China is finding it hard to get enough uranium to fuel nuclear plants

International Herald Tribune
April 22, 2007 

BOAO, China: China is finding it hard to obtain enough uranium to fuel the nuclear power reactors it plans to build, according to the country’s top energy official.

The comments by Chen Deming, a vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, came just months after China signed a deal with Australia giving it access to yellowcake from Australia, which has about 40 percent of the world’s recoverable uranium reserves.

“Where are the materials? I still have no answer now and am searching for materials in other countries, including Australia,” Chen said Saturday at the annual Boao Forum for Asia on the southern island of Hainan.

China plans to have 40 gigawatts of nuclear power generation capacity in place by 2020, up from about 7 gigawatts at the end of 2006. In addition, China will have a further 18 gigawatts of nuclear capacity under construction by 2020, Chen said.

“Altogether, China will develop nearly 60 gigawatts of nuclear power generation facility, and that’s a very large number,” said Chen.

The 60 gigawatts of nuclear capacity is roughly two-thirds of Britain’s total capacity.

Local media said earlier this month that China would set up a national strategic uranium reserve as part of its five-year plan for the nuclear industry up to 2010. China’s own uranium deposits, which must also provide fuel for its nuclear weapons program, are relatively limited so Beijing has been looking overseas for supplies.

Global uranium prices are now closing in on $100 a pound and could climb sharply higher.

Chen said that, in the long run, nuclear power was only a partial alternative to oil and coal because the world’s total reserves of uranium could never be enough to make nuclear a primary source of power.

The nation is drafting regulations to require the government and companies to build up emergency stockpiles to protect against international price fluctuations, he said .

China is building storage tanks in Zhenhai, Zhousan and Qingdao and in the northern city of Dalian, he said. The terminals are set to be completed in 2008. China completed a 3.7 billion yuan, or $476 million, oil storage tank in Zhenhai in October and has started filling it.

Iran set to announce nuclear plans on Monday

By Edmund Blair

TEHRAN (Reuters) – Iran’s president has promised to disclose news about Iran’s nuclear program when he visits its uranium enrichment facility on Monday where the West says Iran is mastering the skills needed to make atomic bombs.

Iran has rejected U.N. demands to halt enrichment, a process than can make power plant fuel or material for warheads, and has instead vowed to expand what it insists is peaceful atomic work.

Diplomats speculate President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could announce that Iran has installed more centrifuges, the machines used in the enrichment process, at the Natanz facility in central Iran. But Iranian officials have been tightlipped.

“If you wait 24 hours, you will all find out,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told a Sunday news conference when asked what the president would announce.

Journalists will accompany the president with senior officials from Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization to the site about 200 km (125 miles) south of Tehran.

Ahmadinejad, who said in February he would announce “great” nuclear achievements in the days to April 9, is expected to hold a news conference.

Sunday’s Jam-e Jam newspaper wrote: “The installation and start up of 3,000 centrifuges and the injection of uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas will be announced by the president.”

UF6 gas is fed into centrifuges as feedstock.

Iran, the world’s fourth largest oil exporter which says it wants a network of nuclear power plants, runs 350 experimental centrifuges at an above ground pilot facility at Natanz.

The IAEA said in February Iran had set up two cascades of 164 centrifuges below ground, where Iran is installing 3,000 machines as part of its “industrial” enrichment plans.

Diplomats who follow Iran’s nuclear file say Iran has set up four more cascades since February, bringing the total number now in the underground section to six cascades or 984 centrifuges. The diplomats have said no feedstock has been fed in yet.

The Islamic Republic’s refusal to accept U.N. demands to stop enrichment has prompted the U.N. Security Council to pass two sanctions resolutions on the country since December.

The UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, says it has gaps in its knowledge about Iran’s plans that need to be filled before it can confirm they are peaceful.

The IAEA is pushing Tehran to agree to let it install cameras in the underground section of Natanz to monitor Iran’s work. Iran says such intrusive surveillance goes beyond its basic safeguards commitment to the IAEA. Talks continue.

Angered by the second sanctions resolution in March, Iran said it would limit cooperation with the IAEA by not giving early word of plans to build new nuclear installations, backing out of a voluntary agreement to provide such information.