LIGHTBRIDGE Corp 10-K

ITEM 1. BUSINESS When used in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, the terms “Lightbridge”, the “Company”, “we”, “our”, and “us” refer to Lightbridge Corporation together with its wholly-owned subsidiaries Lightbridge International Holding LLC and Thorium Power Inc. Lightbridge’s principal executive offices are located at 11710 Plaza America Drive, Suite 2000, Reston, Virginia 20190 USA. Overview At Lightbridge we are developing the next generation of nuclear fuel to impact, in a meaningful way, the world’s climate and energy problems. Our nuclear fuel could significantly improve the economics, safety, and proliferation resistance of nuclear fuel in existing and new nuclear reactors, large and small, with a meaningful impact on addressing climate change, and air pollution, all while benefiting national security. We project that the world’s energy and climate needs can only be met if nuclear power’s share of the energy-generating mix grows substantially in the coming decades. We are developing our nuclear fuel to enable that to happen. In particular, we are focusing on the potential of small modular reactors that we believe can benefit from our fuel with improved economics and load following when included on an electric grid with renewables. According to the World Nuclear Association (WNA), there are 437 operable power reactors worldwide and an additional 57 reactors under construction. We expect slow net growth in this number as old reactors close and fewer new large reactors are built, due to the inherent challenges facing new build large reactors, including regulatory and political challenges, financing difficulties, and the inability for large reactors to be profitable without running constantly. We believe our metallic fuel will offer significant economic and safety benefits over traditional nuclear fuel, primarily because of the superior heat transfer properties of all-metal fuel and the resulting lower operating temperature of the fuel. We also believe that uprating a reactor with Lightbridge Fuel™ will add incremental electricity at a lower levelized cost than any other means of generating baseload electric power, including any renewable, fossil, or hydroelectric energy source, or any traditional nuclear fuel. Emerging nuclear technologies that many in the industry believe have the potential to generate significant amounts of power include SMRs, which are now in the development and licensing phases. We expect that Lightbridge Fuel™ can provide SMRs with all the benefits our technology brings to large reactors, with the benefits being more meaningful to the economic case for deployment of SMRs. Lightbridge Fuel™ is expected to generate more power in SMRs than traditional nuclear fuels, which will help decarbonize sectors that are now powered by fossil fuels. We expect that our ongoing research and development (R&D) initiatives will be compatible with Lightbridge Fuel™ powering SMRs for multiple purposes. The first SMRs that could use our fuel are expected to begin operations as early as 2028. We have built a significant portfolio of patents reflecting years of R&D, and we anticipate testing our nuclear fuel through third party vendors and others, including the United States Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratories. Currently, we are performing the majority of our R&D activities with DOE national laboratories and are working on additional contracts with them for future scopes of R&D work. Our Nuclear Fuel Since 2008, we have been engaged in the design and development of proprietary, innovative nuclear fuels to improve the cost competitiveness, safety, proliferation resistance and performance of nuclear power generation. In 2010, we announced the concept of all-metal fuel (i.e., non-oxide fuel) for use in currently operating and new-build reactors. Our focus on metallic fuel is based on listening to the voices of prospective customers, as nuclear utilities have expressed interest in the improved economics and enhanced safety that we believe metallic fuel will provide. We are also now listening to industrial companies that are expressing interest in SMRs to power their own industrial facilities. 5 Table of Contents The fuel in a nuclear reactor generates energy in the form of heat. That heat is then converted through steam into electricity that is delivered to the transmission and distribution grid. We have designed our innovative, proprietary metallic fuels to be capable of significantly higher burnup and power density compared to conventional oxide nuclear fuels. Burnup is the total amount of electricity generated per unit mass of nuclear fuel consumed and is a function of the power density of a nuclear fuel and the amount of time the fuel operates in the reactor. Power density is the amount of heat power generated per unit volume of nuclear fuel. Conventional oxide fuel used in existing commercial reactors is nearing the limit of its design and licensed burnup and power density capability. As a result, further optimization to (i) increase power output from the same core size and (ii) improve the economics and safety of nuclear power generation using conventional oxide fuel technologies is limited. A new fuel is needed to bring enhanced performance to reactors large and small. We are working to develop Lightbridge Fuel™ to meet that goal. As the nuclear industry prepares to meet the increasing global demand for electricity production, longer operating cycles and higher reactor power outputs have become a much sought-after solution for the current and future reactor fleet. We believe our proprietary nuclear fuel designs have the potential to improve the nuclear power industry’s economics by: · enabling increased reactor power output via a power uprate (potentially up to a 30% increase) or a longer operating cycle without changing the core size in new build pressurized water reactors (PWRs), including SMRs; or · providing an increase in power output of potentially up to 10% while simultaneously extending