ЦӨМИЙН ТҮЛШНИЙ ТАЙЛАН

Дэлхийн эрэлт, нийлүүлэлтийн хүртээмжийн 2021-2040 он хүртэлх хувилбарууд

The 20th edition of the World Nuclear Association's biennial report on the outlook for nuclear power and nuclear fuels. It has become the definitive reference source of the world industry and is available at a price of £850.

World Nuclear Association has published reports on nuclear fuel supply and demand at roughly two-yearly intervals since its foundation in 1975. The 20th edition of The Nuclear Fuel Report was released in September 2021 and includes scenarios covering a range of possibilities for nuclear power to 2040.

Nuclear power currently contributes approximately 10% of the world’s electricity production. It is expected to play an increasingly important role in future electricity and energy supply for several reasons, including:

  • The near-zero carbon dioxide and other pollutant emissions associated with nuclear power generation.

  • The on-demand reliable and secure nature of nuclear power, attractive to developing countries, those lacking indigenous energy resources, and to developed countries intent on introducing high shares of renewables, while maintaining grid stability.

  • Its long-term cost-competitiveness.

  • The industrial and human-capital benefits associated with its development and use.

  • The ability to produce near zero-carbon heat, in addition to electricity, that could help to decarbonize many hard-to-abate sectors of the economy.

This 2021 edition of The Nuclear Fuel Report continues a positive trend in nuclear generating capacity projections that began in the previous (2019) edition. This has reversed a negative trend that had spanned the preceding three reports (2013, 2015 and 2017). Despite a slight reduction in nuclear generating capacity projections that can be seen in the near to mid term in the Reference and Upper scenarios, all three cases show considerable growth from 2035 onwards due to vast nuclear construction programmes in East and South Asia, extended operational lifetimes of existing reactors and anticipated expansion of the pool of nuclear countries due to more newcomer countries expected to operate their first reactors before 2040. 

However, in the near term, one of the major components of secondary supply, commercial inventories, will continue to play an indispensable part in bridging the gap between supply and demand.

Beyond mining, the report found that:

  • In the conversion sector, near-term reactor requirements in UF6 will be largely covered by commercial inventories. By 2023, global conversion production is expected to meet requirements due to the ramp-up and restart of existing facilities. Nevertheless, in the long-run more conversion capacity will be needed.

  • In the enrichment sector, excess capacity is currently used for underfeeding and tails re-enrichment, bringing in approximately 6,000-8,000 tU in support of the undersupplied uranium market. This will largely be reduced over time, as enrichment requirements rise due to nuclear generating capacity growth.

  • In the fuel fabrication sector, competition may become more intense from both the commercial and technological perspective, due to increased interest in developments of advanced fuels (e.g. for non-light water reactors). Nuclear fuel demand increasing in Asia and decreasing in the West may cause fuel vendors to move from a regional to a more global market approach.

The report concludes that rapid uranium demand growth in a number of countries, above all in China, will result in the need for additional mined uranium within the period covered by the scenarios. In 2020 uranium supply was nearly 30% less than reactor fleet requirements for that year. Irrespective of the uranium supply scenario, the capacity of all presently-known mining projects will have to at least double by the end of the forecast period. There is no doubt that sufficient uranium resources exist to meet future needs; however, the producers are waiting for the market to rebalance in order to start reinvesting in new capacity and bringing idled and shutdown projects back to production. Additional conversion capacity is also likely to be needed, while enrichment and fuel fabrication capacities appear to be sufficient to cope with demand.

Further information is available here.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/our-association/publications/publications-for-sale/nuclear-fuel-report.aspx