Showing posts with label open pit uranium mining. Show all posts
Showing posts with label open pit uranium mining. Show all posts
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Mining and mega park overreach
blast
There's go Virginia, remember it will be just a puff, according to Wales, don't think so!
Comment: Board of Supervisors, we do not want our tax monies going to development uranium mining and milling in the MegaPark- vote for a resolution to ban uranium mining and milling now or do not give monies to the RIFA! No to uranium mining and milling in Virginia!
By Published by The Editorial Board
Published: January 24, 2010
The Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors rejected a resolution this week to ban uranium mining within 20 miles of the Berry Hill Road industrial mega park.
But it does make sense for the politicians who are well on their way to spending $222 million to develop the 3,700-acre industrial mega park to take a stand on this issue.
The Berry Hill Road industrial mega park sits on land that was once considered for uranium mining.
As we’ve said before, uranium mining and milling opponents don’t have to prove it’s dangerous. Virginia Uranium Inc., the company that wants to mine a 119-million-pound uranium ore deposit at Coles Hill, has to prove that it’s safe.
Today, at least two studies are being done — including one commissioned by the state — to answer the safety questions. If those studies eventually lead to uranium mining and milling in Virginia, it would be foolish to believe that the only local mine will be at Coles Hill outside of Chatham.
So, the question is whether or not the Berry Hill Road industrial mega park is being developed for the uranium mining and milling industries — or for something else.
What’s the problem with saying — in the form of a resolution — that the county, the city and the Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Facility Authority board have no intention of developing this new industrial site for the uranium mining and milling industries?
Just 11 months ago, the Board of Supervisors went on record with a tough resolution that the state’s study must first find “no harm” would come to Pittsylvania County’s “businesses, institutions, environment or residents” before uranium mining could proceed here.
If the Berry Hill Road industrial mega park is being developed for the uranium mining and milling industries, the taxpayers deserve to know that — because to date, the safety of those industries hasn’t been demonstrated to the taxpayers.
Resolutions by Danville City Council, the Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors and the RIFA board are all that’s needed to clear up this issue.
Posted by karen on January 24, 2010 at 10:17 am
A “special district” in the county zoning ordinance for megapark status could be established…similar to Article IV, Special Provisions Div. 1.,for Smith Mtn. Lake, and incorporate use of a buffer area. However, if the Supes won’t entertain passage of a resolution…fat chance on a zoning amendment. It would involve public hearings and the majority of the Supes do not appear to want to hear from the public anyway.
A buffer area around the megapark would assure “safe haven” for the supposedly thousands of employees of the megapark. Assuming that NC won’t mine uranium near the park…employees will likely choose to live there and those counties across the border in NC can collect their tax revenue. DPRIFA will collect revenues from the megapark and the citizens of Pittsylvania County will get…MINED!
Posted by woc1 on January 24, 2010 at 7:24 am
How in the world could it ever be safe to mine on a site located directly on the Dan River?
Mining in this county would only benefit maybe a 100 residents, while an auto plant or other large industry would employee tens of thousands.
If they mine at Berry Hill it will be a slap in the face to locals. About ten people would get very rich from it, the rest of us would have to deal with the mess.
Read more:
http://www2.godanriver.com/gdr/news/opinion/editorials/danville_editorials/article/mining_and_mega_park_overreach/17335/
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Quake victims blame uranium mining company
Comment: Interesting? No to uranium mining!
Posted on Sunday 27 December 2009 - 13:55
By M'theto Lungu,
Africa news
Reporter in Karonga
Kayerekera Uranium Mining Company, Paladin Africa Limited, has been blamed for the continuing earthquakes and tremors being experienced in Karonga District.
Taking place at the DC's office, non-governmental, religious, and community representatives said they were convinced Paladin mining activities, which were recently commissioned by State President Dr. Bingu wa Mutharika, were the chief cause of the problem.
We demand that the company closes and also that the DC explains to us what we should tell the people.
Damage
Representatives from the geological survey department were also in defensive mode, insisting this was a natural order where after thousands and millions of years such occurrences repeat themselves. They offered no tangible explanation on what should transpire and what residents should expect.
The quake demarcation line has damaged roads, cut through residential, religious and public buildings, in some areas water gushing out from under the surface through cracks as big as 50cm and deeper than a mature bamboo tree.
