Overview: Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant

The Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, located in Piketon, Ohio, began operations in 1954 as part of a U.S. government expansion program for the production of highly enriched uranium to fuel military reactors and nuclear weapons production.

Later, the Piketon plant, along with its sister enrichment plant in Paducah, Kentucky, took on a different mission: the production of low-enriched uranium to fuel commercial nuclear power plants around the world.

Both plants are owned by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and leased and operated by the United States Enrichment Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of USEC Inc.

In May 2001, USEC ceased uranium enrichment operations in Piketon and consolidated operations in Paducah. The following year, transfer and shipping operations were also consolidated at Paducah.

Today, the mission of the Piketon plant is three-fold:

• performing external contract work, including:
  • cold-standby, uranium deposit removal and winterization services for DOE,
  • a range of specialized support services for DOE and its contractors, such as safeguards and security, fire services and emergency management, analytical laboratory services, computing and telecommunications, and environmental monitoring,
• providing operational and administrative support functions for USEC, and
• performing other activities, such as decontaminating uranium feed material for DOE.

Piketon is hosting USEC's American Centrifuge Demonstration Facility and construction has begun on the future American Centrifuge Plant.

American Centrifuge is USEC's next-generation uranium enrichment technology.