Overall activity in the U.S. uranium raw materials industry declined again last year, according to data in Uranium Industry Annual 2001, which was recently released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA). Domestic production of uranium oxide (U₃O₈) fell to 2.6 million pounds--the lowest since 1953--while exploration and development expenditures dropped to $4.8 million, 84 percent less than in 1997 and 28 percent below the 2000 level.

Employment in the U.S. uranium raw materials industry was also off sharply, totaling 423 person-years compared with 627 in 2000 and 1,120 in 1998. Exploration employment was zero.

Prices continued to soften even as U.S. demand increased; the average price paid by owners and operators of U.S. civilian nuclear power reactors fell to $10.15 per pound of uranium oxide equivalent (U₃O₈e) from $11.04 the previous year and $12.14 in 1998.

Mining and Processing

Only three commercial uranium mines were operating during part or all of 2001, down from 10 in 1998. No underground mines were in operation during 2001, compared with four in 1998; only 3 in-situ leach mines were active, down from 6 in 1998.

All six U.S. conventional uranium mills, with a combined milling capacity of 13,600 tons of ore per day, were inactive at the end of 2001. However, one mill was active during part of 2001, and two others produced uranium concentrate from mine water. Three nonconventional in-situ leach plants with a total capacity of 5 million pounds of U₃O₈ per year were in commercial operation in the United States at the end of 2001.

Uranium Concentrate Production, 1949-2001
	Reserves Reserves are estimates of the quantity of uranium in known mineral deposits that can be recovered at or below a specified "forward cost"--the operating and capital costs that will be incurred in the future to produce the uranium. The EIA's year-end 2001 estimate of U.S. uranium reserves for the $30- and $50-per-pound U3O8 forward cost categories were 268 and 899 million pounds, respectively, slightly less than the year before and continuing a decade-long downtrend.
Sources: 1949-1991 -- Energy Information Administration (EIA) Annual Energy Review 2000, Table 9.3. 1992-2001 -- EIA, Uranium Industry Annual 2001, Table 5.

Market Activities

Owners and operators of U.S. civilian nuclear power reactors purchased a total of 55 million pounds of U₃O₈e from U.S. and foreign suppliers during 2001, up 30 percent from 1998, and loaded 53 million pounds into fuel assemblies, a 38-percent increase over the same period.

Foreign-origin uranium accounted for 42 million pounds (76 percent) of the deliveries. The top five foreign sources of uranium were Canada (31 percent), Australia (19 percent), Russia (9 percent), Kazakhstan (6 percent), and Uzbekistan (5 percent).

Commercial uranium inventories at the end of 2001 totaled 101 million pounds U₃O₈e, 26 percent less than in 1998. Inventories were held as uranium oxide, natural uranium hexafluoride (UF₆) and enriched uranium hexafluoride, with 24 percent, 19 percent, and 57 percent, respectively.

Uranium Industry Annual 2001 includes appendices with supplementary data for uranium resources and reserves. The publication also contains a glossary of terms used in the uranium industry.

Uranium Industry Annual 2001, DOE/EIA-0478(2001); 56 pages, 52 tables, 24 figures.

If you are having technical problems with this website, please contact the EIA Webmaster at wmaster@eia.doe.gov or call 202-586-8959. For general information about energy, contact the National Energy Information Center at 202-586-8800 or infoctr@eia.doe.gov.

Questions about the report's content should be directed to:

Douglas Bonnar, Office of Coal, Nuclear, Electric and Alternate Fuels

douglas.bonnar@eia.doe.gov

Phone: (202) 287-1911

URL: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/plugs/pluran01.html
File last modified: June 25, 2002