But with the use of advanced nuclear reactors and fuel cycles, supply could be extended to "thousands of years", according to a study published by the OECD's Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

"At 2008 rates of consumption, total identified resources are sufficient for over 100 years of supply," the report entitled "Uranium 2009: Resources, Production and Demand" said.

Nevertheless, the NEA and the IAEA emphasised that the projection was the based on the current state of nuclear power technology.

"The deployment of advanced reactor and fuel cycle technologies can positively affect the long-term availability of uranium and could conceivably extend it to thousands of years," they said.

Even though the global economic and financial crisis had recently led to declines, world demand for electricity was expected to continue to grow "significantly over the next several decades," the study said.

Many governments saw nuclear power as a way of producing competitively-priced electricity that is essentially free of greenhouse gas emissions.

Current global uranium resources were "more than adequate to meet projected requirements," the study insisted.

"Nonetheless, the challenge remains to develop environmentally sustainable mining operations and to bring increasing quantities of uranium to the market in a timely fashion. A strong market will be required for resources to be developed within the timeframe required to meet projected uranium demand," it concluded.

As of January 1, 2009, the world's total identified uranium resources amounted to 6.3 million tonnes, according to the study, which is published every two years.

The biggest uranium producers are currently countries such as Canada, Kazakhstan, Australia and Namibia.

But that was just "the uranium we know about today," said Peter Waggitt, a uranium production consultant working for the IAEA, told a news briefing held at the presentation of the report.

"What we don't know about is the uranium we haven't found yet. Most of the uranium that is being exploited today was found 20 or 30 years ago. We haven't found a lot of new uranium, because people weren't looking. It is highly likely that there are more significant resources of uranium out there," Waggitt said.

"But people have only started looking seriously again in 2003 and 2004. So the prognostication that we have is that there will be a lot of new discoveries in the next 10 years or so that will increase the supply."

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