Health risk
There are also fears that a cholera outbreak could hit the district of 270,000 people due to lack of safe water compounded by rainfall.
The paramount chief in the district, Mtemi wa Atemi Karonga, has also been blamed alongside some politicians for allowing Paladin to start mining without considering natural, health, and other residual effects on the people and the area.
Residents have differing beliefs behind the quake causes, others mathematically adding up the quake lines are confluent to Paladin's geographical positioning,
The meetings continue and today chiefs are meeting the DC to force out an official statement on what the people of Karonga should expect. More than 6,000 people have been moved to Mabulambo Camp whilst others remain around their damaged houses sleeping outdoors in makeshift plastic shelters. The Red Cross and the DC's office continue to distribute tents and plastics for shelter.
Four lives have been lost and 260 people injured since the earthquakes started weeks ago and a number of organizations and other well-wishers have since started contributing various relied services after government declared the area a disaster spot.
Read more:
http://www.africanews.com/site/Quake_victims_blame_uranium_mining_company/list_messages/28875
Posted on Sunday 27 December 2009 - 13:55
By M'theto Lungu,
Africa news
Reporter in Karonga
Kayerekera Uranium Mining Company, Paladin Africa Limited, has been blamed for the continuing earthquakes and tremors being experienced in Karonga District.
Taking place at the DC's office, non-governmental, religious, and community representatives said they were convinced Paladin mining activities, which were recently commissioned by State President Dr. Bingu wa Mutharika, were the chief cause of the problem.
We demand that the company closes and also that the DC explains to us what we should tell the people.
Damage
Representatives from the geological survey department were also in defensive mode, insisting this was a natural order where after thousands and millions of years such occurrences repeat themselves. They offered no tangible explanation on what should transpire and what residents should expect.
The quake demarcation line has damaged roads, cut through residential, religious and public buildings, in some areas water gushing out from under the surface through cracks as big as 50cm and deeper than a mature bamboo tree.
Health risk
There are also fears that a cholera outbreak could hit the district of 270,000 people due to lack of safe water compounded by rainfall.
The paramount chief in the district, Mtemi wa Atemi Karonga, has also been blamed alongside some politicians for allowing Paladin to start mining without considering natural, health, and other residual effects on the people and the area.
Residents have differing beliefs behind the quake causes, others mathematically adding up the quake lines are confluent to Paladin's geographical positioning,
The meetings continue and today chiefs are meeting the DC to force out an official statement on what the people of Karonga should expect. More than 6,000 people have been moved to Mabulambo Camp whilst others remain around their damaged houses sleeping outdoors in makeshift plastic shelters. The Red Cross and the DC's office continue to distribute tents and plastics for shelter.
Four lives have been lost and 260 people injured since the earthquakes started weeks ago and a number of organizations and other well-wishers have since started contributing various relied services after government declared the area a disaster spot.
Read more:
http://www.africanews.com/site/Quake_victims_blame_uranium_mining_company/list_messages/28875
Friday, December 4, 2009
Uranium mining bad for environment
Comment: Great Letter!
By Published by The Editorial Board
Published: November 30, 2009
Updated: December 1, 2009
To the editor:
I’m trying to figure out what an environmentally-friendly uranium mine tailings management operation and the environment have in common. Let me guess … how about nothing!
The National Academy of Sciences is considering whether to conduct a study to determine if uranium mining and milling can be done safely, but the scope of this study is still being worked on. I hope this recent little “rainfall” will be considered in their study, along with the damage from hurricanes we’ve had in the past.
I would also like to know where the facilities designed for severe weather are, let alone their distance to populated areas. I’m still trying to find one safe mining operation that hasn’t caused damage in that area. Also, consider how deep the pits will have to be to hold thousands of tons of ore and be covered with water to keep down the dust.
Here we go again — as far as regulations go — comparing farmers’ primitive ponds to a uranium mining operation. The government has more important things to do than be concerned about your fish pond. VUI has stated the amount of rainfall would not increase the amount of radiation already in rock. Well, I’ll be — I guess we’ll all be safe.
