Canada’s Cameco Corporation and Global Laser Enrichment (GLE) have executed an exclusive offtake agreement covering 100% of all future production from GLE’s planned Paducah Laser Enrichment Facility (PLEF) in Kentucky. Cameco (which owns 49% of GLE, alongside Australia’s SILEX Systems at 51%) will purchase every pound of nuclear fuel produced by the facility. Product pricing will be tied directly to Cameco’s average realised price across its long-term contracting portfolio, net of selling costs. This eliminates the need for GLE to fund its own sales and marketing operations.
The deal anchors commercial demand for several outputs, including natural uranium hexafluoride (UF6) from tails re-enrichment, low-enriched uranium (LEU), LEU+ (5-10% U-235), and high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) for advanced reactors. The agreement removes major commercial uncertainty by establishing a guaranteed demand anchor for the SILEX laser-enrichment technology, which has never previously operated at commercial scale.
Michael Goldsworthy, SILEX’s CEO/Managing Director said: “We are delighted with the execution of this crucial Offtake Agreement which provides a home for all of GLE’s future nuclear fuel products, including natural UF6 and enriched uranium products to help fuel the world’s rapidly growing nuclear reactor fleet.”
SILEX (Separation of Isotopes by Laser EXcitation) is a third-generation uranium enrichment technology. While the exact engineering parameters (wavelengths, laser pulsing, and flow physics) remain highly classified, the fundamental mechanism relies on laser-induced condensation repression rather than mechanical forces.
Uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas is mixed with a carrier gas and forced through a specialised nozzle into a vacuum chamber, creating a supersonic free jet. The gas expands adiabatically, cooling it to extremely low temperatures. This cooling narrows the molecular absorption spectrum, allowing for highly precise isotopic targeting. An industrial infrared laser tuned to a precise frequency (roughly 16 micrometres) fires into the gas stream. The laser energy is preferentially absorbed by the lighter uranium-235 UF6 molecules, leaving the heavier uranium-238 UF molecules unexcited.
These unexcited molecules readily bind with the carrier gas to form heavy molecular clusters. However, the laser-excited U-235 molecules experience “condensation repression” and their added vibrational energy prevents them from clustering. The heavy U-238 clusters continue traveling in a straight line along the centre axis of the supersonic jet and pass straight through a mechanical “skimmer” nozzle. The lighter, U-235 molecules diffuse outward away from the beam axis, allowing them to be separately collected as enriched product.
Because lasers target the specific isotope directly, SILEX features a significantly higher separation factor per stage compared with gas centrifuges. A SILEX plant requires far fewer cycles (stages) to reach target enrichment levels, enabling a much smaller physical footprint, lower capital expenditures, and faster deployment.
The PLEF feedstock is secured by a 40-year US Department of Energy (DOE) agreement, signed in November 2016, for roughly 300,000 tonnes of high-assay depleted uranium hexafluoride tails. Paducah is the site of a former gaseous diffusion uranium enrichment plant, and GLE intends to re-enrich high-assay depleted uranium tails from previous operations. GLE expects to produce about 70,000 tonnes of “new, fresh feed” from the tails at Paducah over the plant’s lifetime. PLEF is targeting up to 6m separative work units a year from 2030. A pilot-scale technology demonstration is expected to reach Technology Readiness Level 6 (TRL-6) this year. GLE has applied to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for an operating licence for PLEF, which is expected in 2027.
However, before PLEF can begin operation, GLE will first have to achieve TRL-7 as defined by DOE guidelines, GLE must transition the SILEX technology from a pilot-scale loop to a full-scale prototype demonstration in an operational, plant-like environment. Having secured independent validation for TRL-6 in late 2025 at its Wilmington Test Loop, GLE and SILEX Systems are working through the specific technical and operational milestones required to clear the TRL-7 hurdle.
The primary laser systems used in TRL-6 were sized for a pilot test loop. TRL-7 requires the design, fabrication, and continuous firing demonstration of full-scale commercial laser systems capable of handling the mass flow rates expected in a commercial facility. GLE will have to scale up the physical separator units (the supersonic gas expansion nozzles and collection chambers). TRL-7 requires these components to operate at full scale replicas of what will be installed in PLEF.
GLE cannot simply build a boutique prototype; they must prove the components can be manufactured reliably. GLE must demonstrate that its custom, proprietary components can be repeatedly fabricated by its in-house manufacturing teams and external US domestic supply chain partners. The systems must prove they can consistently handle uranium hexafluoride UF6) gas at full volumes without clogging, unexpected material degradation, or laser optics fouling over extended periods.
Under the DOE framework, TRL-6 proves the technology works in a relevant environment. TRL-7 requires it to work in an operational environment. GLE must run the integrated commercial-scale systems under continuous, long-duration test campaigns. This shifts the focus from proving the physics (which was done in TRL-6) to proving system reliability, uptime, and steady-state enrichment efficiency. The full-scale system must consistently yield the exact isotopic separation factors required to generate commercial-grade products—specifically proving the system’s flexibility to transition between producing natural UF6 (from tails), standard LEU, LEU+, and HALEU without losing efficiency.
Clearing TRL-7 serves as the primary technical gate for the project’s economics. Successfully hitting these milestones will provide the definitive data required for GLE to complete its preliminary detailed design and bankable feasibility study for the Paducah plant. This study is the final step required before Cameco and SILEX Systems make a formal Final Investment Decision (FID) to begin physical construction of the PLEF.
The global uranium enrichment market is currently dominated by second-generation gas centrifuge technology (accounting for roughly 75% of the market), led by players such as Rosatom (Russia), Orano (France), and Urenco (UK/Germany/Netherlands). In future, US Centrus also aims to become a key player in this market.
By executing this 100% exclusive offtake for the Paducah facility, Cameco is fundamentally shifting its position from a simple mining company into a fully integrated nuclear fuel company. Prior to this, a utility had to buy uranium from a miner (like Cameco), ship it to a converter, and then ship it to an enricher (like Urenco or Centrus). Through its 49% ownership of GLE and 49% ownership of reactor-builder Westinghouse, Cameco can now contract out the entire lifecycle of nuclear energy within its own ecosystem.
Western utilities are aggressively trying to displace Russian enriched uranium. By locking up 300,000 tonnes of US DOE tails as feedstock for a 6m SWU plant, Cameco and SILEX could become the premier US domestic supplier of next-generation fuel (LEU+ and HALEU) for the SMR market. Building enrichment facilities is high-risk. By guaranteeing a buyer for 100% of the output at portfolio market pricing, GLE completely bypasses the multi-million-dollar hurdle of building a sales infrastructure, immediately clearing the path toward a positive FID.
