The abolition of restraints on the expanded production of Australian uranium could clear the way for an enrichment business worth $20 billion a year by 2020.
The abolition of restraints on the expanded production of Australian uranium could clear the way for an enrichment business worth $20 billion a year by 2020.
Independent analyst and author of online Stockanalysis, Peter Strachan, said the downstream processing of the mined product uranium oxide, or yellowcake, into fuel rods for nuclear power reactors could develop into a multi billion dollar business to rival Australia’s coal mining industry.
“If Australia was clever, it would be encouraging the production of high value-added fuel rods, sell or lease them to the global nuclear powered electricity generating sector then take them back for disposal,” Mr Strachan told WA Business News.
The enrichment would be from a natural level from about 0.5 per cent uranium oxide to 3.5 per cent, with the four-metre long by 20to 30 centimetre round fuel rods having a life in a 1,000 megawatt (Mw) power station of 18 months to two years. The coal-fired power Collie station generates 300Mw.
Mr Strachan said the money would flow from the manufacture, sale or leasing of the rods, their storage by the owners/lessees for about 50 years after use, then their return to Australia for safe storage in granite blocks that have been stable for many millions of years.
Previous attempts to establish such storage facilities in Western Australia have failed and the federal government has named the Northern Territory as its preferred storage location for domestic intermediate level nuclear waste. No decision has been made.
Mr Strachan said there was currently a world wide yellowcake shortage of more than 25,000 tonnes a year.
A recent analysis of the uranium sector by Hartleys’ Simon Tonkin and Andrew Rowell said major barriers to nuclear energy’s expansion included the high capital cost of building new plants, waste handling and its ultimate long-term storage, and decommissioning costs.
Capital costs were typically two to three times those of a comparable coal or gas power station, but the variable costs of power from uranium were considerably lower than coal and gas.
Another disadvantage of burning fossil fuels, which produces 64 per cent of the world’s electricity, is the creation of greenhouse gases.