But if you take an egg and crack it open, it don’t look like it once did. Do you feel lucky? There also a few years from having a specific finalized design for this mining operation. Nothing like telling people it will be fine and not to worry, not knowing how they’re going to start. I myself don’t care to be a guinea pig in this science project. As the old saying goes, you can put sugar on a pile of manure and it might look sweet, but it’s still a pile of manure.
TIMOTHY F. STUART
Chatham, VA
http://www2.godanriver.com/gdr/news/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/danville_letters/article/uranium_mining_bad_for_environment/15976/
By Published by The Editorial Board
Published: November 30, 2009
Updated: December 1, 2009
To the editor:
I’m trying to figure out what an environmentally-friendly uranium mine tailings management operation and the environment have in common. Let me guess … how about nothing!
The National Academy of Sciences is considering whether to conduct a study to determine if uranium mining and milling can be done safely, but the scope of this study is still being worked on. I hope this recent little “rainfall” will be considered in their study, along with the damage from hurricanes we’ve had in the past.
I would also like to know where the facilities designed for severe weather are, let alone their distance to populated areas. I’m still trying to find one safe mining operation that hasn’t caused damage in that area. Also, consider how deep the pits will have to be to hold thousands of tons of ore and be covered with water to keep down the dust.
Here we go again — as far as regulations go — comparing farmers’ primitive ponds to a uranium mining operation. The government has more important things to do than be concerned about your fish pond. VUI has stated the amount of rainfall would not increase the amount of radiation already in rock. Well, I’ll be — I guess we’ll all be safe.
But if you take an egg and crack it open, it don’t look like it once did. Do you feel lucky? There also a few years from having a specific finalized design for this mining operation. Nothing like telling people it will be fine and not to worry, not knowing how they’re going to start. I myself don’t care to be a guinea pig in this science project. As the old saying goes, you can put sugar on a pile of manure and it might look sweet, but it’s still a pile of manure.
TIMOTHY F. STUART
Chatham, VA
http://www2.godanriver.com/gdr/news/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/danville_letters/article/uranium_mining_bad_for_environment/15976/
Uranium mining study gets green light, with conditions (In Virginia)
Comment: Remember Virginia Uranium Inc. and/or Santoy Resources Ltd. Virginia Uranium Limited, the new uranium corporation will be called Virginia Energy Resources Inc., a foreign Canadian Uranium Corporation is paying for the so call independent uranium study by the National Academy of Sciences who by the way say they never take money for a for Profit Corporation will be taking money from Virginia Uranium which the state of Virginia is funneling through Virginia Tech! The thoughts of this blog are that the State of Virginia is not paying for the study should not enable Virginia Uranium Inc! Only Virginia Uranium should talk to National Academy of Sciences and not the state of Virginia.
By John Crane
Published: December 3, 2009
Virginia’s uranium mining study has gotten the green light — but with conditions — from the National Research Council’s Governing Board Executive Committee.
Before the study can be fully approved, several issues must be addressed, wrote Anthony R. de Souza, director of the Board of Earth Sciences and Resources for the National Academies, in a letter to Michael E. Karmis, director of the Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research at Virginia Tech.
“These issues … relate to the funding source for the study, the requirement for independence of the NRC in carrying out the study, full transparency regarding funding, and a minor revision of the proposed statement of task,” de Souza wrote in the Nov. 23 letter.
“The proposed study is still contingent upon clarification of these issues,” said Jennifer Walsh, spokeswoman for the National Academy of Sciences. The NRC is part of the National Academy of Sciences.
Attempts to reach Karmis were unsuccessful Thursday.
The committee will meet Monday, Walsh said. However, the issues could be worked out before that meeting, she said.
“It’s still a work-in-progress,” Walsh said.
The NAS study would not be site-specific, but would address uranium mining and milling issues throughout Virginia, which has had a mining moratorium since 1982.
Jack Dunavant, chairman of Southside Concerned Citizens, said whether the study turns out to be objective after it’s over remains to be seen.
“As long as they do it objectively, I say full steam ahead,” Dunavant said Thursday.
David Bovenizer, spokesman for Delegate Lee Ware, who heads the Virginia Coal and Energy Commission’s Uranium Mining Subcommittee, said he was pleased with the committee’s decision.
