2023-05-02 10:04:45
Olivier Becht, the French Minister of Foreign Trade begins this Tuesday, May 2 a visit to Kazakhstan. This central Asian republic, richly endowed with uranium, provides France with most of its radioactive metal needs. Uranium is a highly sought after mineral at the moment.
Kazakhstan’s subsoil is full of oil and gas. The war in Ukraine has been a boon for its hydrocarbon exports to the West. This is also true for its uranium. Because even if Russian ore is not subject to sanctions, Westerners who continue to source nuclear fuel from Russia are actively seeking alternatives. Kazakhstan, world number one in extraction with 40% of production, seems to be a first choice substitute. The countries of Eastern Europe are looking to this origin to renew their contract from 2025, indicated the director of the national company Kazatomprom. Romania received its first shipments of Kazakh uranium in April. In the first quarter, Kazakh production fell slightly, but demand and prices are picking up.
Kazakhstan provides France with 40% of its needs
France, two-thirds of whose electricity comes from nuclear power plants, has established a long-standing partnership with its largest supplier. The visit of the Minister Delegate for Foreign Trade is part of this relationship punctuated by regular meetings at the highest level of the State. The Kazakh president was for example in France last November. Orano, the former Areva, the world’s leading producer of uranium, operates two sites there and is in the process of developing a third which should ensure production for the next 15 years. Hyper-competitive factories. With production costs lower than those of Niger. But this excellence is not enough to make Kazakhstan the preferred supplier of all countries equipped with nuclear power plants. It still lacks complete mastery of the ore cycle to become an independent player.
Because Kazakhstan still depends heavily on Russia to process the ore
Russia is unavoidable. It has half of the world’s uranium enrichment capacity. And it mainly deals with Kazakh uranium. Russia provides about one-fifth of European imports of enriched uranium, 14% of American imports. France imports recycled fuel from Russia. All these countries hostile to Moscow, however, continue to turn to this origin. For lack of choice. Finding other suppliers who can handle all the production can take 7 to 10 years, estimates an expert. Investments in treatment capacities are so high that only States can commit to these projects. Nothing to do with the hydrocarbon market: after the sanctions on Russian oil, it only took a few weeks to reorganize the black gold trade.
It is on this economic reality that all attempts to impose sanctions on Russian uranium exports come up against.
Eastern European countries are the most opposed to it. Very often their reactors are of Soviet design, this is the case for 18 power stations in Europe. But only Rosatom, the Russian atom champion, has the technology to deliver the ad hoc fuel to them. European imports of Russian uranium amount to one billion dollars a year; the European bill for Russian oil was close to 90 billion dollars. The financial stakes of sanctions against Russian uranium are therefore much lower. The Russian champion Rosatom and its network of foreign subsidiaries still has a bright future ahead of it: despite the war, Rosatom has planned power plants in Slovakia, Finland and Hungary. Its exports have jumped by 20% in 2022. As for Kazatomprom, it must above all, as with oil, diversify the export routes for its uranium to avoid crossing the territory of its imposing neighbor.
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