(Bloomberg) -- A long-delayed, multi-billion dollar uranium project in Mongolia under development by French state-controlled miner Orano SA could start producing the nuclear fuel by 2030, the company said.
Commercial output from the Zuuvch Ovoo mine could begin after five years of construction, pending the signing of an investment agreement, according to Olivier Thoumyre, Orano’s representative in Mongolia. A confirmation vote on the project in the country’s parliament is scheduled for the current legislative session.
Global uranium demand is rebounding as China continues to add plants, while other nations in Europe and Asia prepare to build reactors as part of strategies to curb emissions. If it goes ahead, Zuuvch Ovoo stands to be the largest mining project in Mongolia since the development of the Oyu Tolgoi copper-gold mine led by Rio Tinto Plc, a venture that took decades to bring fully online, including an underground expansion that opened last year.
Mongolia has the possibility of becoming a “major player” in uranium, Thoumyre said at an industry convention in Nalaikh, a town near the capital, Ulaanbaatar. Zuuvch Ovoo has been in development since before 2013, when Areva SA, Orano’s forerunner, formed a joint venture with Mongolia’s nuclear company, Mon-Atom, to develop uranium resources.
The reappointment of Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrai as prime minister in July has boosted confidence in policy continuity from the previous administration, which agreed to negotiate with Orano over the mine a year ago. “Discussion never stopped” over terms, Thoumyre said on Thursday.
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