Uranium depletion

Uranium depletion is the inescapable result of extracting and consuming uranium since it is a finite resource. The journal Environmental Science and Technology argues that the availability of high-grade uranium ore will deplete over time making the fuel more environmentally and economically expensive to extract. [cite web
url=http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=8568
title= Uranium not a magic bullet, says new study
date=2008-04-27
language=English
accessdate=2008-05-13]

Uranium production

Primary sources

About 96% of the global uranium reserves are found in these ten countries: Australia, Canada, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Brazil, Namibia, Uzbekistan, USA, Niger, and Russia [cite web
title=Uranium reserves
publisher=European Nuclear Society
author=
url=http://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/u/uranium-reserves.htm
date=
language=English
accessdate=2008-05-09] Out of those Canada (28% of world production) and Australia (23%) are the major producers. [cite web
url=http://www.uxc.com/fuelcycle/uranium/production-uranium.html
title=World Uranium Production
publisher=UxC
date=2007-11-27
language=English
accessdate=2008-03-15 ] In 1996, the world produced 39,000 tonnes of Uranium. [cite web
url=http://www.uic.com.au/nip41.htm
title=World Uranium Mining, Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper 41
publisher=Australian Uranium Association
date=2007-07
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-15] And in 2005, the world produced a peak of 41,720 tonnes of uranium,cite web
url=http://www.uxc.com/fuelcycle/uranium/production-uranium.html
title=UxC: World Uranium Production
publisher=UxC Consulting Company, LLC
date=2007-11-27
language=English
accessdate=2008-05-01] although the the production continues to not meet demand.

Various agencies have tried to estimate how long these primary resources will last, assuming a once-through cycle. The European Commission said in 2001 that at the current level of uranium consumption, known uranium resources would last 42 years. When added to military and secondary sources, the resources could be stretched to 72 years. Yet this rate of usage assumes that nuclear power continues to provide only a fraction of the world’s energy supply. If electric capacity were increased six-fold, then the 72-year supply would last just 12 years.cite web
url=http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/industrials/article555314.ece
title=Uranium shortage poses threat
publisher=The Times
author=Uranium shortage poses threat
date=2005-08=15
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-25] The world's present measured resources of uranium, economically recoverable at a price of 130 USD/kg according to the industry groups Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), are enough to last for "at least a century" at current consumption rates. [cite web
url= http://www.nea.fr/html/general/press/2008/2008-02.html
title= "Uranium resources sufficient to meet projected nuclear energy requirements long into the future"
date= 3 June 2008 | publisher= Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA)
quote= "Uranium 2007: Resources, Production and Demand", also known as the Red Book, estimates the identified amount of conventional uranium resources which can be mined for less than USD 130/kg to be about 5.5 million tonnes, up from the 4.7 million tonnes reported in 2005. Undiscovered resources, i.e. uranium deposits that can be expected to be found based on the geological characteristics of already discovered resources, have also risen to 10.5 million tonnes. This is an increase of 0.5 million tonnes compared to the previous edition of the report. The increases are due to both new discoveries and re-evaluations of known resources, encouraged by higher prices.
accessdate= 2008-06-16 ] [cite web
publisher=OECD Publishing
url=http://www.oecdbookshop.org/oecd/display.asp?sf1=identifiers&st1=9789264047662
title=Uranium 2007 – Resources, Production and Demand
date=2008-06-17
isbn=9789264047662
accessdate=2008-06-21] According to the Australian Uranium Association, yet another industry group, assuming the world's current rate of consumption at 66,500 tonnes of Uranium per year and the world's present measured resources of uranium (4.7 Mt) are enough to last for some 70 years.cite web
url=http://www.uic.com.au/nip75.htm
title=Uranium Supply
publisher=Australian Uranium Association
date=2007-03
language=English]

econdary resources

Only 62% of the requirements of power utilities are supplied by mines. The balance comes from inventories held by utilities and other fuel cycle companies, inventories held by governments, used reactor fuel that has been reprocessed, recycled materials from military nuclear programs and uranium in depleted uranium stockpiles. [cite web
url=http://www.cameco.com/uranium_101/markets/
title=Markets
publisher=Cameco Corporation
language=English]

The plutonium from dismantled cold war nuclear weapon stockpiles is drying up and will end by 2013. The industry is trying to find and develop new uranium mines, mainly in Canada, Australia and Kazakhstan. However, those under development will fill only half the current gap.cite web
url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2006/jun/07/guardiansocietysupplement2
title=On the road to ruin
publisher=The Guardian
author=Michael Meacher
date=2006-06-07
language=English]

