OREANDA-NEWS. January 23, 2013. In 2012, despite difficult market conditions due to the adverse consequences of the Fukushima NPP accident, TENEX not only managed to preserve the previous years’ record high of over USD 3 billions’ worth of uranium exports, but even increased its decade-long export contract portfolio by nearly 40%.

The year 2012 proved to be extremely important in terms of performing the HEU-LEU Agreement, signed by the governments of Russia and the United States on 18 February, 1993, which provided for use of high-enriched uranium taken from dismantled nuclear weapons. In pursuance of this agreement, under a contract between TENEX and USEC, this past year saw 864 tons of low-enriched uranium shipped to the United States, earning Russia’s federal government a huge foreign-currency revenue – over USD 1 billion. In 2012, an amendment was signed to this contract refining a number of technical and logistical aspects to ensure that in 2013 the HEU-LEU Agreement is carried out in a full and timely manner. Overall, by the end of 2012, a 20-year programme for low-enriched uranium deliveries provided for by the HEU-LEU Agreement was 95% complete.

In 2012, TENEX continued its active work in securing new contracts for Russian uranium supplies with energy companies from various regions across the world. As has become customary, active assistance to TENEX in its operation in the global market was provided by the company’s overseas affiliates: Internexco of Germany, TENAM Corporation of the United States, TENEX-Korea of the Republic of Korea, TENEX-Japan of Japan, and Tradewill of the UK.

Of a special note is TENEX’s entry into a new, Middle East sales market through the conclusion of a long-term contract with the UAE’s Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation on 15 August, 2012, for supplies of Russian enriched uranium to the Baraka NPP, currently under construction in this country.

In 2012, TENEX successfully completed two pilot projects aimed at developing the company’s uranium business.

The first saw a consignment of Australian natural uranium delivered into Russia in November 2012 under a contract signed in June 2012 with Energy Resources of Australia, member of Rio Tinto Group. This shipment marked the start of practical work on Russian-Australian arrangements, formalised in 2007 in an intergovernmental agreement on cooperation in use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, also paving the way for the use of Australian natural uranium on toll processing principles in the sales of Russian nuclear fuel services to foreign customers.

The second project, the delivery in October 2012 of an enriched uranium shipment via the seaport Vostochny from Russia to Japan, confirmed that this new transport corridor is convenient and promising for delivering uranium products via Russia’s Far East to Pacific Asia countries.

Another thing that should be viewed as the company’s achievement is its certification to the ISO 28000:2007 standard, “Supply Chain Security Management”. In August 2012, TENEX became the first company in Russia’s nuclear industry to receive a certificate from Germany’s certifying body TUV Thuringen e.V. confirming compliance of the company’s management system with requirements to the export/import supply chain for nuclear fuel cycle products. Obtaining this certificate is testimony to the international recognition of TENEX’s competencies in managing security at all stages in the uranium product supply chain.

In January 2012, TENEX obtained an authorisation from the Russian government to extend the term of general export licences from three to five years from the issue date of a state accreditation certificate, which significantly advances the speed of finalising export contracts.