Rio Tinto mines uranium at operations in Namibia and in northern Australia. It is a relatively small market compared with most of the other product markets in which Rio Tinto is involved. The uranium is processed into fuel used in nuclear power plants for the generation of electrical power.

It competes in this market against other mine producers and against uranium recovered from nuclear warheads no longer required by the military in the former Soviet Union and the US. All the uranium mined by Rio Tinto is sold under government approved contracts, which stipulate that the uranium supplied will be used only for peaceful, non explosive purposes and subject to the safeguard provisions of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

In many parts of the world, there is significant public concern about the safety of nuclear power plants and about the disposal of radioactive wastes from these plants. Partly for this reason, very few nuclear power plants have been built in recent years and the demand for uranium has slowed. However, in a world that remains hungry for energy, but has growing concerns about emissions from power stations using hydrocarbon fuels, nuclear power remains an option.