the operating cycle length from 18 to 24 months in existing PWRs, including in Westinghouse-type four-loop PWR plants, which are currently constrained to an 18-month operating cycle by oxide fuel enriched up to 5% in the isotope uranium-235, or increasing the power potentially up to 17% while retaining an 18-month operating cycle. We believe our fuel designs will allow current and new build nuclear reactors to safely increase power production and reduce operations and maintenance costs on a per kilowatt-hour basis. New build nuclear reactors could also benefit from the reduced upfront capital investment per kilowatt of generating capacity in the case of implementing a power uprate. In addition to projected electricity production cost savings, we believe our technology can result in utilities or countries needing to deploy fewer new reactors to generate the same amount of electricity (in the case of a power uprate), resulting in significant capital cost savings. For utilities or countries that already have operating reactors, we expect that our nuclear fuel could be utilized to both increase the power output of those reactors as well as enable them to load follow with electric grid demands, which have become increasingly variable with large additions of intermittent renewable generation. Nuclear Industry and Addressable Market Overview of the Nuclear Power Industry According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, nuclear power provided 4.6% of the world’s total energy from all sources in 2020, including approximately 10.5% of global electricity generation. According to the WNA, as of January 2022 there were currently 437 operable nuclear power reactors worldwide, mostly light water reactors, with the most common types being PWRs, including Russian-designed water-cooled, water-moderated energetic reactors (VVERs), and boiling-water reactors (BWRs). Nuclear power provides a non-fossil fuel, low-carbon energy solution that can meet baseload electricity needs. 6 Table of Contents Of the world’s existing reactors currently in operation, PWRs account for approximately 70% of the net operating capacity, with BWRs being the second most prevalent and accounting for approximately 14%. Of the nuclear reactors currently under construction, approximately 70% are PWRs with a rated electric power output of 1,000 megawatts or greater. Almost all the new build reactors currently under construction are either Generation III or Generation III+ type reactors. The primary difference from second-generation designs is that many Generation III or Generation III+ reactors incorporate passive or inherent safety features, which require no active controls or operational intervention to avoid accidents in the event of malfunction. Many of these passive systems rely on a combination of gravity, natural convection, and/or resistance to high temperatures. We initially focused our fuel design on existing U.S. PWRs because they represent a large market segment for which Lightbridge Fuel™ could provide significant economic and safety benefits through a power uprate up to 10% along with an operating cycle extension from 18 to 24 months, or a power uprate of 17%, as described below, without extending the cycle length. We estimate that in order to produce all the clean energy that the world will need in 2050 (the seminal year for climate change according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) using nuclear power, it would require the equivalent of about an additional 20,000 reactors with generating capacities of 1,000 megawatts of electricity each. Realistically, the industry will not grow from approximately 440 to over 20,000 of these reactors during this timeframe. We expect that the net worldwide growth in the number of large reactors between now and 2050 will be fewer than 200, with most new plants built by China and Russia, making them difficult for Lightbridge Fuel™ to reach. Existing large reactors can present an additional market opportunity for Lightbridge Fuel™ but cannot by themselves move the needle on climate change. In contrast, SMRs can be pivotal contributors to preventing further climate change, while providing the necessary energy capacity to meet global energy needs. Large reactors have considerable capital costs and must operate at full power 24/7 to be profitable. Due to their modular construction and smaller size, SMRs are expected to have much lower capital costs per unit, thus making their deployment easier to finance by private and government sectors. Furthermore, one of the limiting factors relating to existing large reactors is their inability to load follow efficiently. Load following means increasing or decreasing power as other electricity sources, mostly wind and solar power, come on and off the electric grid. Natural gas plants are currently used to back up wind and solar generation since these plants can easily increase or decrease the energy they generate based on need. SMRs are expected to have the ability to reduce their power (i.e., by shutting down or reducing the power output of some units while running the other units at full power) while the wind is blowing, or the sun is shining. We believe that Lightbridge Fuel™ will allow SMRs greater flexibility in changing power levels, making it easier for SMRs to replace natural gas to load follow with renewables, helping to expand markets for renewables and SMRs together as countries seek to decarbonize energy generation. Other components of the reactor would also need to be designed to handle the changes in power, and we believe that it is feasible, with fuel power ramp or transient capability being one of the current limiting factors to nuclear power plants balancing with wind and solar. We expect that Lightbridge Fuel’s™ most significant economic benefit will be its ability to provide a 30% power uprate. However, the existing large reactors cannot realize that benefit because their systems are not designed to handle that much of an increase in power. The most additional power existing large PWRs could take from Lightbridge Fuel™ is estimated at approximately 17%. Only newly designed large reactors may benefit from the full 30% greater power available from Lightbridge Fuel™. While we believe that only a limited number of new, large reactors will be built, we expect that much larger numbers of SMRs will be deployed in the future. 