Unconventional resources

Unconventional resources are occurrences that require novel technologies for their exploitation and/or use. Often unconventional resources occur in low-concentration. The exploitation of unconventional uranium requires additional research and development efforts for which there is no imminent economic need, given the large conventional resource base and the option of reprocessing spent fuel.cite web
url=http://www.worldenergy.org/publications/survey_of_energy_resources_2007/uranium/673.asp
title=Survey of Energy Resources 2007 Uranium - Resources
publisher=World Energy Council
date=2007
language=English] Phosphates, seawater, uraniferous coal ash, and some type of oil shales are examples of unconventional resources being considered.

Phosphates

The soaring price of uranium may cause long-dormant operations to extract uranium from phosphate.cite web
url=http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070511/NEWS/705110305/-1/Help0530
title=Phosphate industry may restart uranium mining as price soars
publisher=Herald Tribune
author=Ted Jackovics
date=2007-05-11
language=English] The technology for recovering uranium from phosphate mines is mature.

Worldwide, there were approximately 400 wet-process phosphoric acid plants in operation. Assuming an average recoverable content of 100 ppm of uranium, this scenario would result in a maximum theoretical annual output of 3700 tonnes U₃O₈. [cite web
url=http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1104_scr.pdf
title=Analysis of Uranium Supply to 2050 - STI-PUB-1104
publisher=IAEA
date=2001-05
language=English
accessdate=2008-05-07] Historical operating costs for the uranium recovery from phosphoric acid range from $48-119/Kg U₃O₈. [cite web
url=http://www.wise-uranium.org/purec.html
title=Uranium Recovery from Phosphates
publisher=Wise Uranium Project
date=2008-02-17
language=English
accessdate=2008-05-07] These operating costs are by far higher than uranium market prices, and most uranium recovery plants have been closed.

eawater

The uranium concentration of seawater is approximately 3 parts per billion but the quantity of contained uranium is vast. Researchers estimate there are some 4 billion tonnes. This amounts to 700 times more than known terrestrial resources recoverable at a price of up to $130 per kg of U₃O₈.Fact|date=May 2008 If half of this resource could ultimately be recovered, it could support for 6,500 years 3,000 GW of nuclear capacity.Fact|date=May 2008

One method of extracting uranium from seawater is using a uranium-specific nonwoven fabric as an absorbent. The total amount of uranium recovered from three collection boxes containing 350 Kg of fabric was >1 kg of yellow cake after 240 days of submersion in the ocean.cite journal
url=http://www.ans.org/pubs/journals/nt/va-144-2-274-278
title=Aquaculture of Uranium in Seawater by a Fabric-Adsorbent Submerged System
journal=Nuclear Technology
publisher=American Nuclear Society
author=Noriaki Seko, Akio Katakai, Shin Hasegawa, Masao Tamada, Noboru Kasai, Hayato Takeda, Takanobu Sugo, Kyoichi Saito
date=November 2003
volume=144
number=2
accessdate=2008-04-30] According to the OECD, uranium may be extracted from seawater using this method for about $300/KgU cite web
url=http://www.neutron.kth.se/courses/reactor_physics/NEA-redbook2003.pdf
title=Uranium Resources 2003: Resources, Production and Demand
publisher=OECD World Nuclear Agency and International Atomic Energy Agency
author=
date=2008-03
page=p. 22
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-23] The experiment by Seko et al was repeated by Tamada et al in 2006. They found that the cost varied from ¥15,000 to ¥88,000 (Yen) depending on assumptions and "The lowest cost attainable now is ¥25,000 with 4g-U/kg-adsorbent used in the sea area of Okinawa, with 18 repetitionuses [sic] ." With the May, 2008 exchange rate, this was about $240/Kg U [cite journal
url=http://jolisfukyu.tokai-sc.jaea.go.jp/fukyu/mirai-en/2006/4_5.html
author=Tamada M. et al.
title=Cost Estimation of Uranium Recovery from Seawater with System of Braid type Adsorbent
publisher=Nippon Genshiryoku Gakkai Wabun Ronbunshi.
volume=5
number=No.4
date=2006
pages=p.358-363
language=Japanese, translated into English
accessdate=2008-05-02]

