The United Kingdom announced a £210 million ($280 million) export finance deal to supply enriched uranium to Ukraine’s state nuclear operator, Energoatom. The agreement, unveiled on June 15, is designed to keep Ukraine’s battered power grid running while severing one more thread of Moscow’s energy leverage.
Energoatom generates over 50% of Ukraine’s electricity. Losing reliable nuclear fuel supply would be, to put it mildly, catastrophic for a country already absorbing sustained strikes on its energy infrastructure.
What the deal actually looks like
The two-year supply contract runs through UK Export Finance, the government’s export credit agency. The uranium will come from Urenco, an enrichment company partly owned by the UK government.
Over one-third of the supplied uranium will be processed at Urenco’s facility in Chester, England.
