Urenco

Urenco is a uranium enrichment company owned in equal shares by the governments of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Germany, plus a German utility consortium. Founded under the 1970 Treaty of Almelo, Urenco operates centrifuge enrichment plants in Capenhurst (UK), Gronau (Germany) and Almelo (Netherlands), as well as a facility in the United States. It is one of only a handful of commercial uranium enrichers worldwide and supplies fuel assemblies to nuclear utilities across Europe, the Americas and Asia.

Urenco's strategic importance rose sharply after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Western governments identified Ukraine's reliance on TVEL (a Rosatom subsidiary) for fuel rods for its Soviet-designed VVER reactors as a critical vulnerability. Urenco, alongside Westinghouse, became central to efforts to diversify Ukraine's nuclear fuel supply away from Russia. On 16 June 2026, the UK Government announced a £210m UK Export Finance-backed deal for Urenco to supply enriched uranium to Energoatom, sufficient to power Ukraine's VVER reactors for approximately two years.

The deal carries significance beyond Ukraine: it demonstrates that Western-aligned enrichers can technically and commercially substitute for Russian fuel on Soviet-designed reactor types, a question of relevance to several EU member states still operating VVER reactors.