The unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by Russia has created significant impacts in the global nuclear fuel market because Russia was a major fuel supplier. Now, nations are looking to remove their dependence from Russian nuclear fuel and lock the Russians out of the global fuel market with policy action. However, given the lack of conversion and enrichment capabilities outside of Russia, swift action will need to be made to replace the fuel production capabilities in Russia with capabilities in the US and the Western world. While there are some options to meet the demand gap for LEU given the absence of Russian fuel imports, there is no commercial HALEU production capability outside of Russia; developing HALEU production capability in the US for commercial needs will be crucial as the projects go through the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program.