7 Table of Contents Target Market for Lightbridge Fuel™ Our target market segments include water-cooled commercial power reactors, such as PWRs, BWRs, VVER reactors, CANDU heavy water reactors, water-cooled SMRs, as well as water-cooled research reactors. We are currently focused on prioritizing opportunities with SMRs in the near-term. In 2021, our SMR target market saw an increase in interest in North America and Europe, as evidenced by Ontario Power Generation selecting the BWRX-300 SMR for the Darlington new nuclear site, which will work with GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy to deploy the reactor. Canada’s first commercial, grid-scale, SMR could be completed as early as 2028. In addition, according to WNA, a subsidiary of Synthos, a chemical manufacturing company headquartered in Poland, began screening sites for SMRs in Poland and has signed agreements related to SMR development with GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, Tractebel, and Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation, which could ultimately replace coal units at the Pątnów power plant. Nuclear Power as Clean and Low Carbon Emissions Energy Source Nuclear power provides clean, reliable baseload electricity. According to the WNA, nuclear reactors produce no greenhouse gas emissions during operation, and over the course of their lifecycles, nuclear power plants produce about the same amount of CO2 equivalent emissions per unit of electricity as wind. The WNA further notes that almost all proposed pathways to achieving significant decarbonization suggest an increased role for nuclear power, including those published by the International Energy Agency, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Energy Initiative, U.S. Energy Information Administration, and World Energy Council. We believe that deep cuts to CO2 emissions are only possible with electrification of most of the transportation and industrial sectors globally and powering them and the current electricity needs of the world with non-emitting or low-emitting power or no-carbon liquid fuels. We believe this can be done only with a large increase in nuclear power, several times the amount that is generated globally today. We believe that our nuclear fuel technology will be an essential element of reaching this goal, for electricity generation and potentially to produce hydrogen for zero-carbon liquid fuels. Influence of the Accident at Fukushima, Japan and New International Nuclear Build The accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan following the strong earthquake and destructive tsunami that occurred on March 11, 2011, increased public concerns related to nuclear power, resulting in a slowdown in, or in some cases, a complete halt to, new construction of nuclear power plants as well as the early shut down of existing power plants in certain countries. As a result, some countries that were considering launching new domestic nuclear power programs before the Fukushima accident have delayed or cancelled preparatory activities they were planning to undertake as part of such programs. The Fukushima accident appears to have shrunk the projected size of the global nuclear power market in 2025-2030 as reflected in the most recent reference case projections published by the WNA. At the same time, the event has brought a greater emphasis on safety to the forefront that may be beneficial to us because our metallic fuel provides improved safety and fuel performance during normal operation and design-basis accidents. Anticipated Safety Benefits of Lightbridge Fuel™ The expected safety benefits of Lightbridge Fuel™ are as follows: · Operates at lower operating temperatures than current conventional nuclear fuel, contributing to lower stored thermal energy in the fuel rods; 8 Table of Contents · Is not expected to generate explosive hydrogen gas under design-basis accidents when there is a loss of coolant in the reactor; · Enhances structural integrity of the nuclear fuel rods; · Has lighter and stiffer fuel assembly, which may contribute to improved seismic performance; and · May buy more time to restore active cooling in the reactor during Beyond Design-Basis events, defined by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (US-NRC) as “accident sequences that are possible but were not fully considered in the design process because they were judged to be too unlikely.” Due to the significantly lower fuel operating temperature and higher thermal conductivity, our metallic nuclear fuel rods are expected to provide major improvements to safety margins during certain off-normal events. The US-NRC licensing processes require engineering analysis of a large break loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA), as well as other scenarios. The LOCA scenario assumes failure of a large water pipe in the reactor coolant system. Under LOCA conditions, the fuel and cladding temperatures rise due to reduced cooling capacity. Preliminary analytical modeling shows that under a design-basis LOCA scenario, unlike conventional uranium dioxide fuel, the cladding of the Lightbridge-designed metallic fuel rods would stay at least 200 degrees below the 850-900 degrees Celsius temperature at which steam begins to react with the zirconium cladding to generate hydrogen gas. Build-up of hydrogen gas in a nuclear power plant can lead to a hydrogen explosion, which contributed to the damage at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Lightbridge Fuel™ is designed to mitigate hydrogen gas generation in design-basis LOCA situations. This is a major safety benefit. Lightbridge Spent Fuel - Proliferation Resistance The April 2018 issue of Nuclear Engineering