U.S. Uranium Concentrate Production in 2021 Close to All-Time Lows: EIA

The U.S. produced 21,000 pounds of uranium concentrate last year, which is less than one percent of the 2014 production of 4.9 million pounds, the highest since 2000, according to a July 26 report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Uranium is the fuel that is widely used by nuclear power plants for nuclear fission. An increasing amount of the fuel used by power reactors is purchased from other countries owing to declining domestic production.

Production data were not reported in 2020, but last year’s production dropped by 88 percent from 2019 levels, according to the agency’s annual uranium production report released in May. Commercial nuclear power plants purchased a total of 46.7 million pounds of uranium concentrate in 2021 at an average price of $33.91 per pound. By comparison, the 2020 purchase volume was slightly higher at 48.9 million pounds, although the procured price was marginally lower at $33.27 per pound. The country imported about 95 percent of uranium bought in 2021 because of lower domestic production. A total of 35 percent of U.S. purchases came from Kazakhstan, followed by 15 percent from Canada and 14 percent from Australia.

In 2021, domestic nuclear power plant operators bought enrichment service contracts for processing 14 million separative work units, or SWU, a measure of the effort involved in isolating uranium isotopes during the enrichment process. In 2021, about 19 percent of SWUs originated in the U.S., while the remaining 81 percent were processed abroad: 28 percent from Russia, 17 percent from the U.K., 13 percent from Germany, and 11 percent from the Netherlands.

There are various phases of the nuclear fuel cycle represented in commercial uranium inventories such as in-process for conversion, enrichment, or fabrication. The U.S. commercial inventories totaled 141.7 million pounds at the end of 2021, an increase of 8 percent over 2020. Commercial nuclear reactor operators own 108.5 million pounds of uranium concentrate equivalent as of 2021, a two percent increase from 2020.