Most of my blog posts have to do with nuclear reactors, nuclear weapons and/or nuclear waste. But occasionally I blog on other nuclear related issues such as the production of radioisotopes for medical use. The radioisotope market was over eleven billion dollars in 2016 and is estimated to rise to almost twenty billion dollars by 2021. There have been concerns lately that the production of Molybdenum-99 will be sufficient to supply the global demand.
Mo-99 is the precursor for technetium-99m. Tc-99m is the most popular radioisotope used in nuclear medicine. Mo-99 only has a sixty-six hour half-life so it cannot just be manufactured and stockpiled for whenever it is needed. The ability to produce and distribute Mo-99 in a timely fashion is critical to insuring that it will be available when needed. Mo-99 is produced in special reactors, many of which are connected to research organizations. Highly enriched uranium targets are bombarded to produce Mo-99. These targets are of concern to organizations and governmental agencies dedicated to preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Commercial production of Mo-99 in the U.S. ended in 1989. The U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has been partnering with U.S. private firms to speed up the creation of technologies which can produce Mo-99 without the need for the highly-enriched uranium targets.
Shine Medical Technologies just started the construction of a new radioisotope production plant in Janesville, Wisconsin. They create Mo-99 along with other radioisotopes used in medical diagnosis and treatment. They will produce these isotopes with an accelerator-driven subcritical assembly and will only need low-enriched uranium for targets. They have received twenty five million dollars from the NNSA.
Shine applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a construction permit in 2013. In 2015, the conclusion of a review of Shine’s safety analysis report prompted the NRC to recommend granting the construction permit. The permit was granted by the NRC in early 2016. Space at the facility will be used to research further refinements in the production technology for radioisotopes. The facility is being construction near an airport to facilitate the rapid shipment of the radioisotopes. The first commercial shipments of Mo-99 are planned for 2020.
Northstar Medical Radioisotopes is also working with the NNSA. They are developing a production method for radioisotopes that involves the use of a linear accelerator. Another participant in the NNSA project is General Atomics. GA is working on technology that utilizes a low-enriched uranium target for radioisotope production.
NTP Radioisotopes SOC Ltd is a subsidiary of the South African Nuclear Energy Corporation. It claims that it currently supplies between twenty five and thirty three percent of the global demand for Mo-99. The NTP finance director said, "We have managed to grow our market share for Mo-99 through continued investment in our production, and by working with our partners to cover the supply gap."
The OECD-Nuclear Energy Agency published a report about the supply of medical radioisotopes in April of this year. They said that “additional reactor capacity and associated processing capacity from existing radioisotope producers were added during 2016.” In addition, the report said "Overall, the current irradiator and processor supply chain capacity should be sufficient and if well maintained, planned and scheduled, be able to manage an unplanned outage of a reactor, or a processor throughout the whole period to 2022. If no additional capacity is added, then from mid-2018, the level of capability to manage adverse events falls, in particular when considering processing capacity." The report went on to say, “The supply situation will continue to require "careful and well considered planning", to minimize security of supply risks, with a high degree of cooperation between producers being essential for the foreseeable future.” The NEA stated that regular monitoring of the market will be required as well as periodic reviews of the progress in bringing new production capacity online.
