实际流转的物质
Kazakh uranium is dissolved underground and pumped up as a solution — nothing is blasted and no waste rock is moved. It then passes through conversion, enrichment and fuel fabrication, each of which exists in only a handful of countries and each of which is under international safeguards.
- 材料
- Uranium
- 品种
- Sandstone-hosted uranium recovered in situ, no rock moved at all
- 起点
- Kazakhstan — Wellfields on the Chu-Sarysu and Syrdarya basins
逐步追踪，逐境跨越
Kazakhstan · Southern Kazakhstan wellfields 持有方 Kazatomprom and joint ventures (国有生产商)
Mining without a mine
A mildly acidic solution is injected through wells into the ore-bearing sandstone, dissolves the uranium, and is pumped back to surface through recovery wells. There is no pit, no shaft and no tailings dam.
为何选择此地: In-situ recovery only works in permeable, water-saturated sandstone with the right chemistry. Kazakhstan has an unusual amount of it, which is why it became the largest producer.
Kazakhstan · Central processing plant 持有方 Kazatomprom (国有生产商)
Yellowcake
The uranium is stripped from solution onto resin, eluted and precipitated as U3O8 — a yellow-brown powder — then dried and drummed.
其余部分的去向: Note the units. 200 tU is 236 t U3O8 — mixing tonnes of uranium with tonnes of oxide is the classic error in this industry's reporting.
为何选择此地: Concentrating before transport, and before the safeguards paperwork gets heavier.
Canada · Conversion facility 持有方 Converter (精炼商)
Conversion to a gas
Yellowcake is purified and converted to uranium hexafluoride, which becomes a gas just above room temperature — the only practical form for enrichment.
其余部分的去向: The fluorine comes from fluorspar. A mineral most people have never heard of is a precondition for nuclear fuel.
为何选择此地: Only a handful of commercial conversion plants exist worldwide. This is a genuine bottleneck.
France · Centrifuge plant 持有方 Enricher (精炼商)
Enrichment
Thousands of centrifuges in cascade separate uranium-235 from uranium-238 by mass, raising the fissile fraction from 0.7% to 3–5%. Most of the feed leaves as depleted tails.
其余部分的去向: The great majority becomes depleted uranium — used for radiation shielding, ballast and armour, and otherwise stored.
为何选择此地: Enrichment is dual-use. Where it exists is a matter of treaty and politics as much as engineering.
France · Fuel fabrication plant 持有方 Fuel fabricator (制造商)
Pellets and rods
Converted to uranium dioxide powder, pressed into ceramic pellets the size of a fingertip, sintered, ground to tolerance and sealed into zirconium alloy tubes bundled into assemblies.
为何选择此地: The cladding is zirconium with the hafnium removed — two chemically near-identical metals that had to be separated for this to work at all.
France · Reactor 持有方 Utility (最终用户)
About a year of electricity
Loaded into the core. One pellet holds roughly the energy of a tonne of coal. A large reactor's annual load fits in a few shipping containers.
为何选择此地: Four countries, and every gram inventoried at every handover.
本文为示例演算，以公开的典型产率和回收率对既定起始量逐步推算，各比例可供核验；这不是某批具体货物的记录。路线事实——途经哪些国家、经历哪些工序，以及为何该材料不能在其他地方简单处理——均来源于公开报道。