Russia's nuclear fuel company TVEL will supply two reload batches of HEU fuel assemblies to the Chinese Experimental Fast Reactor (CEFR) (see also World Nuclear News story). The contract, signed with the China Institute of Atomic Energy (CIEA), is reported to have value of about $50 million. The fuel will be delivered to China in 2017-2018 and loaded into the reactor in 2019.

The CEFR reactor achieved its first criticality in July 2010, with HEU fuel supplied by Russia (reported to be 64.4% U-235). In 2013, TVEL signed a contract to supply additional batch of HEU fuel. At the time it was expected that CEFR will begin operations with plutonium-based MOX fuel in 2015, but apparently it will continue to use HEU until at least 2019.