Bloomberg.com: Top Worldwide: "At the start of the year, there were 441 operating reactors, and another 24 under construction, according to the London-based World Nuclear Association. An extra 41 plants have funding and approvals in place. China plans to build 28 power plants to meet rising demand for energy, according to the association.
Uranium prices may jump another 34 percent this year to $54 a pound, according to Resource Capital Research. The spot price was at $40.25 a pound on March 24, according to industry publication Metal Bulletin.
China's Premier Wen Jiabao, who held a joint media conference in Canberra today with Australian Prime Minister John Howard, wants to establish a price setting mechanism as part of the agreement between Australian and China, the Australian Financial Review reported, citing Wen's comments to businesses executives in Perth yesterday.
The comments raised fears of a repeat of the damaging spat between China and its trading partners over iron ore prices, the newspaper reported. Macfarlane played down the comments, saying prices would be set as part of normal commercial arrangements, the paper said.
BHP's Olympic Dam holds more than a third of the world's known uranium and the company is studying spending more than A$4 billion on an expansion that would triple uranium production, as well as increase gold and copper output.
Energy Resources in October raised its estimate of uranium reserves at Ranger and said the additional reserves would add three years to the operating life of the mine.
Two Assets
``When you look at those two assets, they have the ability to expand pretty quickly, especially Olympic Dam for BHP Billiton,'' said Mark Pervan, head of research at Daiwa Securities SMBC in Melbourne.
For China to get access"
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