Russia to consider restricting uranium exports, Putin says

Thursday, 12 September 2024

In the Kremlin's official report on the online meeting of the government held on Wednesday, Putin noted efforts by some countries to restrict Russia's access to certain goods and said: "Russia is the leader in reserves of a number of strategic types of raw materials: for natural gas, this is almost 22% of the world's reserves, for gold - almost 23, for diamonds - almost 55%."

He then asked the Prime Minister, Mikhail Mishustin: "Please look at some types of goods that we supply in large quantities to the world market. Supplies of a number of goods to us are limited - maybe we should also think about certain restrictions? Uranium, titanium, nickel. In some countries strategic reserves are being created, and some other measures are being taken. But in general, if this will not harm us ... I am not saying that we need to do this tomorrow, but we could think about certain restrictions on deliveries to the foreign market not only of the goods that I have named, but also of some others.

'I will not talk about the reasons now, I think that my colleagues in the Government all understand perfectly well the importance of Russian raw materials for these positions that I named: just what came to mind: uranium, titanium, nickel, but there are others. Then, please, report separately, think about it."

In the same meeting Alexander Kozlov, natural resources and environment minister, noted that only 35% of Russia's Far East and 45% of Siberia had been geologically studied and he said Russia needed to increase geological exploration, in particular for seven raw materials - uranium, chromium, manganese, titanium, fluorspar, tungsten and aluminum. He added that Russia's share of known global reserves allowed "the potential to create raw material alliances that can provide exceptional opportunities for regulating world markets. For example, together with South Africa, we control 80% of the world's platinum and palladium production, with China - almost 56% of coal and 84% of vanadium. Both countries are part of BRICS. In total, we have 13 countries and 13 types of minerals on which we can unite".

According to World Nuclear Association figures on uranium supply, in 2021, Russia had about 8% of 'reasonably assured resources plus inferred resources', plus about a 45% share of global enrichment capacity in 2020.

A variety of Ukraine war-prompted sanctions on trade with Russia have been imposed by countries such as the USA, the European Union and the UK. In May, US President Joe Biden signed into law a ban until 2040 on the import into the country of unirradiated, low-enriched uranium produced in the Russian Federation or by a Russian entity, but with the ability of waivers to be granted to allow the import of limited amounts of low-enriched uranium until 1 January 2028.

According to a December 2023 US House Report on HR 1042, the USA currently imports more than 20% of its enriched uranium from Russian state-owned nuclear company Rosatom and its subsidiary Tenex.