Republican Lawmakers Want More Info on DOE Uranium Market Analysis

A group of 18 Republican lawmakers are calling on the Department of Energy to provide additional information as to how it determined that its latest plans to transfer stocks of excess uranium for other purposes won’t have an “adverse material impact” on the domestic uranium industry. In a letter sent earlier this week to Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, the lawmakers questioned the basis for a Secretarial determination issued in May to allow the Department to move forward with plans to transfer a maximum of 2,705 metric tons of natural uranium equivalent material per year to help fund cleanup activities and for National Nuclear Security Administration programs. In its determination, DOE said it based its analysis that the transfer would not have an “adverse” impact on the domestic uranium production industry on work done by Energy Resources International, as well as “as other information and analysis reviewed by the Department.”

In their July 14 letter, the lawmakers called on DOE to release the “other information and analysis” it used in making its latest determination. The lawmakers noted that “unlike ERI’s four prior market impact analyses, ERI’s 2014 analysis does not make a finding that DOE’s uranium transfers will not have an adverse material impact on domestic uranium industries. To the contrary, ERI’s 2014 analysis explicitly states that it ‘does not make any conclusion regarding whether or not the release of DOE inventories into the commercial markets will result in an adverse material impact.’” They went on to write, “We therefore can only assume that DOE relied exclusively on ‘other information and analysis’ to justify your finding that the 2014 transfers will not have an adverse material impact on domestic uranium industries. For that reason, we ask that you disclose, in its entirety, this other information and analysis.”

The letter was signed by Sens. John Barrasso (Wyo.), Mike Johanss (Neb.), Michael Enzi (Wyo.), Mike Lee (Utah), John Cornyn (Texas), Deb Fischer (Neb.) and Orrin Hatch (Utah), as well as by Reps. Cynthia Lummis (Wyo.), Adrian Smith (Neb.), Cory Gardner (Colo.), Michael Burgess (Texas), Doug Lamborn (Colo.), Blake Farenthold (Texas), Scott Tipton (Colo.), Paul Gosar (Ariz.), John Shimkus (Ill.), Trent Franks (Ariz.) and Steve Pearce (N.M.). In a brief written response yesterday, a DOE spokesperson said, “The Department received a letter from several representatives regarding uranium transfers and appreciates their interest in the matter. We are currently reviewing the letter and its contents.”