and Design, a technical journal affiliated with the European Nuclear Society, included an article stating that after analyzing Lightbridge’s fuel, the authors concluded that any plutonium extracted from Lightbridge’s spent fuel would not be useable for weapon purposes. We anticipate the following proliferation resistance advantages for our metallic fuel: · One-half of the amount of plutonium produced and remaining in the spent fuel as compared to conventional uranium dioxide fuels; and · Lower Plutonium-239 fraction compared to uranium dioxide fuel; therefore, our spent fuel would be unsuitable as a source for weapon purposes. We are currently exploring potential plutonium disposition benefits of our metallic nuclear fuel technology. Development of Lightbridge Fuel™ Recent Developments GAIN Vouchers · DOE awarded the Company a Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) voucher in 2019 for the experiment design for irradiation of material samples of Lightbridge metallic fuel in the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) at Idaho National Laboratory (INL). On April 22, 2020, we entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC, the DOE’s operating contractor at INL and the project commenced in the second quarter of 2020 and was completed during the third quarter of 2021. This experiment design forms the basis of our current and future efforts with the INL. The total project value provided by the DOE was approximately $0.5 million. 9 Table of Contents · The DOE awarded us a second voucher from the GAIN program to support development of Lightbridge Fuel™ in collaboration with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). The scope of the project is to demonstrate Lightbridge’s nuclear fuel casting process using depleted uranium, a key step in the manufacture of Lightbridge Fuel™. On July 14, 2021, the Company executed a CRADA with the Battelle Memorial Institute, Pacific Northwest Division, the operating contractor of the PNNL, in collaboration with the DOE. The project commenced in the third quarter of 2021 and is expected to be completed by the third quarter of 2022. The total project value is approximately $0.7 million, with three-quarters of this amount provided by DOE for the scope performed by PNNL. On May 11, 2021, we announced successful demonstration of the co-extrusion process for three-lobe, six-foot rods using nuclear-grade zirconium alloy in the cladding and in the displacer, and surrogate metallic materials that mimic important characteristics of uranium and zirconium alloy contained in our metallic nuclear fuel rods. This demonstration of Lightbridge’s proprietary manufacturing process uses an internally developed and patented high-temperature coextrusion process. The six-foot length of the surrogate rods is the typical length of the fuel rods used by the SMRs now in development and licensing. Future fabrication of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) rodlets for loop irradiation testing in the Advanced Test Reactor, and ultimately commercial-length HALEU fuel rods, will use similar processing techniques to create Lightbridge Fuel™. Performing these initial fabrication development activities with surrogate materials allows Lightbridge to use a broader range of suppliers and is a cost-effective approach as it does not require uranium material. We expanded our patent portfolio by successfully obtaining 7 new patents in 2021 in the United States and other key foreign countries. The new patents will help safeguard the Company’s intellectual property, which is an integral component of the Company’s plans to monetize the Lightbridge Fuel™ technology. Future Steps Toward Our Fuel Development and Timeline For The Commercialization of Our Nuclear Fuel Assemblies We anticipate near-term fuel development milestones for Lightbridge Fuel™ over the next 2-3 years will consist of the following. · Complete the scope of work relating to the recent second GAIN Voucher award in collaboration with PNNL. · Enter into an agreement to manufacture our nuclear fuel material samples for test reactor irradiation. · Continue to develop and optimize our nuclear fuel manufacturing processes using depleted or natural uranium. · Initiate the design and manufacturing of a multi-lobe fuel rod with enriched uranium for irradiation experiments in a test reactor. The long-term milestones towards development and commercialization of nuclear fuel assemblies include, among other things, irradiating nuclear material samples and prototype fuel rods in test reactors, conducting post-irradiation examination of irradiated material samples and/or prototype fuel rods, performing thermal-hydraulic experiments, performing seismic and other out-of-reactor experiments, performing advanced computer modeling and simulations to support fuel qualification, designing a lead test assembly (LTA), entering into a lead test rod/assembly agreement(s) with a host reactor(s), demonstrating the production of lead test rods and/or lead test assemblies at a pilot-scale fuel fabrication facility and demonstrating the operation of lead test rods and/or lead test assemblies in commercial reactors. 