Production of natural uranium concentrates

Natural uranium, i.e., isotopically speaking, as found in its natural state, is the essential raw material for the manufacture of nuclear fuels.

Natural uranium is a very special raw material:

• it is dispersed in low-grade ores, which means that the ore has to be processed close to the mine;

• the ores that contain it present nuisances that require special care.

Although there are hardly any power reactors today that run on natural uranium (graphite moderator or heavy water), the latter is the basic material for producing enriched uranium, which is used in the manufacture of modern nuclear fuels.

The fuel cycle offers the possibility of recycling residual (enriched uranium) and generated (plutonium) fissile materials, after they have passed through the reactor. This possibility is still little used today, for a variety of technical reasons, except in France, where a program to recycle plutonium in mixed oxide fuel (MOX) has been launched. Even if it were, as most nuclear reactors - with the exception of fast-neutron reactors, which are currently at the stage of industrial prototypes - consume more fissile elements than they produce, the shortfall must be offset by the production of new raw materials. Uranium is therefore needed for :

• supply the first load for the new reactors;

• ensure fuel renewal for reactors in service.