“The letter conveys good news in the sense that the scope of the study is approved depending now only on resolution of a few technical contractual matters to ensure independency and transparency of the f
unding,” Bovenizer said via e-mail Thursday.
Virginia Uranium Inc., through Virginia Tech’s Center for Coal and Energy Research, would pay for the study’s first phase focusing on the technical and public-safety aspects of mining. That first study would cost as much as $1.4 million. Virginia Tech’s Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research would handle the money and contract with the NAS for the study.
Read more at:
http://www2.godanriver.com/gdr/news/local/danville_news/article/uranium_mining_study_gets_green_light_with_conditions/16038/
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Are We Running Out of Uranium? Let's Hope So
Comment: No to uranium mining and No to Nuke Plants!
by Naturally Savvy
11.27.09
Can a nuclear weary TreeHugger really believe what she's hearing? Could uranium mines be facing shortages? Earlier this week, New Scientist reported that nuclear power may be faced with a double blow: Uranium mine owners are talking shortages, and estimates for the amount of uranium that can be economically mined may be lower than once thought.
It's bad news for all those nuclear power plants being built around the world (at great expense to tax-payers, I might add), but it may be good news for green energy.
What's more, with the economical future of nuclear energy in question, governments and corporations may start to invest more resources in developing economical clean energy -- which could mean better clean energy technologies that avoid the problems we're currently dealing with (like water wars and the impact of wind turbines on human health).
Who knows -- maybe governments will stupidly throw money at an industry that generates vast amounts of toxic waste, and nuclear energy will continue to thrive. But maybe, just maybe, this is an opportunity for renewable energy to really take off.
Read more at:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/11/are-we-running-out-of-uranium-lets-hope-so.php?campaign=th_rss
Monday, November 9, 2009
Britain's nuclear strategy threatens destruction of Kalahari (Uranium Mining)
Comment: No to Nuke Plants, No to Uranium Mining, corporate greed is pushing the Nuke plants, solar and wind can provide clean power!
Namibian environmentalists warn expansion of uranium mining could devastate spectacular natural landscape
John Vidal The Observer
Sunday 8 November 2009
The hidden cost of Britain's new generation of nuclear power could be the destruction of the Kalahari desert in Namibia and millions of tonnes of extra greenhouse gas emissions a year, the Observer has discovered.
The desert, with its towering sand dunes and spectacular lunar-like landscapes, is at the centre of an international uranium rush led by Rössing Uranium, a subsidiary of the British mining giant Rio Tinto, and the French state-owned company, Areva, which part-manages the nuclear complex at Sellafield and wants to build others in Britain.
Tomorrow, Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, will release a batch of plans covering every aspect of Britain's strategy to replace its ageing nuclear power stations.
It is not expected to consider the source of the fuel needed for the new reactors. But Rössing is expanding its existing giant mine – which already provides nearly 8% of the world's uranium – into the Namib-Naukluft national park. Areva has leased hundreds of square kilometres of the desert near Trekkopje, where it plans to build one of the world's largest uranium mines.
At least 20 other mining companies from the UK, Canada, Russia, China, Japan, South Korea and elsewhere have also been given licences to explore thousands of square kilometres of the national park and its surrounds, and six new mines, several of which would be in the park, are at the development stage.
Namibia has some of the planet's richest uranium deposits and expects to become the third largest uranium producer and largest exporter within five years.
The mines are all expected to be in open pits up to 200 metres below the desert sands. With their waste heaps, acid plants and giant slurry ponds, they will extend over hundreds of square kilometres. "Large areas of the desert will be inevitably devastated," says Bertchen Kohrs, director of the Namibian environment group Earthlife. "They will do immense damage. We fear that there will be major contamination of the ground water supplies."
Documents seen by the Observer suggest the mines would initially consume about 53 million cubic metres of water a year, more than 75% of the water presently supplied by the Namibian state water company. The water will need to be pumped more than 56km to the mines from the coast. The proposed expansion of the uranium mining would create mountains of waste radioactive sand.
But an Areva spokesman said: "Our post-mining decommissioning plan will ensure that most of the Trekkopje mining area will return to its former wilderness state. The technical process applied to extract the ore will not cause any pollution to the underground water. The desalination plant will be powered by electricity produced from different sources, including non-CO2-emitting sources such as hydroelectricity."
