US queries French uranium imports

Tuesday, 10 March 2015

The US Department of Commerce (DOC) is querying the status of a minority of US imports of French low-enriched uranium (LEU) in 2013-2014 under antidumping legislation.

Imports of LEU into the USA are subject to antidumping duty if DOC determines that they were sold at less than nominal value. According to a Federal Register filing by DOC, the preliminary findings from its review suggest that this applied to some imports from Areva between 1 February 2013 and 31 January 2014.

The antidumping order covers LEU containing less than 20% uranium-235 that has not been converted into another chemical form or fabricated into nuclear fuel assemblies. LEU that is re-exported is not subject to the duty.

According to DOC's preliminary findings, the majority of the LEU entering the USA from France during the reporting period were either not subject to the antidumping order or were excluded from it under the re-export provision. However, based on questionnaire responses filed by exporter Areva and US importer and fuel fabricator Global Nuclear Fuels-America, DOC found some shipments identified by Areva as 'sample sales' were in fact bona fide sales, and were therefore subject to the antidumping order.

Final antidumping duties on the imports will be determined by DOC and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), but DOC says that Areva failed to provide full responses to its requests for information and warns that this could affect the amount of duty it must pay.

"If we continue to rely on adverse facts available to establish Areva's weighted-average dumping margin, then we will instruct CBP to assess antidumping duties for entries of subject merchandise … at a rate equal to the weighted-average dumping margin found in the final results," the filing notes.

Researched and written
by World Nuclear News