Among the other methods to recover uranium from sea water, two seem promising: algae bloom to concentrate Uranium [cite journal
url=http://www.springerlink.com/content/p22p0j6u818x3h34/
title=Extraction of uranium from sea water by cultured algae
publisher=SpringerLink
author=E. A. Heide, K. Wagener1, M. Paschke and M. Wald
date=1973-09
volume=60
number=9
accessdate=2008-04-22] and nanomembrane filtering. [cite web
url=http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/en/wo.jsp?wo=2004080578&IA=WO2004080578&DISPLAY=DESC
title=Purification of fluids with nanomaterials
author=Cooper, Christopher, H. et al.
date=2003-03-07
accessdate=2008-04-22]

So far, no more than a very small amount of uranium has been recovered from sea water in a laboratory.

Uraniferous coal ash

An international consortium has set out to explore the commercial extraction of uranium from uraniferous coal ash from coal power stations located in Yunnan province, China.

Oil shales

Some oil shales contain uranium as a byproduct. Between 1946 and 1952, a marine type of Dictyonema shale was used for uranium production in Sillamäe, Estonia, and between 1950 and 1989 alum shale was used in Sweden for the same purpose.Cite paper
last =Dyni | first =John R.
title =Geology and resources of some world oil-shale deposits. Scientific Investigations Report 2005–5294
publisher = U.S. Department of the Interior. U.S. Geological Survey
year = 2006
url = http://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2005/5294/pdf/sir5294_508.pdf
format=PDF
accessdate =2007-07-09]

Countries whose uranium has already depleted

Many countries are not able to supply their own uranium demands anymore. Eleven countries have already exhausted their uranium resources: Germany, the Czech Republic, France, DR Congo, Gabon, Bulgaria, Tajikistan, Hungary, Romania, Spain, Portugaland Argentina have already peaked their uranium production and exhausted their uranium resources and must rely on imports for their nuclear programs or abandon them.cite web
url=http://www.lbst.de/publications/studies__e/2006/EWG-paper_1-06_Uranium-Resources-Nuclear-Energy_03DEC2006.pdf
title=Uranium Resources and Nuclear Energy
publisher=Energy Watch Group
date=2006-12
language=English
accessdate=2004-04-23] cite web
url=http://www.neutron.kth.se/courses/reactor_physics/NEA-redbook2003.pdf
title=Uranium Resources 2003: Resources, Production and Demand
publisher=OECD World Nuclear Agency and International Atomic Energy Agency
author=
date=2008-03
page=p. 29
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-23]

Pessimistic uranium depletion outlook

Various agencies have tried to estimate how long these resources will last.

*European Commission

The European Commission said in 2001 that at the current level of uranium consumption, known uranium resources would last 42 years. When added to military and secondary sources, the resources could be stretched to 72 years. Yet this rate of usage assumes that nuclear power continues to provide only a fraction of the world’s energy supply. If electric capacity were increased six-fold, then the 72-year supply would last just 12 years.cite web
url=http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/industrials/article555314.ece
title=Uranium shortage poses threat
publisher=The Times
author=Uranium shortage poses threat
date=2005-08-15
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-25]

*OECD

The world's present measured resources of uranium, economically recoverable at a price of 130 USD/kg according to the industry groups OECD, NEA and IAEA, are enough to last for some 80 years at current consumption [cite web
publisher=OECD Publishing
url=http://www.oecdbookshop.org/oecd/display.asp?sf1=identifiers&st1=662006031P1
title=Uranium 2005 – Resources, Production and Demand
date=2006-02-06
isbn=9789264024250]
*Australian Uranium Association

According to the Australian Uranium Association, yet another industry group, assuming the world's current rate of consumption at 66,500 tonnes of Uranium per year and the world's present measured resources of uranium (4.7 Mt) are enough to last for some 70 years.cite web
url=http://www.uic.com.au/nip75.htm
title=Uranium Supply
publisher=Australian Uranium Association
date=2007-03
language=English]

Optimistic uranium depletion outlook

All the following references claim that the supply is far more than demand. Therefore, they believe that uranium will not deplete in the near future or ever.