Rio Tinto said it was addressing the carbon emissions of the mining operations. "Rössing has a greenhouse gas management plan to minimise emissions through improved energy efficiency," said a spokesman.
Additional reporting by Damian Carrington
Click Title or Link to whole post:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/nov/08/nuclear-power-namibia-mining
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Uranium dust a problem
Comment: Great Letter, Mr. Stanhope! Please read comments after the letter. The nukes are blogging our papers when we write letters against uranium mining! Joffan is a nuke; just go on web and google his name. This blog thinks it is amazing that the nuke bunch feels so threaten by everyday normal people who just want to protect our homes against huge uranium corporations and expose the liars they tell! The nuke bunch feels so threaten that they have huge conferences to teach other little nukes how to debunk the anti-nuke people! No to uranium mining, No to nuke plants!
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 10:06 AM EST
Over the last 2 1/2 years I have been talking about the dust problem that would accompany the opening of an open-pit uranium mine in Pittsylvania County.
I have spoken about the low-level radioactive dust that would come with the blasting and the tailing piles.
(Low-level radiation accumulates in the body).
I have spoken to the supervisors probably a dozen times, with absolutely no results.
Phil Lovelace has spoken more often than I have about leakage of radioactive water from the holding ponds.
He also has received dumb looks from the supervisors.
In fact, one of them sometimes looks as if he is asleep.
In my opinion five of the supervisors have paid so little attention that it appears they work with Virginia Uranium.
On Sept. 25, 2009, Australian Broadcasting Corp. News ran a story on the dust problem that is now happening in South Australia.
From the area of and around the Olympic Dam Uranium Mine Site, dust is blowing for several hundred miles.
There is some low-level radioactive material in this dust.
If we allow a mine what will stop us from having the same problem?
On March 15, 2009, Northwest Territory Government (Australia) spoke to the mining company ERA about the contaminated water leaking from the Ranger Uranium Mine's tailing pond.
Here at the Ranger Mine we are talking about 100,000 liters a day.
I believe this comes to about 25,000 gallons of contaminated water a day.
These are basically new mines with the latest technology.
This is not something from the past; this is today's technology and today's problem.
Hopefully this information will help get the people of this county to become more aware of what is happening elsewhere and stop "our" mine before it happens here.
George Stanhope
Chatham, VA
Board of directors
Southside Concerned Citizens
Comments:
jp andrews
wrote on Nov 6, 2009 7:07 AM:
" apparently "joffan" is another nuke employee, towing the radioactive company line, trying to
discredit anyone who raises concerns about an industry which has had one of the most disgraceful safety and environmental records of any industry since time began.
"joffan and his nuke peers talk down to those of us who have legitimate concerns about the dangers of uranium mining (which are thoroughly documented)as if we are children afraid of the boogie man. well, go to colorado or new mexico and ask the people living near uranium mines about that boogie man.
We who have real, hard questions about this ridiculous idea are not paid for our time or our efforts to stop uranium mining in virginia. when the nuke lovers can show us even ONE uranium mine that has been operated without destroying the environment for miles around it and causing cancer rates to spike up
in that area, then i might begin to lend them some creedence.
otherwise i see them as people who are afraid to tell their real names and who are in the pocket of coles or areva or some other corporation who will reap billions in profits from coles hill. i could hide behind some made up name as well, but i am not afraid to say what i think and sign my name to it. "
MaxTheDog
wrote on Nov 6, 2009 1:32 AM:
" Well, there are problems in Australia (and American West) not only with Dust but leakage with tailings ponds which are listed below!
Also review the fines of uranium mining and watch the film, Hard Rain about uranium mining!
Uranium mining will ruin America!
Please review the list below:
Dust is a concern in Australia:
Uranium mine told to address dust risks
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/09/25/2696047.htm
Leakage in Australia uranium mines and other mines:
Mine spill sparks call for farm talks (Australia)
Probe into uranium mine leak continues
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/10/20/2719474.htm
Waste leak site clean: BHP Billiton,
BHP Billiton says it has cleaned up the site of a radioactive waste leak at its Olympic Dam uranium mine in South Australia.
