The uranium price hit $91/lb this week, its highest since 2007, but the global pivot back to nuclear energy is creating challenges such as the need to rebuild supply chains that have “long since disappeared”, John Ciampaglia, chief executive officer of Sprott Asset Management, which runs the Sprott Physical Uranium Trust, said in a blog post on Wednesday (3 January).

Ciampaglia said the price could now be near a level that can sustain new mining projects. He said price gains this year have clearly been driven by utilities, which bought more uranium in 2023 than they have done since 2012.

Ciampaglia said the period from 2011 to 2020 was “a lost decade” for uranium and nuclear energy. It impacted the whole sector from the building of nuclear power stations to the mining and processing of uranium, and the nuclear fuel supply chain.