* M. King HubbertIn his 1956 landmark paper, M. King Hubbert wrote "There is promise, however, provided mankind can solve its international problems and not destroy itself with nuclear weapons, and provided world population (which is now expanding at such a rate as to double in less than a century) can somehow be brought under control, that we may at last have found an energy supply adequate for our needs for at least the next few centuries of the "foreseeable future.""cite web
url=http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/1956/1956.pdf
title=Nuclear Energy and the Fossil Fuels 'Drilling and Production Practice'
author=M. King Hubbert
publisher=American Petroleum Institute
page=36
date=1956-06
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-18] Hubbert's study assumed that breeder reactors would replace light water reactors and that uranium would be bred into plutonium (and possibly thorium would be bred into uranium). He also assumed that economic means of reprocessing would be discovered. For political, economic and nuclear proliferation reasons, the plutonium economy never materialized. Without it, uranium is used up in a once-through process and will peak and run out much sooner. [cite web
url=http://www.peakoil.org.au/peakuranium.htm
title=Is there enough Uranium to run a nuclear industry big enough to take over from fossil fuels?
publisher=Peak oil.en peakoil.org.au
author=Dave Kimble
date=
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-21] However, at present, it is generally found to be cheaper to mine new uranium out of the ground than to use reprocessed uranium, and therefore the use of reprocessed uranium is limited to only a few nations.

* IAEAThe IAEA estimates that using only known reserves at the current rate of demand and assuming a once-through nuclear cycle that uranium will deplete in 85 years. However, if all primary known reserves, secondary reserves, undiscovered and unconventional sources of uranium are used, uranium will be depleted in 47,000 years.Fact|date=May 2008

* OECDThe OECD estimates that with 2002 world nuclear electricity generating rates, with LWR, once-through fuel cycle, there are enough conventional resources to last 270 years. With breeders, this is extended to 8,500 years. [cite web
url=http://www.neutron.kth.se/courses/reactor_physics/NEA-redbook2003.pdf
title=Uranium Resources 2003: Resources, Production and Demand
publisher=OECD World Nuclear Agency and International Atomic Energy Agency
author=
page=p. 65
date=2008-03
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-23]

If one is willing to pay $300/KgU uranium, there is a vast quantity available in the ocean. [cite web
url=http://www.neutron.kth.se/courses/reactor_physics/NEA-redbook2003.pdf
title=Uranium Resources 2003: Resources, Production and Demand
publisher=OECD World Nuclear Agency and International Atomic Energy Agency
author=
page=p. 22
date=2008-03
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-23]

* Kenneth S. Deffeyes
Deffeyes estimates that if one can accept ore one tenth as rich then the supply of available uranium increased 300 times. ["World Uranium Resources", by Kenneth S. Deffeyes and Ian D. MacGregor, "Scientific American", January, 1980, page 66, argues that the supply of uranium is very large.] [cite web
url=http://www.osti.gov/energycitations/product.biblio.jsp?osti_id=6665051
title=Citation for World uranium resources
author=Deffeyes, K.S.; MacGregor, I.D.
date=1980-01-01
publisher=Scientific American
volume=242
number=1
page=pp. 50-60
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-26] His paper shows that uranium is log-normal distributed. There is relatively little high-grade uranium and a nearly inexhaustibly large supply of very low grade uranium.

* Huber and MillsHuber and Mills believe the energy supply is infinite and the problem is merely how we go about extracting the energy. [cite web
url=http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bottomless-Well-Twilight-Virtue-Energy/dp/046503117X
title=The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy
publisher=Basic Books
author=Peter W. Huber and Mark P. Mills
date=2005
language=English
accessdate=2008-04-26]

* Bernard CohenIn 1983, physicist Bernard Cohen proposed that uranium is effectively inexhaustible, and could therefore be considered a renewable source of energy.Cite journal
volume = 51
issue = 1
pages = 75-76
last = Cohen
first = Bernard L.
title = Breeder reactors: A renewable energy source
journal = American Journal of Physics
accessdate = 2007-08-03
date = 1983-01 |format = PDF
url = http://sustainablenuclear.org/PADs/pad11983cohen.pdf] He claims that fast breeder reactors, fueled by naturally-replenished uranium extracted from seawater, could supply energy at least as long as the sun's expected remaining lifespan of five billion years. - whilst uranium is a finite resource mineral resource within the earth, the hydrogen in the sun is finite too - thus, if the resource of nuclear fuel can last over such time scales, as Cohen contents, then nuclear energy is every bit as sustainable as solar power or any other source of energy, in terms of sustainability over the finite realistic time scale of life surviving on this planet.

ee also

*Peak uranium

References