All of the uranium that comes out of Global Laser Enrichment’s planned Paducah enrichment facility will be bought by Cameco, a Canadian corporation that owns a minority stake in GLE.
The exclusive offtake agreement was announced earlier this week by Silex Systems, the Australian company that owns 51% of GLE. Silex Systems innovated the process GLE plans to use at the first-of-its-kind, $1.76 billion Paducah Laser Enrichment Facility.
GLE CEO Stephen Long said the agreement is a big step forward for the company’s “book of business,” essentially guaranteeing that all uranium enriched at what is expected to be the world’s first commercial-scale laser enrichment facility will have a buyer before the company even completes construction.
“Cameco is stepping into that gap for us and fulfilling that role, and especially with the production of the natural uranium, which we plan to do first. Cameco already has a long-term contract portfolio for this sort of production, and so I expect that they will fold our offtake right into their existing contract.”
Silex CEO Michael Goldsworthy said in the release that the company is “delighted” with the agreement.
“[It] provides a home for all of GLE’s future nuclear fuel products, including natural UF6 and enriched uranium products to help fuel the world’s rapidly growing nuclear reactor fleet,” he said. “The Agreement will guarantee GLE receives pricing for its products equivalent to Cameco’s average realised price, net of appropriate selling costs, achieved on an annual basis across its long-term contracting portfolio, and without the significant cost of GLE establishing its own sales and marketing resources.”
Long said the company is still on track for production to begin in Paducah by 2030, though the company is waiting on its enrichment license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He said he expects the application review process to be complete by the end of November before beginning the mandatory hearing process. Ultimately, Long said he expects GLE to acquire its license in early 2027.
Their licensing process is being contested by the environmental advocacy group Kentucky Resources Council, along with a pair of Paducah area residents.
KRC filed its initial petition to halt GLE’s licensing process in May, urging the NRC to address the legality of the deal struck between GLE and the U.S. Department of Energy more than ten years ago to allow the company access to spent nuclear fuel from the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant site, which would share a fence line with the GLE development. The environmental group also asserted that the regulatory agency was not properly reviewing potential environmental impacts of the project on the air, land, water resources and communities in western Kentucky, pointing out a reliance on “generic” – not site-specific – data in pre-licensing regulatory documents from GLE.
An Atomic Safety and Licensing Board panel rejected KRC’s petition requesting a hearing on GLE’s federal license application in July, saying that KRC and Paducah resident Michael McVicker lacked sufficient standing. KRC executive director Ashley Wilmes told WKMS that she believes the panel “applied the wrong legal standard” to the nonprofit’s petition. KRC has appealed the panel’s decision.