10 Table of Contents There are inherent uncertainties in the cost and outcomes of the many steps needed for successful deployment of our fuel in commercial nuclear reactors, which makes it difficult to predict the timing of the commercialization of our nuclear fuel technology with any accuracy. However, based on our best estimate and assuming adequate R&D funding levels, we expect to begin demonstration of lead test rods and/or possibly lead test assemblies with our metallic fuel in commercial reactors by the early 2030s and begin receiving purchase orders for initial fuel reload batches from utilities 15-20 years from now, with final qualification (i.e., deployment of our nuclear fuel in the first reload batch) in a commercial reactor taking place approximately two years thereafter. We are exploring ways of shortening this timeframe that may include securing access to expanded irradiation test loop capacity in existing or new research reactor facilities both within the United States and overseas. Please see Item 1A. Risk Factors in this Annual Report on Form 10-K for a discussion of certain risks that may delay or impair such developments including without limitation the availability of financing and the many risks inherent in developing a new type of nuclear fuel. Impact of COVID-19 to our Business The recent COVID-19 pandemic has continued to impact our business operations for the year ended December 31, 2021. The future impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on our financial position, results of operations and future liquidity and capital resources availability is unknown and uncertain. In an effort to protect the health and safety of our employees, we took proactive, aggressive action from the earliest signs of the outbreak in China, including working from home and curtailing employee travel. In an effort to contain COVID-19 or slow its spread, governments around the world had also enacted various measures, including orders to close all businesses not deemed “essential,” isolate residents to their homes or places of residence, and practice social distancing when engaging in essential activities. We will continue to actively monitor the COVID-19 pandemic and may take further actions altering our business operations that we determine are in the best interests of our employees and stakeholders, or as required by federal, state, or local authorities. It is not clear what the potential effects any such alterations or modifications may have on our financial position, results of operations or liquidity, including the effects on our employees and future prospects, including our R&D activities for the fiscal year 2022 and beyond. Future Potential Collaborations and Other Opportunities In the ordinary course of business, we engage in periodic reviews of opportunities to invest in or acquire companies or units within companies to leverage operational synergies and establish new streams of revenue. We will be opportunistic in this regard and may also partner or contract with entities that could be synergistic to our fuel business or present an attractive stable business and/or growth opportunity in the nuclear space. Competition Currently, competition with respect to the design of commercially viable nuclear fuel products is limited to conventional uranium dioxide fuels, which are reaching the limits in terms of their capability to provide increased power output or longer fuel cycles. We believe that the industry needs fuel products that can provide these additional benefits. While we believe conventional uranium dioxide fuel may be capable of achieving power up-rates of up to 10% in existing PWRs or extending the fuel cycle length from 18 to 24 months, doing so would require uranium-235 enrichment levels above 5% (as is also the case with our metallic fuel), higher reload batch sizes, or a combination thereof. The alternative route of increasing reload batch sizes while keeping uranium enrichment levels below 5% for power uprates up to 10% using conventional uranium dioxide fuel would raise the cost and reduce the efficiency of each fuel reload, resulting in a significant fuel cycle cost penalty to the nuclear utility. The cost penalty could have a dramatic adverse impact on the economics of existing plants whose original capital cost has already been fully depreciated, which includes most U.S. nuclear power plants. 11 Table of Contents In addition to conventional uranium dioxide fuel, potential competition to our metallic fuel technology can come from so-called Accident Tolerant Fuels (ATF). We regard ATF as part of a series of relatively small changes to conventional uranium dioxide fuel over time. ATF uses uranium dioxide with added substances and/or changes to the cladding tube. After the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in March 2011, the U.S. Congress directed the DOE to investigate every aspect of nuclear plant operation including the existing uranium dioxide fuel pellets contained in zirconium-based alloy tubes (cladding). According to the February 2019 Nuclear Energy Institute technical report on ATF titled “Safety and Economic Benefits of Accident Tolerant Fuel”, advanced fuel design concepts (such as ATF) were accelerated by combining recent operating experience with worldwide research and development. Over the past several years, the ATF program has received significant DOE funding support and initial interest from utility customers seeking ATF demonstration programs in their operating reactors. For example, in January 2022, Southern Nuclear has agreed to load four lead test assemblies with a chromia and alumina doped ATF design. Similar ATF concepts are being tested by GE Nuclear, TVEL, and others. When the DOE originally launched the ATF program, the program was focused solely on achieving enhanced safety benefits, such as extra “coping time” during severe accidents. Over the past year, many ATF vendors concluded that the unexpectedly small accident tolerance benefits their ATF fuel concepts offered (such as several extra hours of coping time during severe accidents rather than their original goal of approximately 72 hours) were not enough of an incentive for nuclear utilities to adopt ATF designs, which would cost more and have reduced the efficiency relative to conventional uranium dioxide fuels. As a result, ATF vendors have begun exploring opportunities for extending the operating cycle length from 18 to 24 months in existing PWRs by going to higher enrichments (i.e., from approximately 5% to 7-8% enrichments) with ATF designs. If they are successful in extending the cycle length to 24 months in a cost-effective way, this could give sufficient economic incentive for nuclear utilities to switch to the ATF designs in the coming years. This recent shift in positioning by many ATF vendors represents a competitive threat to Lightbridge for use in existing large PWRs, as ATF vendors are