Uranium cost curve
Every uranium operation with an issuer-stated cost per pound, cheapest first, with a width equal to its annual capacity, so the chart reads as cumulative supply against cost. Each figure keeps the basis the company reports (all-in sustaining cost, C1 cash cost, or a study projection for projects not yet producing), its period, its original currency and a link to the document. Operations whose operator discloses no unit cost are listed, not estimated. Company-level costs sit on the stock screener; the per-project database is at Projects.
Cost curve by operation
Each step is one operation: its width is annual capacity, its height the issuer's cost per pound. Hover a step for the basis, period and source.
No operation has both a cited cost and a curated width for this view.
Widths are cited nameplate or licensed capacities, falling back to the trailing four quarters of dried and drummed production where no nameplate is curated. Operations with a cost but no curated width, and operations with no disclosed cost, are listed below the chart; nothing is estimated onto the curve.
Ranked unit costs
every cited figure, cheapest first, basis on every row| # | Operation | Status | US$/lb | Basis | As stated | Period | Width, Mlb/yr | Source |
|---|
As stated is the issuer's own figure in its own currency; hover it for the conversion note. A row reads "operator-wide" when the company publishes one consolidated cost that spans this operation. Study projections come from feasibility studies and restart plans for operations that are not yet producing at steady state.
Not on the curve
- McArthur River / Key LakeCameco · CCJ · CanadaOperating25.00 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Cigar LakeCameco / Orano · CCJ · CanadaOperating18.00 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Inkai (JV)Cameco / Kazatomprom · CCJ · KazakhstanOperating10.40 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Kazatomprom ISR mines (Tortkuduk, Budenovskoye, etc.)Kazatomprom · NATKY · KazakhstanOperatingcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Langer HeinrichPaladin Energy · PALAF · NamibiaOperating6.00 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- HoneymoonBoss Energy · BQSSF · AustraliaOperating2.45 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Lance ProjectsPeninsula Energy · PENMF · USAOperating3.00 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Lost CreekUr-Energy · URG · USAOperating2.20 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Pinyon Plain / White Mesa MillEnergy Fuels · UUUU · USAOperating8.00 Mlb/yr processing plant licensed capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Christensen Ranch / IrigarayUranium Energy Corp · UEC · USARestart4.00 Mlb/yr processing plant licensed capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Rook I / ArrowNexGen Energy · NXE · CanadaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Wheeler River / PhoenixDenison Mines · DNN · CanadaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Hurricane (Larocque East)IsoEnergy · ISOU · CanadaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- DasaGlobal Atomic · GLATF · NigerDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- EtangoBannerman Energy · BNNLF · NamibiaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- TumasDeep Yellow · DYLLF · NamibiaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- KayelekeraLotus Resources · LTSRF · MalawiRestart2.40 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Sunday Mine ComplexWestern Uranium & Vanadium · WSTRF · USARestartcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- HusabSwakop Uranium (CGN) · NamibiaOperatingcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- RössingCNUC · NamibiaOperatingcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Olympic Dam (by-product)BHP · AustraliaOperatingcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Patterson Lake South / Triple RPaladin Energy (Fission) · PALAF · CanadaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Mulga RockDeep Yellow · DYLLF · AustraliaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Smith Ranch-HighlandCameco · CCJ · USARestart5.50 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- LetlhakaneLotus Resources · LTSRF · BotswanaDevelopmentcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
- Alta MesaenCore Energy · EU · USAOperating1.50 Mlb/yr processing plant licensed capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Rosita (South Texas Integrated Project)enCore Energy · EU · USACare And Maintenance0.80 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Shirley BasinUr-Energy · URG · USADevelopment1.00 Mlb/yr nameplate capacityCost: Not disclosed
- Burke HollowUranium Energy Corp · UEC · USAOperatingcapacity not curatedCost: Not disclosed
Not disclosed means the operator publishes no per-pound cost in any document we cite; the operation is never given an estimated cost. Its capacity, where curated, still counts in the coverage denominator above.
Methodology
- What a step is
- One operation. Its height is the cost per pound the issuer states; its width is annual capacity in Mlb U3O8. Steps are sorted by cost, so the x-axis reads as cumulative supply available at or below a given cost. Nothing on the curve is estimated: a figure is either quoted from a cited document or the operation is listed off the curve.
- Three cost bases, never merged
- All-in sustaining cost of production; C1 cash cost of production (AISC not disclosed); Feasibility-study projection — the company is not yet producing (see notes for what the figure includes). A C1 cash cost understates all-in economics, and a study projection has not been achieved in production, so the chart draws one series per basis and the legend and every row name it.
- Per lb produced vs sold
- Some producers report cost per pound produced, others per pound sold (which can carry inventory timing and taxes). The table states which; where the document does not say, the row says so.
- Currency
- Costs stated in Canadian or Australian dollars are shown in USD using the conversion the issuer itself prints in the same document; the original figure and currency sit beside it and the conversion note is on hover.
- Width
- Default width is the cited nameplate or licensed capacity of the operation, or of its processing plant when that plant serves only this mine. The alternative view uses the trailing four contiguous quarters of dried and drummed production from the production tracker, summed through the same aggregation rule that refuses mixed stages, bases, levels and overlapping periods; fewer than four contiguous quarters means no width from production. Each step says which it uses.
- Operator-wide figures
- Where a company publishes one consolidated unit cost spanning several operations (Cameco for its Canadian mines, enCore for its South Texas plants, Kazatomprom for its fleet), that figure is shown on each operation it covers and flagged operator-wide; a fleet figure is paired with the company’s attributable pounds so the width matches the cost’s basis.
- Not on the curve
- Operators that publish no per-pound cost (Husab, Rössing, Olympic Dam, Inkai and others) appear in the list below the table with their capacity where it is curated, so the coverage figure counts them against the curve rather than hiding them. Developers whose planned capacity is not yet curated with a citation show a cost in the table but no width.
- Spot and incentive lines
- The spot line is the site's live U3O8 price with its provenance shown in the ribbon (a last banked print is marked as such). The incentive band ($60-70/lb) is a site assumption for the sustained price that sanctions new mines, not a published figure.
Curated rows last updated 2026-10-16. See the site-wide methodology for provenance labels and the other datasets.
Cite this page
Using our data in an article or report? Please credit Yellowcake Analytics with a link.
Yellowcake Analytics. "Uranium Cost Curve: AISC and Cash Costs by Operation." Yellowcake Analytics, 2026, https://www.yellowcakeanalytics.com/cost-curve.
<a href="https://www.yellowcakeanalytics.com/cost-curve">Uranium Cost Curve: AISC and Cash Costs by Operation</a> — Yellowcake Analytics (www.yellowcakeanalytics.com)
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