the country and among trusted allies. The Sapporo Five, the U.S., U.K., Canada, Japan, and France, have agreed to work together to ensure a stable fuel supply. But this “friend-sourcing” may be upset by the deal with ASP.
The state of the U.S.-South Africa relationship is strained. This is evidenced by the fact that the U.S.-South Africa nuclear cooperation agreement, originally signed in 1997 and then renegotiated in 2022, has lapsed despite its approval by the U.S. government.
South Africa also is a leader of the nonaligned movement and has supported Russia’s war in Ukraine and recently signed a nuclear fuel MOU with that nation.
Further, the recent non-aligned BRICS meeting, chaired by Russia, established the Nuclear Energy Platform, with the membership of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the UAE. The objective of this new organization is to focus on energy and non-energy uses of peaceful nuclear technologies in BRICS and BRICS+ nations.
The end of 2024 is witnessing the transition of the value of advanced nuclear power from the theoretical to the deployable.
But this advancement is exposing possible frailty in the political contract that has assumed domestic primacy in advanced nuclear energy and fuel in exchange for massive investment by the U.S. government and its allies.
The commercial world is questioning the durability of this deal and the assurance of U.S. and allied nation HALEU fuel supply. That concern has moved a well-capitalized American company like TerraPower to align with an uncertain U.S. ally in South Africa, exposing possible flaws in the foundation of the advanced nuclear status quo.
Ken Luongo, President, Partnership for Global Security
