US Signs Law Banning Russian Uranium Imports... "Cutting Off Funding"

Russia "US Economic Damage Is Greater" Backlash

U.S. President Joe Biden signed a bipartisan bill banning the import of Russian uranium on the 13th (local time), according to The Washington Post (WP).

The bill prohibits the import of low-enriched uranium produced by Russia or Russian companies into the United States and will take effect 90 days from that day. However, the law's application will be deferred until 2028 for power companies that would have no choice but to shut down reactors if the supply of Russian uranium is cut off.

President Joe Biden of the United States
[Photo by Yonhap News]

Jake Sullivan, White House National Security Advisor, stated, "The new bill reestablishes U.S. leadership in the nuclear sector" and "will help protect the energy sector for future generations."

The bill passed the House last December but failed to clear the Senate due to opposition from Republican Senator Ted Cruz. However, after Senator Cruz withdrew his opposition, the bill passed the Senate unanimously. WP described this as "a measure to block one of the last major financial flows from the U.S. to Russia during the Ukraine war."

The U.S. banned imports of Russian crude oil and natural gas in March 2022, shortly after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but uranium was not included in the sanctions. This is because 20% of the enriched uranium used in 93 commercial reactors in the U.S. is Russian-made. At the time, there were concerns that the import ban could disrupt nuclear power plant operations.

The U.S. has paid about $1 billion annually to Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear corporation, for Russian uranium imports. Uranium imports continued even after it was revealed last year that Rosatom supplied missile fuel components, technology, and raw materials necessary for weapons development.

WP analyzed that U.S. and European companies lost competitiveness while competing with cheap Russian uranium, and that the U.S. lacks sufficient domestic uranium enrichment capacity. The U.S. has relied on Russian uranium since it began importing highly enriched uranium from dismantled Russian nuclear warheads for power generation after the end of the U.S.-Soviet Cold War in 1993. In response, the U.S. Congress passed a $2.7 billion budget to foster the nuclear fuel enrichment industry.

Russia opposed the U.S. uranium import ban. According to Russia's Sputnik News, Anatoly Antonov, Russian Ambassador to the U.S., said the ban on Russian uranium imports would cause more damage to the U.S. economy than to Russia. He claimed, "The U.S. government is harming its own economy despite insufficient domestic enrichment capacity," and "the Biden administration's sanctions will not achieve the desired results."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.