Uranium mine water leak concerning, govt says
About 100,000 litres of contaminated water is seeping from a tailings dam at the mine every day: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/15/2516584.htm
Uranium mine water leaking into Kakadu
Tens of thousands of litres of contaminated water is leaking into Kakadu National Park every day from the Ranger Uranium Mine (AAP: Tara Ravens):http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/13/2515907.htm
Cloncurry creek 'caustic' after mine leak,
Residents of the north-west Queensland community of Cloncurry are being warned to stay clear of a creek running through the town which has been contaminated by mine water:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/05/21/2576607.htm
Green group says Govt knew of radioactive leak:
Friends of the Earth says it has known about a radioactive leak at Olympic Dam for three months, but only released the information to the media yesterday:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/24/2524910.htm
Rio Tinto to be prosecuted for uranium disaster:http://www.minesandcommunities.org//article.php?a=7207&highlight=uranium,mining,fines
Environmental Problems and Violations Accumulate for Uranium Mining and Processing:
http://www.nunnglow.com/latest/violations-accumulate-for-uranium-isl-mining.html
Please watch the following film about the problems of uranium mining:
A Hard Rain (problems with nuclear power and uranium mining)
If you want vital and factual information to debate the issue intelligently and overthrow the myths that the nuclear and pro uranium mining lobby has so successfully implanted in the media:
http://www.frontlinefilms.com.au/videos/hardrain.htm "
Joffan
wrote on Nov 5, 2009 12:58 PM:
" Dear Mr Stanhope
I applaud your willingness to keep citizen's oversight on industrial projects, but a number of your concerns about uranium mining are misplaced or just flat-out wrong.
Dust is an issue that needs control at any open-cast mining, but the radioactivity from a uranium mine is negligible, and your simple assertion that low-level radiation accumulates in the body is wrong.
Similarly tailing ponds need to be carefully controlled and maintained, but the concerns are general to all mines, with no special radioactive threat from uranium mines, despite the noises from anti-nuclear-power groups.
Your mention of dust storms in South Australia is a piece of deception. These are nothing to do with mining activity, at Olympic Dam or elsewhere. http://www.ga.gov.au/remote-sensing/basics/gallery/natural-disasters/dust-east-australia-2009.jsp
The characterization of Ranger is also disingenuous; the "leakage" is into the underlying rock, which is more of an exchange process, and the geophysics surveys determined that any contamination will remain localized.
Olympic Dam, principally a copper mine, opened in 1987. Ranger opened in 1980. While they use modern technology, I would not call either of them "new".
with regards. "
http://www.wpcva.com/articles/2009/11/06/chatham/opinion/opinion02.txt
Meghalaya puts on hold UCIL's pre-mining development (uranium mining)
Sat, Nov 07, 2009 11:10:28 IST
Giving in to pressure from agitating organisations, Meghalaya government has decided to put on hold the UCIL's pre-mining developmental works in the uranium-rich areas of the state and formed a committee to look into the apprehensions.
The decision was taken by the government during a meeting with representatives from the agitation organisations led by the Khasi Students Union (KSU). “The Joint Committee on Uranium mining to be chaired by Deputy Chief Minister (in charge mining) BM Lanong, will comprise members from the agitation groups, scientists, environmentalists and other experts. It will try to address the concerns expressed by the organizations,” Meghalaya Chief Minister DD Lapang said after the meeting. The committee has been given three months for the exercise and after it submits its recommendations, the government will decide whether to go ahead with the proposed UCIL’s pre-mining developmental works, Lapang said.
Lapang also dismissed claims by the protesting groups that the pre-project developmental activities by the UCIL were meant to facilitate the uranium mining project. “As per an agreement with the UCIL, the project was divided into two phases – one the developmental works and the other the actual mining.
The mining issue in Meghalaya has been hanging fire for more than two decades now with some prominent NGOs and political parties vehemently opposed to the proposal on the grounds that it would lead to degradation of the environment besides opening the floodgates for outsiders into the tribal state. Explorations by Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research done two decades back estimated there could be over 16,000 tonnes of uranium ore in the Mahadek Basin of the state.
Click Title or Link to whole post:
http://www.merinews.com/article/meghalaya-puts-on-hold-ucils-pre-mining-development/15787751.shtml
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Desert Residents Pay High Price for Lucrative Uranium Mining
Comment: Don't you love the French, love to ruin people's lives!
