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The start of production in the sixth cascade of new uranium enrichment capacity at Urenco USA's National Enrichment Facility in New Mexico means 75% of the ongoing capacity expansion has been completed.
The company is in the process of installing 700,000 separative work units (SWU) of new capacity between 2025-2027 through the addition of eight centrifuge cascades to an existing building at the site, in support of its goal to expand its domestic enrichment production capacity to more than 7 million SWU over the next decade. It expects to install the seventh cascade later this year and the final cascade in the spring of 2027.
The company also plans to start work next year to refurbish existing cascades at the site as part of ongoing capital investments in the facility to maintain a long-term, reliable supply of enrichment services for its customers. Then, in 2029, it intends to begin construction of a new enrichment plant at the facility, where 2.1 million SWU of new enrichment capacity will be installed with the initial cascades starting production in 2032 and additional cascades installed through 2036.
"We are consistently delivering new capacity to help fuel the US nuclear industry and allied nations, and our teams are doing it ahead of schedule and on budget," said Jody Blackshear, Managing Director of Urenco USA. "This experience will support our larger capacity programmes in the years ahead as we look to increase our enrichment production by more than 50% to meet the needs of our customers with traditional and advanced reactors."
Enrichment is the process to increase the concentration of uranium-235 - the isotope of uranium which is capable of undergoing fission in a nuclear reactor - from 0.7% in naturally occuring uranium to the levels required in nuclear fuel (most nuclear reactors in commercial operation today need fuel containing between 3.5% and 5% U-235).
Gaseous uranium hexafluoride is passed through gas centrifuges, in which a fast-spinning rotor inside a vacuum casing makes use of the very slight difference in mass between the different uranium isotopes to separate them. As the rotor spins, the concentration of molecules containing the heavier, non-fissile, isotopes increases near the outer wall of the cylinder, with a corresponding increase in the concentration of molecules containing the lighter U-235 isotope towards the centre.
The Urenco USA National Enrichment Facility, in Eunice, New Mexico, is currently the only commercial uranium enrichment capacity in the USA.