At NRC headquarters are (from left) UUSA’s Gerard Poortman, Wyatt Padgett, Lisa Hardison, and Paul Lorskulsint (seated), with the NRC’s James Downs (seated), Shana Helton, Kimyata Morgan-Butler, John Lubinski, and Johnathan Rowley. (Photo: Urenco USA)
Just one day after Urenco USA (UUSA) was picked by the Department of Energy as one of six contractors eligible to compete for future low-enriched uranium task orders, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on December 11 formally approved the company’s license amendment request to boost uranium enrichment levels at its Eunice, N.M., enrichment facility to 10 percent fissile uranium-235—up from its current limit of 5.5 percent.
A milestone: At a December 11 gathering at NRC headquarters in Rockville, Md., John Lubinski, director of the NRC’s Nuclear Material Safety & Safeguards Office, and Shana Helton, director of the NRC’s Division of Fuel Management, formally presented the approval to Paul Lorskulsint, UUSA’s chief nuclear officer.
The NRC must now review UUSA’s implementation of requirements in the amendment, which is anticipated in late spring 2025. The company will be authorized to produce enrichment levels up to 10 percent U-235—which Urenco calls “LEU+”—in all cascades at its gaseous centrifuge facility—the only commercial-scale uranium enrichment facility now operating in the United States.
U.S. capacity: “This positive progress is important to support the nuclear industry to create fuels that will reduce outage cycles for current reactors, provide fuels for some advanced reactor types, and assist our current and future customers”, said John Kirkpatrick, managing director of UUSA. “Since operations started in 2010, UUSA has been a critical part of the U.S. energy ecosystem.”
The New Mexico facility currently has a capacity of 4.4 million separative work units (SWUs), Kirkpatrick noted, which can supply one-third of the domestic enrichment demand. The facility is licensed to produce up to 10 million SWUs. UUSA announced in July 2023 that it would expand its U.S. capacity by 15 percent to support industry needs and could consider further expansion based on market demand.
HALEU plans: In addition to the LEU contract that Urenco received last week from the DOE, the company was one of four potential HALEU suppliers announced in October under a similar contract structure.
HALEU supplied under that contract must be enriched in the continental United States, but Urenco is also planning to build HALEU enrichment capacity in the United Kingdom, after the company was awarded about $245 million in May to add HALEU capacity at the company’s Capenhurst site in northwest England.
Urenco’s head office is located in near London, England. The company is owned by the British, Dutch, and German governments and also operates enrichment facilities in Germany and the Netherlands.