now trying to encroach into a critical element of Lightbridge’s value proposition, i.e., the ability of Lightbridge Fuel™ to extend the cycle length from 18 to 24 months in existing large PWRs. While it is not certain that the ATF vendors will be successful in this approach, if ATF could provide for two-year cycles, it could severely weaken or undermine our economic value proposition in existing large PWRs. That said, we believe Lightbridge Fuel™ remains the only advanced light-water reactor fuel in development that can provide power uprates, cycle length extensions, improved safety, and load following in a single product as desired by the utilities. The above developments make prioritizing existing large PWRs less attractive than we had previously expected. Depending on the ultimate outcome of ATF technologies and government funding available to support advanced fuel technologies for existing large PWRs, this market segment could become more accessible again in the future. However, in the near-term, we believe that a realignment of our corporate initiatives with a focus on SMRs could lead to more beneficial, valuable, nearer-term opportunities for Lightbridge. We believe the 30% power uprate our fuel could provide to a new SMR designed to accommodate the full power uprate could reduce the upfront capital investment per kilowatt and generate positive incremental profit margin for SMR plants. At the same time, due to fuel design constraints, we do not expect ATF technologies to achieve the same power uprate capability in SMRs. This could give Lightbridge strong competitive advantages over ATF in this market segment. 12 Table of Contents Nuclear power faces competition from other sources of electricity as well, including natural gas, which in recent years has been the cheapest option for power generation in the U.S. and has resulted in some utilities abandoning nuclear initiatives. Other sources of electricity, such as renewables like wind and solar, may also be viewed as safer than nuclear power, although we believe that generating nuclear energy with Lightbridge Fuel™ is the safest way to produce baseload electricity in suitable power reactors. To the extent demand for electricity generated by nuclear power decreases, the potential market for our nuclear fuel technology will decline. Raw Materials We do not plan to utilize any raw materials directly in the conduct of our operations (except for potential purchases of certain raw materials in small quantities for testing and demonstration efforts). Fuel fabricators, which will ultimately fabricate fuel products incorporating our nuclear fuel technology, will acquire the zirconium and uranium, and additional raw materials that are required for the production of nuclear fuel assemblies that go into the reactor core. Uranium and zirconium are available from various suppliers at market prices. However, the availability of uranium metal enriched to 19.75% in the isotope uranium 235 is currently limited to small quantities sufficient only for research and testing purposes. Deployment of our fuel will necessitate increasing enrichment level from 5% up to 19.75% at enrichment facilities, as well as deployment of de-conversion/metallization capability at a commercial scale, as well as the design and licensing of a shipping container capable of accommodating fuel assemblies with uranium metal enriched up to 19.75%. We expect that utilities will contract with nuclear fuel fabricators to order nuclear fuel assemblies, and then ship the completed nuclear fuel assemblies to the reactor sites. Government Support/Approvals Needed, Relationships with Critical Development Partners/Vendors and Other Government Regulation Due to our long fuel development timelines to commercialization and the significant amount of R&D funding required to bring our next generation nuclear fuel technology to market, substantial U.S. government funding and political support will be essential to the success of our nuclear fuel development program. Without significant U.S. government funding and cost sharing contributions toward our fuel development activities, it will be unfeasible for the Company to fund all of its future fuel development efforts on its own. The Biden administration’s energy policy includes proposals for advanced nuclear as part of “critical clean energy technologies.” We understand that the administration is prioritizing advanced nuclear technologies, including advanced fuels and SMRs, as part of its nuclear energy policy. President Biden has brought the U.S. back into the Paris Agreement on climate change, with the goal that the U.S. electricity sector be carbon neutral by 2035, just 13 years from now. We believe Lightbridge Fuel’s™ coupling with SMRs can enhance the already strong case for SMRs and attract more private and government investment. In addition to U.S. government funding, political support for our project is similarly important. The sales and marketing of our services and technology internationally may be subject to U.S. export control regulations, including 10 C.F.R. Part 810 and 10 C.F.R. Part 110, and the export control laws of other countries. Governmental authorizations may be required before we can export our services or technology or collaborate with foreign entities. US-NRC regulations at 10 C.F.R. Part 110 govern the export and import of nuclear equipment and material. Part 810 generally governs the exports of technology for development, production, or use (see 10 C.F.R. §810.3 for definitions of these terms) of reactors, equipment and material subject to Part 110. If authorizations are required and not granted, our international business could be materially affected. Furthermore, the export authorization process is often time consuming and any delays could impact our fuel development and commercialization timelines. Violation of export control regulations could subject us to fines and other penalties, such as losing the ability to export for a period of years, which would limit our revenue growth opportunities and significantly hinder our attempts to expand our business internationally. 