Overseas uranium mining to be stepped up

Sun Qin, chairman of China National Nuclear Corp

China National Nuclear Corp will speed up overseas uranium mining exploration, focusing on Australia, Africa and Central Asia, to meet the energy company's growing demand for the raw material, its chairman said on Monday.

"We have no worries about uranium resource reserves, as we will enhance efforts on exploring the resources both at home and abroad," said Sun Qin, chairman of China National Nuclear Corp, a State-owned energy company which runs more than 40 percent of China's nuclear sites.

He said the eurozone debt crisis has given Chinese companies such as CNNC a good opportunity to expand their overseas mining operations.

"We will step up uranium mining projects in foreign countries," he said. "The target overseas markets include Australia, Africa and Central Asia."

The Ministry of Land and Resources said on Nov 4 that a large leaching sandstone-type uranium deposit had been discovered in northern China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

Considered one of the world's top uranium mines, it is the country's largest leaching sandstone-type uranium deposit so far, which is of great significance for boosting domestic uranium supplies and ensuring sufficient resources to develop the nuclear power industry, the ministry said.

"We expect that the domestic market will satisfy half of our demand, with the other half coming from overseas," especially through purchasing uranium resources abroad, Sun said. China imported 16,126 metric tons of uranium in 2011, down 6 percent from the previous year, according to the General Administration of Customs.

Around 95 percent of China's uranium imports are from Kazakhstan, Namibia, Australia and Uzbekistan.

"The discovery in Inner Mongolia will help China to reduce its dependence on foreign supplies," said Yan Weidong, deputy director of the management and development division of the ministry's information center.

An executive meeting of the State Council on Oct 24 approved two programs, the national plan for nuclear power security (2011-20) and the nuclear power development plan (2011-20).

According to these programs, China is expected to have 40 million kilowatts of installed nuclear capacity by 2015, which would consume at least 7,500 tons of natural uranium annually.