Project information
Nuclear Q&A: Dependencies on Russia and How to Reduce Them

While Europe is divesting from Russian fossil fuels, its nuclear sector is still heavily dependent on Russia. Russia accounts for around 6% of global uranium production and the EU imports more than €200 million worth of uranium from Russia each year (around 20% of uranium demand). In addition to supplying raw materials for the operation of nuclear power plants, Russian companies provide fuel assemblies, spare parts and servicing for Russian-origin reactors, which are particularly important in Eastern Europe, where they were built during the Cold War. The two-year "Nuclear Questions and Answers" project will be jointly led by Dr. Nils Haneklaus and Dr. Liliya Satalkina from the Td-Lab Sustainable Mineral Resources at the University for Continuing Education Krems (UWK) in Austria (specialists in energy raw materials, the project focuses on replacing Russia's import dependence on uranium), as well as Doc. Tomáš Vlček and Dr. Martin Jirušek from the Department of International Relations and European Studies at Masaryk University (MUNI) in the Czech Republic (experts in energy policy and energy security focusing on reducing dependence on Russian nuclear sector, reactor technology and energy supply in the project) will critically analyse the import dependence of the nuclear industry in Europe (with a focus on the Czech Republic and Eastern Europe) and the world on Russia and propose ways to reduce this dependence. The project will result in at least one peer-reviewed article that will be jointly submitted before the end of the project to Energy Policy (Q1-Journal, IF 7.576) or a similarly authoritative journal. In addition, the project team will use this mobility project to apply for bilateral follow-up funding between the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) and the GA Czech Republic within the WEAVE funding programme.