Among the publicly available data, the situation of China domestic uranium resources is not rosy. However, “China’s data on uranium reserves tend to be confidential. At present, the data you see about China’s uranium reserves are all china’s report to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
In general, it may underreport.” Xu Yuming, deputy secretary-general of the China Nuclear Energy Association, told Energy magazine, “It is certain that the reserves are larger than these figures.”
The Uranium Red Book–“2009 Uranium: Resources, Production and Demand”–released by the International Atomic Energy Agency reveals that China’s proven uranium reserves are only 1714,000 tons.
According to the Statistics, in addition to the fuel-loading in the new built nuclear power plants, an annual 160-180 tons of uranium will be required per a million-kilowatt unit. Thus, if the total installed nuclear power capacity is 60 million kilowatts by end of 2020, it will consume about 10,000 tons of uranium per year.
