US utility uranium procurement: goals and tactics

This paper summarizes and attempts to explain the results of a survey sent to 37 US utilities asking them two questions: What are the goals of your uranium procurement strategy? and what are the tactics you use in achieving those goals? The results are presented in a summary fashion to protect individual company proprietary information. This paper is directed particularly to non-US uranium market participants as an aid to gain further insight into ''the US market'' and to understand how the potential cumulative market responses of US utilities may influence their procurement plans. Out of 37 utilities surveyed, 25 responded. Some utilities were interviewed over the telephone. Some responses were as short as one paragraph, while others were 1 to 5 pages in length. The format was chosen to encourage original responses. The range of responses could be used in the future as a basis for a multiple-choice type survey to form a more statistically representative sample. The responses are summarized for each of the two questions. (author)