13 Table of Contents The testing, fabrication and use of nuclear fuels by our future partners, licensees and nuclear power generators will be heavily regulated. The test facilities and other locations where our fuel designs may be tested before commercial use require governmental approvals from the host country’s nuclear regulatory authority. The responsibility for obtaining the necessary regulatory approvals will lie with our research and development contractors that conduct such tests and experiments. Nuclear fuel fabricators, which will ultimately fabricate fuel using our technology under commercial licenses from us, are similarly regulated. Utilities that operate nuclear power plants that may utilize the fuel produced by these fuel fabricators require specific licenses relating to possession and use of nuclear materials as well as numerous other governmental approvals for the ownership and operation of nuclear power plants. Certain Challenges and Uncertainties 1. U.S. government funding support Presently, our ability to fund our fuel development program at a level necessary to adhere to our projected fuel development timelines is severely limited due to internal funding constraints. This is in addition to our corporate overhead and other fixed costs, such as in-house project management and R&D personnel. As a result, we believe seeking and securing significant U.S. government funding to support our fuel development program is essential for us to be successful in our fuel development and commercialization efforts. Prioritization of SMRs over existing large reactors, along with the significant government funding opportunities we expect to go toward SMRs in the coming years, may help accelerate our projected fuel development timelines by up to a few years for SMR applications. 2. Availability of suitable test loops in the ATR After the Halden research reactor was shut down in 2018, we embarked on a global search for an alternative for loop irradiation testing of our metallic fuel rods. Ultimately, we settled on the ATR at INL and applied to DOE for and won two GAIN Vouchers. Our initial understanding was that we would have access to a government funded PWR water test loop in the ATR to generate sufficient data to support our LTA testing and potentially eliminate the need for lead test rod (LTR) testing in a large commercial reactor. However, availability of irradiation test loops for fuel in the ATR has become limited and highly competitive, limiting how much fuel material can be inserted into the reactor as well as its duration in the reactor. If new test loops are not added to the ATR, loop irradiation testing in the ATR may not provide sufficient data to justify regulatory approval for LTA testing in a large commercial PWR in a commercially feasible timeframe. This would likely necessitate an extra fuel development step of LTR testing in a large commercial PWR in addition to the ATR loop testing before LTA testing could commence. As a result, our fuel development timelines are 15-20 years before we expect to secure our first orders for fuel batch reloads in large commercial PWRs, unless we can access significantly increased test loop capacity. Consequently, the projected fuel development costs make it unfeasible for Lightbridge to fund this fuel development effort on our own. 3. Partnerships with fuel vendor and nuclear utility The ability to design and fabricate the LTAs and engagement with a nuclear utility that is willing to accept our LTAs, is required to demonstrate our nuclear fuel in a commercial reactor. In the U.S., the fabricator and the utility will be primarily responsible for securing necessary regulatory licensing approvals for the LTA operation. With a shift in focus toward SMRs, we plan to build additional relationships with SMR reactor and fuel vendors, as well as existing and/or potential SMR utility customers. 14 Table of Contents 4. Supply chain infrastructure for HALEU Establishment of required supply chain infrastructure to support high-assay low-enriched uranium metallic fuel is a necessary step in the commercialization of our nuclear fuel. Existing commercial nuclear infrastructure, including conversion facilities, enrichment facilities, de-conversion facilities, fabrication facilities, fuel storage facilities, fuel handling procedures, fuel operation at reactor sites, used fuel storage facilities and shipping containers, were designed and are in most cases currently licensed to handle uranium in oxide form with enrichment up to 5% in the isotope uranium-235. Our fuel designs are expected to use uranium metal with uranium enrichment levels up to 19.75% and would therefore require certain modifications to existing commercial nuclear infrastructure to enable commercial nuclear facilities to receive and handle our fuels. Those nuclear facilities will need to complete a regulatory licensing process and obtain regulatory approvals in order to be able to process, handle, or ship uranium metal with enrichment levels up to 19.75% and operate commercial reactors and spent fuel storage facilities using our metallic fuel. 5. Need for experimental data on our metallic fuel There is a lack of publicly available experimental data on our metallic fuel. We will need to conduct various irradiation experiments to confirm fuel performance under normal and off-normal reactor conditions. Loop irradiation in a test reactor environment prototypic of commercial reactor operating conditions and other experiments on unirradiated and irradiated metallic fuel samples will be essential to demonstrate the performance and advantages of our metallic fuel. We are planning loop irradiation testing of our metallic fuel samples in the ATR at INL as part of this effort. 