3 ms·
> And where does the nuclear fuel come from? Russia. Not true at all. Russia is producing 5% of the world Uranium, and they probably use quite a lot of that do
by lelag 2y ago
> And where does the nuclear fuel come from? Russia.
Not true at all. Russia is producing 5% of the world Uranium, and they probably use quite a lot of that domestically given they produce 8% of all nuclear power in the world with their own plant.
Kazakhstan + Uzbekistan is 50% of the word production. Canada is second and will be happy to start selling to the EU. Namibia and Australia both produce twice as much as Russia.
Not to say that supply of natural Uranium is not a concern because you do depends of a small list of countries but we don't need to buy any from Russia.
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_p...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country
- est31 2y agoRussia's large market share is rather in uranium enrichment than uranium mining. That's what I meant when I wrote "nuclear fuel".
- legulere 2y agoThat’s raw uranium ore. Uranium undergoes several refinement steps. In each Russia has an enormous market share.
- account42 2y agoSo? Refinement doesn't have a dependency on a particular location. This is like saying nuclear energy in Germany is dependent on France and other countries. Currently it is but only because we choose to not do it locally - it doesn't have to be this way.
- rhubinak 2y agoNot true by skimming the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enriched_uranium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enriched_uranium > The following countries are known to operate enrichment facilities: Argentina, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Iran, Japan, the Netherlands, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
- legulere 2y agoBefore uranium enrichment comes conversion to Uranium Hexafluoride. For instance the German uranium enrichment facility (biggest one in Europe) gets Uranium Hexafluoride from Russia. Also a list of countries operating enrichment facilities does not say anything about capacity (Russia 50%) or market share (Russia 44%). https://www.enerdata.net/publications/executive-briefing/uranium-enrichment.html https://www.enerdata.net/publications/executive-briefing/ura... The reality is that both the US and Europe are dependent on Russian uranium services, with the biggest dependency in Eastern Europe for fuel rods for Soviet-style Reactors. It's slowly changing, but will probably take decades.
- philistine 2y agoYou know refinement can be done anywhere? We take bauxite and ship it to the other side of the world to make aluminium because electric power is cheaper there.
- ViewTrick1002 2y agoWe still haven't been able to decouple from the Russian nuclear industry. It is one of few industries not yet sanctioned. On the other hand Germany managed to decouple itself from the Russian fossil gas industry within months. So tell me again "How it can be done anywhere" when we apparently can't do it without Russia 3 years into the war.