50,000 years of fuel: US firm targets 4 billion tons of uranium hidden in seawater

The ocean could become an enormous source of nuclear fuel as the United States works to triple its nuclear energy capacity by 2050. Fluxnium, a US clean-tech startup emerging from stealth, has developed polymer fibers designed to extract dissolved uranium from seawater and convert it into yellowcake. The company recently raised $7 million in a seed round led by Congruent Ventures, with participation from Active Impact Investments and Constellation Energy. Fluxnium plans to use technology licensed from US Department of Energy laboratories to make ocean-based uranium competitive with material supplied by conventional mines. A vast reserve beneath the waves More than 4 billion metric tons of uranium are dissolved across the world’s oceans, according to Fluxnium. That represents enough material to potentially meet global demand for around 50,000 years. “It’s like a thousand times more than all identified hard rock mines combined,” Fluxnium founder and CEO Jeff Green told TechCrunch. Accessing that reserve could give the US nuclear industry another source of fuel at a time when yellowcake prices are rising. Prices have climbed 75% over the past five years, according to the US Energy Information Administration. The US also lacks significant domestic uranium resources and depends on supplies from other parts of the world. “If you’re in the West, two-thirds, three-quarters of the world’s uranium supply comes from Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Russia, Namibia, Niger, China. There’s geopolitical risk,” Green said. Demand could intensify as technology companies support nuclear energy projects in search of electricity for their AI data centers. “Now with this new nuclear renaissance? If demand comes the way it’s being projected, we’re structurally short uranium.” Green said. Fibers harvest uranium like seaweed Fluxnium’s system uses specially manufactured polymer fibers that attract uranium dissolved in seawater. The underlying chemistry was developed at Department of Energy laboratories, while the startup has focused on improving how the fibers are produced and configured. The material is formed into long, braided lines that are suspended from ocean buoys, similar to the methods used for farming seaweed. After remaining in the water for 30 to 60 days, the fibers are returned to shore. The captured uranium is then removed from the material and purified into yellowcake. The extraction process does not produce toxic tailings, while each fiber line can be deployed several times. Cutting the cost of ocean uranium Economics have historically prevented seawater uranium extraction from competing with conventional mining. When the technology was demonstrated at a national laboratory, production costs exceeded $200 per pound, more than double the current price charged by Western suppliers. Fluxnium has sought to lower that figure by increasing the surface area of its fibers. A larger surface allows the material to capture more uranium during each deployment, reducing the cost per pound. Manufacturing the specialized fibers and deploying them offshore remain major expenses. Fluxnium will therefore focus on lowering costs across every stage of the operation. “None of the components of this process are anything novel. It’s all been done in different ways,” Green said. “Our job is to drive cost out of the supply chain, keep working through all the stages of the process to make it as low cost as possible,” he added.Get the latest in engineering, tech, space & science - delivered daily to your inbox.Atharva is a full-time content writer with a post-graduate degree in media & amp; entertainment and a graduate degree in electronics & telecommunications. He has written in the sports and technology domains respectively. In his leisure time, Atharva loves learning about digital marketing and watching soccer matches. His main goal behind joining Interesting Engineering is to learn more about how the recent technological advancements are helping human beings on both societal and individual levels in their daily lives.