Owners and operators of US civilian nuclear power reactors (COOs) purchased a total of 48-million pounds of U3O8 equivalent deliveries from US and foreign suppliers in 2019, with the vast majority sourced from Kazakhstan, Russia and Uzbekistan.
The total deliveries was 20% higher than the 40-million pounds delivered in 2018, the US Energy Information Administration’s (EIA’s) uranium marketing annual report shows.
The weighted-average price of $35.59/lb was 8% lower than the 2018 weighted-average price of $38.81/lb U3O8 equivalent.
Similar to recent years, the vast majority of uranium delivered in 2019 was of foreign origin.
Uranium originating in Kazakhstan, Russia, and Uzbekistan accounted for 42% of total uranium purchased by US COOs in 2019. Canadian-origin uranium and Australian-origin uranium together accounted for 39%.
COOs purchased three material types of uranium for 2019 deliveries from 35 sellers, one less seller than in 2018.
During 2019, 22% of the uranium delivered was purchased under spot contracts at a weighted-average price of $27.89/lb. The remaining 78% was purchased under long-term contracts at a weighted-average price of $37.73/lb.
In 2019, COOs signed 34 new purchase contracts with deliveries in 2019 of 8.0-million pounds U3O8 equivalent at a weighted-average price of $26.34/lb.