A public research surface · updated continuously
The nuclear renaissance will be won by whoever owns the chokepoints.
HALEU enrichment, uranium conversion, ultra-large forgings, zirconium cladding, NRC licensing lanes. Nuclear Bottlenecks maps the fuel cycle and component chain behind every restart and SMR — and the listed companies that own each choke. Own the strait, not the tanker.
36 names tracked · 10 chokepoints · free, no login
The chokepoints
I
Enrichment & HALEU
Centrus runs the only NRC-licensed US HALEU cascade; Western SWU is essentially two suppliers plus a Russian import ban with waivers expiring.
LEU · SILXY · CCJ · GENERALMATTER
II
Uranium conversion & deconversion
UF6 conversion is a three-plant Western market and the Metropolis, Illinois plant is the only US converter.
SOLS · CCJ · UEC · BWXT · LEU · GEV
III
Uranium supply & mining
Utilities are structurally under-covered into the late 2020s while Western restarts chase a deficit the spot market already prices.
CCJ · SRUUF · UUUU · UEC · EU · DNN · NXE · URNM
IV
Fuel fabrication & TRISO
Fabricated assemblies come from a handful of licensed lines; TRISO and metallic SMR fuels need facilities that mostly don't exist yet.
BWXT · LEU · XE · CCJ · GEV · LTBR · WESTINGHOUSE
V
Large forgings & heavy components
Reactor pressure vessels need ultra-large forgings only a few plants on earth can pour; order books fill years ahead.
BWXT · CW · JPSWY · HII
VI
Zirconium & specialty metals
Nuclear-grade zirconium sponge and cladding tube is a single-digit-supplier market squeezed between defense and civilian demand.
ATI · CCJ · LTBR · FRAMATOME
VII
SMR & advanced reactor platforms
The visible layer: listed SMR developers racing NRC milestones and first concrete — pre-revenue, catalyst-dense, repricing violently.
BWXT · OKLO · SMR · NNE · LTBR
VIII
Restarts, uprates & nuclear utilities
Existing gigawatts are the only nuclear that ships this decade; restarts, uprates and datacenter PPAs carry dated public catalysts.
CEG · VST · TLN · NEE · PEG
IX
Instrumentation, controls & outage services
Every reactor — new or restarted — buys radiation detection, I&C, dosimetry and outage services from a thin specialist bench.
MIR · CW · BWXT · FLR
X
Private giants & exposure vehicles
Westinghouse, X-energy, TerraPower, Kairos, Urenco — the nuclear cap tables without tickers, and the listed paths into them.
CCJ · BEP · XE · LEU · WESTINGHOUSE · TERRAPOWER · KAIROSPOWER · URENCO
Latest brief · 2026-09-11
A Piper Sandler rating split and climbing rate-hike odds sank the advanced-reactor and enrichment complex, with Centrus down nearly 9%.
The nuclear basket had one of its worst sessions of the quarter, and the damage concentrated on the enrichment chokepoint. Centrus Energy (LEU) fell 8.6% to $165.87, the steepest decline in the group, even though its own fundamentals are intact — Q2 revenue of $176.1 million, up 14%, on a multibillion-dollar enrichment backlog. This was a valuation and rate move, not a fundamental break. The macro set the tone: a fourth straight down day for the indices, WTI above $100, and Fed funds futures pricing roughly a 73% chance of a quarter-point hike next week. Advanced nuclear is acutely rate-sensitive because its reactors require capital years before commercial revenue, so rising yields discount the whole build.
A sector-specific catalyst amplified it. Piper Sandler issued a split rating action across advanced nuclear, and the developer names dropped in near-lockstep: Oklo (OKLO) −6.3% to $39.88, NuScale (SMR) −5.6% to $10.21, X-Energy (XE) −8.2% to $15.84, and NANO Nuclear (NNE) −4.5%. The fuel-cycle names went with them — Energy Fuels (UUUU) −6.3% to $13.63, Cameco (CCJ) −3.0% to $97.42 — as the market cut duration across every pre-cash-flow rung from the mine to the reactor.
The one green was defensive and telling: Huntington Ingalls (HII) rose 0.3% to $281.67, the naval-propulsion end of the vertical, where nuclear work is funded by a defense budget rather than a merchant-power thesis. The utility-scale power buyers that anchor the demand case softened but held better than the developers — GE Vernova (GEV) −2.9% to $923.91, Constellation (CEG) −2.7%, Vistra (VST) −2.7%, Talen (TLN) −2.5% — a reminder that the operating fleet and the not-yet-built fleet trade on very different clocks.
The catalyst path runs through the fuel cycle first. The NRC's final Environmental Impact Statement for GLE's Paducah laser-enrichment facility is expected by late September — the domestic-enrichment signal that bears directly on the chokepoint LEU just sold off on. X-Energy's Xe-100 hits an 18-month NRC construction-permit review milestone December 16, BWXT reports Q3 on November 2, and definitive Westinghouse/U.S. government agreements are targeted by year-end. Further out, the 2028 termination of Russian LEU import waivers keeps the structural bid under domestic enrichment that today's tape looked straight past.