6. Need for development of new analytical models to support our metallic fuel Existing analytical models may be inadequate to fully analyze our metallic fuel. New analytical models, capable of accurately predicting the behavior of our metallic fuel during normal operation and off-normal events, may be required. Experimental data measured from our planned irradiation demonstrations will help to identify areas where new analytical models, or modifications to existing ones, may be required. 7. Need for development and demonstration of qualified fabrication process for our metallic fuel rods Demonstration of a fabrication process both for semi-scale irradiation fuel samples and subsequently for full-length (12-14 feet) metallic fuel rods for large PWR LTAs and shorter length for SMRs (~6 feet) is required. Past operating experience in icebreaker reactors with differently shaped fuel rods with a similar metallic fuel composition involved fabrication of metallic fuel rods up to 3 feet in length. Fabrication of full-length (approximately 12 to 14 feet) PWR metallic fuel rods for large PWRs has yet to be fully demonstrated. In 2021, we demonstrated co-extrusion of full-length rods using surrogate materials (i.e., rods which replaced the uranium component with a suitable physical analogue). Settlement of Arbitration On February 11, 2021, the Company entered into a settlement agreement (the “Settlement Agreement”) with Framatome SAS and Framatome Inc. (together, “Framatome”), resolving the pending claims and counterclaims between the parties in arbitration and judicial proceedings related to the parties’ inactive joint venture, Enfission, LLC. Under the terms of the Settlement Agreement, all joint venture agreements were terminated and the joint venture was dissolved. Lightbridge paid Framatome approximately $4.2 million for outstanding invoices for work performed by Framatome and other expenses incurred by Framatome. Enfission was dissolved on March 23, 2021 and a certificate of cancellation was filed with the state of Delaware on December 17, 2021. See Part I. Item 3. Legal Proceedings , for more information. 15 Table of Contents Our Intellectual Property Our intellectual property rights include multiple U.S. and international patents and patent applications, trade secrets, trademark rights, and contractual agreements. Our patent applications are directed to our proprietary nuclear fuel technology and we seek additional patent protection for our fuel designs, development, and related alternatives by filing patent applications in the U.S. and other countries as appropriate. We received 7 new patents in 2021 and currently have 15 pending patent applications. As of December 31, 2021, we held 5 U.S. patents and more than 140 foreign patents. The expiration dates of these patents, unless it’s a divisional patent filing, are generally 20 years from their application dates. Our U.S. patents begin to expire in 2027. We ensure that we own intellectual property created for us by employees, independent contractors, consultants, companies, and any other third party by signing agreements with them that assign any intellectual property rights to us. We have established business procedures designed to maintain the confidentiality of our proprietary information, including the use of confidentiality agreements with employees, independent contractors, consultants and entities with which we conduct business. In addition to our patent portfolio, we also own trademarks to the Lightbridge corporate name and the Lightbridge logo. Human Capital Management As of December 31, 2021, we had six full-time employees and utilized a network of independent contractors, outside agencies and technical facilities with specific skills to assist with various business functions including, but not limited to, corporate, financial, personnel, research and development, and communications. This allows us to draw upon resources that are specifically tailored to our internal and client needs. The Company’s headquarters are in Reston, Virginia. We continue to conduct business with substantial modifications to employee travel and work locations due impacts of COVID-19. Our Culture Our mission is to help the world combat climate change and meet its energy goals. We are passionate about understanding the needs of our society, and we work hard to develop our next generation nuclear fuel. We also believe that supporting our team with a wonderful work environment supports and powers us to accomplish our goals. The Company’s human resource professional is a resource available for employees regarding the development of their careers and training. We also have physical and mental health programs that are available to our employees. We believe that our relationship with our employees and contractors is satisfactory. Diversity and Inclusion To truly help the world combat climate change, we need to work with a diversity of partners as well as have a diverse workforce. We also must operate with a high degree of awareness of evolving social conditions and social justice and create policy accordingly. We acknowledge that these measures evolve over time and we are committed to improving our policies as awareness of social inequities or injustice arise. We believe an equitable and inclusive environment with diverse teams produces more creative solutions and results in better outcomes for our employees and stakeholders. We strive to attract, retain and promote diverse talent at all levels of the organization. 16 Table of Contents Available Information We make available, free of charge on our website, www.ltbridge.com, our Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K, including exhibits, and amendments to those reports filed or furnished pursuant to Sections 13(a) and 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, as soon as reasonably practicable after such reports are electronically filed with, or furnished to, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC also maintains an internet site that contains reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC at www.sec.gov. The information posted on our website is not incorporated into this Annual Report on Form 10-K, and any reference to our website is intended to be inactive textual references only.