Under the former agreement, all the natural uranium mined by the venture, which is 49% owned by CGNPC with the rest held by Kazatomprom, will be delivered to China in the form of nuclear fuel for powering its energy-thirsty economy. This act is seen to bypass China’s traditional fuel suppliers such as France’s Areva.
Kazakhstan holds around 20% of the world’s uranium reserves and aims to be the world’s number one producer by 2010, overtaking Australia and Canada. In 2008, the country extracted around 8500 t of uranium and in 2009 it plans to extract 11,900 t, according to Kazatomprom.
