Re: story on uranium enrichment on NPR

["Philip Egidi" <phil.egidi@state.co.us>]

Susan, et al.

There have been numerous articles posted at

http://www.1nuclearplace.com/

about the social side of the debate (jobs).  Currently, they have a

couple of articles posted about centrifuge technology culled from the

press:



http://enquirer.com/editions/2002/08/18/fin_forgotten_piketon.html 



http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A33490-2002Aug18.html





My crystal ball has no images of increasing uranium prices.  One of the

last operating mills is here in Colorado, and is in financial

difficulties due to the poor price uranium fetches these days (among

other problems not germane to this discussion).  They have tried to

diversify into processing more exotic ores in order recover zirconium as

well as yellowcake, but to no avail as of yet.  U3O8 is currently

trading at $9.85 per pound, which isn't gonna cut it.  BTW, the RU Disc

U3O8 (I assume this means Russian U3O8 at discount?) is going for $0.20

per pound, according to the following site:



http://www.uxc.com/review/uxc_prices.html



What may be enlightening to the discussion was the petition to the NRC

by the National Mining Association to waive all licensing and inspection

fees for the uranium recovery industry due to the depressed market. 

They fear that the market will remain depressed for the near future.  In

the petition, they postulated that using the uranium mills for direct

disposal of some wastes and reprocessing of other wastes for the

recovery of uranium (which is actually for the considerable disposal fee

they would get, not the value of the yellowcake) would provide the

monies needed to keep some form of a uranium recovery industry viable,

since the premise is that it is a vital commodity.  



http://ruleforum.llnl.gov/cgi-bin/downloader/NMA_PRM_lib/989-0002.htm



The NRC denied the petition on July 3, 2002.



http://ruleforum.llnl.gov/cgi-bin/downloader/NMA_PRM_lib/989-0003.htm



A paper given recently at the Uranium Recovery Workshop in Denver

proposed to take HEU scraps/parts/off-spec materials (perhaps from a

certain facility in TN) and downblend it with DU and then run it through

a uranium mill (not ours in Colorado) to recover yellowcake (the

resulting wastes are then uranium mill tailings and can go on the pile).

 



I know from personal experience that at least two waste streams are

being considered by the mill for either direct disposal or reprocessing

to raise revenue.  Both have met with community resistance to the mills

going into the disposal business, mostly because of the perception the

"dump" business brings on the community.  



Of course, the White Mesa mill in Utah has been accumulating waste for

reprocessing.  They fire up the mill every couple of years when they

have enough material to make a run worth while.



More than the US market, it seems that these companies are looking at

the world-wide demand for uranium fuel.  That is something I know little

to nothing about.

Having worked on projects in both Paducah and Piketon, as well as

spending time in Canon City (where the mill is located), I can attest to

the sensitivity these communities have about creating and losing jobs. 



Phil Egidi

Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment

phil.egidi@state.co.us 

303-692-3083



>>> Susan L Gawarecki <loc@icx.net> 08/20/02 03:02PM >>>

Phil,



Thanks for tracking this down and posting it to the list.  It is

particularly timely in that the Draft Environmental Assessment for the

Transfer of Facilities and Equipment to the United States Enrichment

Corporation Centrifuge Research and Development Project at the East

Tennessee Technology Park [the former K-25 Site at Oak Ridge] has been

released for public comment.  Aside from my perennial criticism about

the use of stale data (1990 housing data?) in the EA, I question why

this effort is going forward at all. 



Urenco is trying to site a commercially viable centrifuge plant (one

potential site is in Erwin, TN) and there is a lot of HEU just waiting

to be downblended (not to mention the MOX likely to be available). 

It's

unclear to me how much the US Government will be subsidizing USEC's

research, but I have suspected this is a payoff in part to compensate

Portsmouth for closure of its GDP (a suspicion intensified upon

learning

there is a shuttered centrifuge project located at PORTS).



Does anyone on RadSafe see potential for a huge jump in the domestic

market for reactor fuel that might justify competing centrifuge plants

in the US?  Or is this really a bailout for USEC, which obviously

won't

be able to compete with Urenco if all it has is the relatively

inefficient Paducah GDP?



A few of my own [cynical] thoughts,

Susan

-- 

.....................................................

Susan L. Gawarecki, Ph.D., Executive Director

Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee

102 Robertsville Road, Suite B, Oak Ridge, TN 37830

Toll free 888-770-3073 ~ www.local-oversight.org 

.....................................................

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