I toured a US national lab that developed a method to extract uranium from seawater. Their results are frankly outstanding. Plastic fibers are cheaply impreg

I toured a US national lab that developed a method to extract uranium from seawater. Their results are frankly outstanding. Plastic fibers are cheaply impregnated with a binder than removes the uranium from the seawater. All you need to do is anchor long sections of the fibers in a high current area like a synthetic kelp bed, pull them onto a boat every few months, and rinse off the uranium with a mild acid (citric or weaker works). The cost analysis for this preliminary configuration estimated yellow cake production at 2x market rate. Last I heard they were working on ways to reduce costs and increase yields. For example, they were working with desalination plants to test extracting uranium from the concentrated effluent before discharge. The method does extract other valuable metals which can either be processed and sold, or returned to the ocean without issue.