抄録
Since a historical event called “Oil Crisis” occurred in 1973, the importance of energy problems have been recognized with much attention especially among those concerned with nuclear industries. This article, based mainly upon the “Uranium-Resources, Production and Demand” published by OECD in 1979, the INFCE final report and others, intends to introduce recent status about the development of nuclear raw materials in the world. It reports the previous history of the statistical data preparations and definitions which represent uranium resources, classification of resources, recent uranium reserves and speculative resources, and uranium concentrate production by countries. It also refers to the situation and outlook of supply and demand up to the year 2025. It includes reevaluation projects for domestic uranium deposits in USA (NURE), Canada, and IUREP project, and a review of the Uranium Institute as well as a brief comment on thorium resources expecting its future energy use. Comment is also made on workable and valuable uranium resources, occurring as unconformity, veinlike deposits in the world from geochronological points of view.