After a visit in late March from French President Nicholas Sarkozy to Niger, residents in the uranium-exporting desert country continue questioning whether AREVA, a company primarily owned by the French government, will honour its promise to protect communities from mining hazards.
Studies and residents' testimonies have pointed to health and environmental dangers from mining operations owned and operated by both AREVA's subsidiaries and the Niger government.
Salifou Adifou, 67, worked for 40 years as a driller at Niger's SOMAÃèR (Aïr Mountains Mining Company), a public-private venture with AREVA owning 63 percent.
The retiree told IRIN he has undiagnosed health problems. "I have stomach and chest pains, but since retirement [in 1999], I cannot afford health care." Adifou said his friend who had worked as a miner is now bedridden.
Neither knows the cause of his health problems, Adifou told IRIN.
Air
The AREVA majority-owned mine called COMINAK (Mining Company of Akouta) commissioned an environmental study of its operations in Arlit in 2006, which reported that the number of deaths linked to respiratory infections was twice as high in the mining town (16 percent) as in the rest of the country.
"The wind carries dust contaminated with the long-lasting radium [time required for it to lose toxicity is more than 1,600 years] and lead...Samples taken from 5km within site...Sandstorms [and] atmospheric waste from mines could be aggravating factors for pulmonary [illnesses] in the region," the researchers wrote in COMINAK's environmental study.
But AREVA dismisses the link between mining and elevated health problems in its January 2009 report on mining activities in Niger. "These problems are typical in desert zones...they are not linked to mining activities."
Nevertheless AREVA directors have agreed to set up health diagnostic centres in all countries where it extracts uranium, starting with Gabon, according to the Paris-based human rights legal association Sherpa. "It has been two long, difficult years to get to this point with the company to give workers a voice," Sherpa director Yann Queinnec told IRIN.
Soil
The Paris-based Commission of Research and Independent Information on Radioactivity (CRIIRAD) has written of "serious safety lapses" in and near AREVA mining sites in Niger.
In 2007 CRIIRAD researchers said they found locals selling contaminated scrap metal from mining sites and the materials were eventually used in housing construction, kitchen utensils and tools. In 2003 CRIIRAD had recommended that AREVA identify and dispose of contaminated metals.
Water
In response to criticism that mining has contaminated increasingly scarce drinking water in northern Niger, AREVA published a statement in January 2009 that "monthly bacterial, bi-annual radiological, and annual chemical analyses show the absence of [water] contamination."
But environmental studies carried out by CRIIRAD and Sherpa in 2005 in mining communities showed water radiation levels up to 110 times higher than World Health Organization (WHO) safe drinking water standards in industrial areas and 10 times higher in urban areas.
Uranium extraction requires water to clean the mining site, treat the mineral and cover workers' and their families' water needs, according to AREVA.
Pastoralists have also accused AREVA of depleting the region's water.
Hydrologists estimate that rain-fed groundwater sources - similar to the aquifer AREVA is tapping 150m beneath the desert - can take some 200 years to replenish.
Corporate responsibility
Though the Niger government owns one-third of the uranium mines, Almoustapha Alhacen - head of the Arlit-based environmental NGO Aghir In'Man - told IRIN he holds AREVA wholly responsible for the north's environmental and health problems. "AREVA is in Canada, but does it exploit uranium as savagely as it does here? Have Canada's cattle also died?"
Pastoralists have blamed a number of cattle deaths on contamination of wells from which animals drink.
AREVA extracted an estimated 3,200 metric tons of uranium in northern Canada in 2007, slightly more than in Niger for the same period. In a May 2007 survey of 1,000 residents living near AREVA's uranium mining operations in Canada, 80 percent responded they supported uranium exploration.
Mines in Canada are "heavily regulated" by some 30 government agencies, from fisheries to nuclear safety, he added.
Half the work force is hired from the local community, Richards told IRIN. "It is just as important that we maintain our social obligations and community standing as it is [that we] meet environmental and health regulations," Richards said.
Even though AREVA France invests $1 million a year for community development in northern Niger, according to its records, NGO leader Alhacen said most mining community residents have "generally negative" views about the industry.
Niger's living conditions - as measured by health, education and income - are among the worst worldwide, according to the UN.
