ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses broad security issues related to provision of nuclear fuel, in practice, enriched uranium, for the West's nuclear power programmes, in particular for those of Europe. Almost all the nuclear power reactors to be installed in the will likely use enriched uranium fuel. The countries with major uranium resources are the United States, Canada, South Africa, Australia, and presumably the Soviet Union. The United States Atomic Energy Commission (USAEC) gaseous diffusion facilities currently supply almost the entire Western world's requirements for enriched uranium. Advanced countries are planning to sharply increase their reliance on nuclear power to generate electricity over the next two decades. Problems developed with the advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR), and Britain has been forced to abandon the AGR in favour of a new reactor system. Soviet enrichment capacity is unknown, but on the basis of their military programme is presumably large, perhaps a significant fraction of American capacity.
