What Is Depleted Uranium

T na m What Is Depleted Uranium? Depleted uranium is created as a byproduct during the processing of natural uranium to make it suitable for use as fuel in nuclear power plants or as a component in nuclear weapons. In natural uranium, 99.27% of the mass consists of atoms of uranium-238. About 0.72% of the mass consists of atoms of uranium-235, and a very small amount (0.0055% by mass) is uranium-234. Although uranium-235 is the rarer of the two major uranium isotopes, it is the one that most readily undergoes nuclear fission and is thus the most useful for common nuclear applications. For most of these applications, the proportion of the uranium-235 isotope found in natural uranium must be increased through a process called enrichment.