Japan Comes Shopping for Kazak Uranium

Although Kazakstan’s nuclear industry is building up the number of foreign partners it works with, it is a long way off acquiring uranium enrichment technology and is likely to remain only a supplier of the basic ore, say NBCentralAsia experts.



On April 30, during a two-day visit by a Japanese delegation led by economics, trade and industry minister Akira Amari, energy companies from Japan signed agreements to go ahead with 24 joint ventures to extract and process Kazak uranium. They agreed to work together to build a nuclear power station in Kazakstan and grant Japanese companies righst to import up to 2,000 tons of uranium concentrate a year mined from the Kharasan-1 and Kharasan-2 deposits.



These contracts represent a continuation of agreements reached with former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi when he visited Kazakstan last August.



Japan is the world’s third largest producer of nuclear energy, consuming around 8,000 tons of uranium a year.



According to Kazatomprom, the national nuclear power company, this is the first time Japan has sent such a high-level delegation to strike foreign energy deals, highlighting the country’s mounting interest in Kazak uranium.



NBCentralAsia analysts say Japan is a promising new partner, but cooperation is still restricted to extracting and exporting the primary ore. There are no plans for Kazakstan to acquire enrichment technology with Japanese help.



“Kazakstan totally lacks enrichment technology. We have the penultimate stage in the process. But [enriched uranium] could be produced here in partnership with the Russians, French and Japanese. The technology is not a secret,” said NBCentralAsia analyst Petr Svoik.



Kazakstan is the world’s third largest extractor of uranium and has the second largest reserves. Japan joins Russia and France as the principal importers of Kazak uranium.



Political scientist Maksim Kaznacheev says Kazakstan cannot automatically start using sophisticated technology to process uranium because of restrictions imposed by the International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA.



“The agreements signed with Japan are only to supply ore. It is unlikely that Japanese companies will give Kazakstan enrichment technology, since there are IAEA restrictions on transferring such technologies.”



Russia is the largest consumer of Kazak uranium and itself supplies processed nuclear fuel to Japan, but Kaznacheev says Japan is not treading on Russia’s toes.



“Japan is not a serious competitor for Russia now, since… the [Kazak-] Russian relationship is based on an integrated technological process, whereas Japan represents a promising export market,” he said.



(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)