CANADIAN ENRICHMENT | FUEL & FUEL CYCLE
“Many Canadian companies, like Cameco, have opted for laser technologies because laser enrichment has always been seen as the holy grail of enrichment”
south of the northern territories], Canada would be able to domestically secure and provide so much baseload energy – clean energy – to these communities for decades to come. Liebenberg: It is worth touching on the peripherals of enrichment, the broader nuclear fuel cycle, which Canada is already good at. Canada has a lot of uranium mines. Canada is also one of the only three countries in the entire Western world that does uranium conversion, and it is very good at producing that feedstock [through conversion] needed for enrichment. This is important because, globally, conversion is one of the weakest links in the entire nuclear fuel supply chain right now, with demand soaring and not enough supply.
The other weakest link, the bottleneck, is enrichment. If the world wants to triple nuclear energy by 2050, it needs to scale up its conversion and enrichment capacity 10-times over the next 25 years. Canada thus needs to not only keep sticking to mining and conversion but also start contributing to scaling enrichment. That will be key to the country becoming energy independent and helping the world meet its nuclear target.
NEI: What regulatory approvals or reforms would be required for Canada to begin a uranium enrichment programme? Yu: Is Canada ready for this new era of nuclear with all these advanced technologies that are emerging? There are dozens of new start-ups in the US that are building new microreactors or SMRs (small modular reactors), and Canada is obviously looking at this and wanting to hop on this train – but to build these new nuclear technologies, you need to go higher than the country’s usual low enrichment of 5%. Regulatory reform would be needed to go higher, which would be from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC). If Canada is to move in that direction, it needs to push that agenda at the government level. In the US, the Biden administration was able to pass the ADVANCE Act to help expedite all these new nuclear technologies through reforming the regulatory body and provide funding opportunities to push forward, expediting all the bureaucracy that was historically there. The only way to get CNSC to move is through action, like the US, from the top of the government, which will trickle down and help expedite plans for enrichment. Liebenberg: The biggest challenge will be with CNSC in
terms of figuring out the licensing of enrichment plants – most importantly, figuring out how to get that done effectively and quickly. The licensing of enrichment plants can take anywhere between six to eight years, but hopefully, with government support, like the ADVANCE act in the US, Canada too can accelerate the licensing process. I would add that enrichment is considered an SNT, a sensitive nuclear technology, requiring a much higher level of scrutiny and security. That is why a lot of enrichers, whether in the US, France or elsewhere, don’t talk
about exactly how their process works – it is classified information. That means there will be a whole new lot of different additional requirements, that Canadian companies will need to work through should they decide to enrich their own uranium.
NEI: Are there any other hurdles you anticipate Canada will face in developing enrichment capabilities, and how can those challenges be addressed? Yu: Changing the public sentiment will be important, and I think education is key to advance this. The government needs to tell the public that they shouldn’t fear this. Nuclear is already safe, but now, with these new technologies, it is even safer. If the Canadian population fears that enrichment is
going to be used for nuclear proliferation, the CNSC and International Atomic Energy Agency could come in and put safeguards around enrichment levels and such to make sure they are not weapons-grade – really make the population believe we are not looking to develop further than for energy.
Then, the government also needs to educate the public about why domestic enrichment is necessary. The government has already announced all these plans to expand nuclear over the past few years, like funding billions of dollars into SMRs that need enriched uranium. So, it is like a chicken or egg problem – we spend that much money on new nuclear technologies but then do not develop what is needed for these technologies. Now you are back to square one, where you are reliant on foreign entities to provide the fuel, when the purpose of expanding these technologies was energy independence.
NEI: Given competition from countries like the US, Russia, China and members of the EU, how can Canada carve out a competitive advantage in the enrichment sector? Liebenberg: Cameco, the only major player in Canada, has a strategic relationship with laser enrichment company Silex through which it owns 49% of the GLE (global laser enrichment) project. I can see Cameco being successful with lasers. Lasers are known to be very cost-effective because lasers can selectively target only uranium-235. So, I think if Cameco puts in the work and can help commercialise laser enrichment, it can have a huge competitive advantage.
NEI: Do you see Canada domestically securing the comprehensive nuclear supply chain soon? Yu: To be honest, I don’t know. The support has to start from the top of the government. In the US, one of the few areas that had full bipartisan support was around nuclear, building back up the industry’s whole supply chain and supporting its emerging technologies. The Canadian government will need to walk down a similar path, then also get positive feedback from its population. ■
www.neimagazine.com | November 2025 | 37
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