Kazakhstan keen on tapping into NMDC mining expertise

Kazakhstan Ambassador Yerlan Alimbayev on Thursday met the top brass of NMDC to discuss ways to leverage the public sector mining major’s capabilities to further strengthen the Kazakh mining industry. A release from NMDC on the visit of the Ambassador said Mr.Alimbayev met CMD Sumit Deb, Director (Finance) Amitava Mukherjee and Director (Technical) Somnath Nandi. …

Top uranium miner Kazatomprom meets 2020 guidance, production drops 19%

The world’s largest uranium producer Kazatomprom reported Monday that its full-year 2020 uranium production of 10,736 tonnes of uranium (reported as U3O8) was within the guidance despite a 19% production drop over 13,291 tonnes mined in 2019. The company said that on both a 100% and attributable basis, production volumes for the fourth quarter and …

The real challenges to nuclear are external, says panel

The challenges the nuclear industry faces are largely external and must be overcome if it is to help tackle the existential threat of climate change, panellists in the Nuclear Energy and its Future session of the Reuters Next conference on 11 January said. These challenges include: the notion nuclear is an out-dated technology; the cost of finance; market design; …

New stimulus bill includes $35.2 billion for new energy initiatives

The new economic stimulus proposal that has been approved by Congress includes roughly $35.2 billion for energy initiatives, according to summary documents seen by TechCrunch. “This is probably the biggest energy bill we’ve seen in a decade,” said policy analyst Dr. Leah Stokes, an Assistant Professor at the Bren School of Environmental Science & Management …

Russian NPPs fulfilled the annual plan for electricity generation ahead of schedule, generating 207.614 billion kWh

Last weekend, Russian nuclear power plants (branches of Rosenergoatom JSC, part of the Electric Power Division of Rosatom) fulfilled ahead of schedule the annual state task of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) to generate electricity in the amount of 207.614 billion kWh. During the same period in 2019, 202.124 billion kWh were generated. Despite a …

Major mine shutdown could give red hot uranium stocks another boost

The world’s largest operating uranium mine will be temporarily suspended, further disrupting a market “already coiled like a spring”. In 2020, COVID-19 interruptions to uranium supply has doubled the structural deficit – the difference between supply and demand — to 40 million pounds. That’s more than 20 per cent of annual uranium consumption. Yesterday, major …

Cigar Lake suspended due to COVID-19

Canadian uranium miner Cameco has opted to temporarily suspend operations are its Cigar Lake operation in northern Saskatchewan, Canada, due to increasing risks posed by COVID-19. The company said that the entire province has been experiencing a “significant negative trend in the pandemic” that has left Cameco uncertain for the mine’s continuous operation as the pool of …

Nuclear electricity costs set to decrease, study finds

The levelised costs of electricity generation of low-carbon generation technologies are falling and are increasingly below the costs of conventional fossil fuel generation, according to a report by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) and the International Energy Agency (IEA). The cost of electricity from new nuclear power plants remains stable, yet electricity from the …