Korea and France sign nuclear fuel and strategic tech pact

South Korea and France established a strategic industrial partnership covering uranium enrichment, advanced reactor engineering and critical technologies during a bilateral summit at the Élysée Palace on Sept. 8, 2026.

State-run utility Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power signed a letter of intent with French nuclear fuel group Orano to secure uranium enrichment services. The arrangement gives South Korea access to Orano's expanding European enrichment facilities.

South Korea consumes about 460 metric tons of enriched uranium annually, with demand projected to reach 540 metric tons next year. The country operates 26 commercial reactors and imports all of its enriched uranium fuel from foreign suppliers.

Four suppliers—Orano, European consortium Urenco, Russia's Rosatom and China National Nuclear Corporation—control roughly 99% of global commercial enrichment capacity. Western utilities are actively moving procurement away from Russian facilities ahead of pending import prohibitions.

The letter of intent establishes basic negotiation principles for a definitive long-term supply contract between the two state-linked operators. It broadens an initial memorandum of understanding signed during French President Emmanuel Macron's visit to Seoul in April.

KHNP holds a 2.5% equity stake in Orano's Georges Besse II enrichment facility in southern France. The new accord prepares South Korea to secure additional capacity increments as Orano expands centrifuge cascades at the site.

Securing Western enrichment capacity is critical as fuel market volatility rises, KHNP President and Chief Executive Kim Hoe-chun said. The utility aims to insulate its reactor fleet from geopolitical shocks affecting enrichment supply lines.

Orano views the partnership as a foundational anchor for its enrichment expansion program, Orano Board Chairman Claude Imauven said. The French group is expanding Tricastin capacity by more than 30% through 2028.

The two governments also agreed to institute a bilateral high-level civil nuclear dialogue. The new channel operates independently of the Korea-France Joint Nuclear Coordination Committee, an intergovernmental body founded in 1982.

State-run research body Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute plans to sign a research pact with French engineering firm Framatome. The agreement covers safety modeling and spent fuel management for small modular reactors.

The nuclear initiative reflects an operational truce between two aggressive reactor exporters. South Korea and France have competed intensely for multi-billion-dollar tenders across Central Europe, including major reactor procurement programs in the Czech Republic and Poland.

Bilateral competition for reactor construction remains active, Cheong Wa Dae National Security Director Wi Sung-lac said during a briefing in Paris. Both sides agreed their respective manufacturing and fuel strengths are commercially complementary, Wi added.

Beyond atomic energy, the two trade ministries signed an agreement on industrial cooperation and competitiveness. The agreement establishes a ministerial Industrial Strategy Dialogue alongside dedicated working groups for critical minerals, manufacturing and technology policy.

The intergovernmental framework unifies policy coordination on rare earth refining, battery precursor flows and semiconductor materials. Both capitals seek to insulate strategic industries from unilateral trade restrictions and offshore resource embargoes.

The summit yielded 16 bilateral cooperation documents across corporate investment, defense supply logistics and scientific research. South Korean President Lee Jae-myung and Macron set a target to expand annual bilateral trade to $20 billion by 2030.

Corporate tie-ups accompanied the diplomatic agreements. Samsung Electronics signed a direct investment agreement to participate as a strategic backer in a €3 billion ($3.25 billion) financing round for French generative artificial intelligence developer Mistral AI.

Samsung plans to co-develop dedicated internal AI foundation models with Mistral AI. The custom software will optimize semiconductor manufacturing workflows and device design while preventing intellectual property leaks outside proprietary corporate servers.

The venture capital round drew co-investments from Sweden's EQT-managed Scale-Up Europe Fund and American private equity firm PSG Equity. The capital will fund large-scale model training and cloud compute clusters across Europe.

The industrial pacts arrived alongside updated security agreements. The two leaders signed an amendment protocol to their bilateral military secrets protection agreement and pledged coordinated naval surveillance to protect commercial shipping corridors in the Strait of Hormuz.

Next steps center on translating the letters of intent into binding procurement contracts. KHNP and Orano plan to convene commercial negotiating sessions before the end of the year to draft binding supply schedules and pricing indices.

The ministerial Industrial Strategy Dialogue will hold its inaugural formal session in Seoul in early 2027. Working groups will review joint supply chain vulnerabilities across rare earth processing and advanced chip packaging.

The initial documents leave key commercial details unsettled. KHNP and Orano did not disclose the contracted enrichment service volumes or baseline pricing formulas governing future deliveries from France.

Official filings also did not state the specific financial sum contributed by Samsung Electronics or the equity percentage acquired in Mistral AI's €3 billion fundraising round.