AREVA France has said its approach is not to dispense "charity" but rather to engage locals in running projects and to increase coordination with donors. Alhacen said damages from mining far outweigh the benefits in Niger. "AREVA [France] publicises that it pays for 200,000 medical visits a year. We do not see that here. Even so, that is admitting that tens of thousands are getting sick every year," said Alhacen.
Government responsibility
Since June 2007 the Niger government has placed more than half the country under a state of alert as a result of a decades-long rebellion that re-erupted in February 2007. Hundreds have died and thousands have been displaced in the last two years as a result of fighting.
Rebels who have attacked military posts and water and electricity plants that feed AREVA operations are demanding more mining profits for community development and more protection from mining's hazards. They have accused the government of overlooking what they call AREVA's environmental non-compliance in exchange for mining royalties.
The government dismisses the rebellion as a front for smuggling.
But leader of the rebel front that launched the February 2007 attack, Aghaly Ag Alambo, told IRIN that mining communities are still not safe. "AREVA is not the main problem. It is not AREVA's job to provide for Nigeriens. It is the government that has failed its people."
Click Title or Link to Read whole post :
http://www.somalipress.com/news/2009-mar-31/desert-residents-pay-high-price-lucrative-uranium-mining.html
Uranium would be biggest 'eyesore' of all (Uranium mining)
Wednesday, October 28, 2009 9:08 AM EDT
If Ben Davenport and Chatham Town Council are so concerned about the appearance of Chatham and how it is perceived by visitors to the town, it seems only logical that they would be more concerned about the potential uranium mine and mill that Virginia Uranium Inc. and its Canadian partners are planning rather than getting themselves into a sweat over a couple of dilapidated buildings.
It seems odd that Mr. Davenport, the driving force behind this "eyesore" cleanup campaign, has to this point remained completely silent about the issue of uranium mining and milling, and yet he describes an abandoned building as "a real shame."
The real shame will occur when the blasting begins at Coles Hill and Chatham becomes known as the most radioactive place on the East Coast.
It is also telling that Virginia Tech would be willing to provide "planning support" for the sanitizing of Chatham when they are at the same time planning massive support for VUI's toxic adventure which will take place a mere six miles from the center of town.
If the town cannot afford to remove an old mobile home from Whitehead Street, how do they think they will be able to pay for cleaning up 30 or 40 years of a uranium mine spewing poison onto its streets and rooftops?
They can plant all the flowerbeds they want, but if uranium mining becomes a reality for Pittsylvania County, all the flowers in the world will not attract anyone to Chatham, with the exception of the unemployed uranium miners from other states who will descend on the town.
Rather than panicking about the mouse running across the floor, Davenport and the town council would be wiser to make a plan about the thousand-pound gorilla sitting in the room with them.
Which one poses the greater threat?
Jesse Pyrant Andrews
Halifax, VA
http://www.wpcva.com/articles/2009/10/28/chatham/opinion/opinion02.txt
If Ben Davenport and Chatham Town Council are so concerned about the appearance of Chatham and how it is perceived by visitors to the town, it seems only logical that they would be more concerned about the potential uranium mine and mill that Virginia Uranium Inc. and its Canadian partners are planning rather than getting themselves into a sweat over a couple of dilapidated buildings.
It seems odd that Mr. Davenport, the driving force behind this "eyesore" cleanup campaign, has to this point remained completely silent about the issue of uranium mining and milling, and yet he describes an abandoned building as "a real shame."
The real shame will occur when the blasting begins at Coles Hill and Chatham becomes known as the most radioactive place on the East Coast.
It is also telling that Virginia Tech would be willing to provide "planning support" for the sanitizing of Chatham when they are at the same time planning massive support for VUI's toxic adventure which will take place a mere six miles from the center of town.
If the town cannot afford to remove an old mobile home from Whitehead Street, how do they think they will be able to pay for cleaning up 30 or 40 years of a uranium mine spewing poison onto its streets and rooftops?
They can plant all the flowerbeds they want, but if uranium mining becomes a reality for Pittsylvania County, all the flowers in the world will not attract anyone to Chatham, with the exception of the unemployed uranium miners from other states who will descend on the town.
Rather than panicking about the mouse running across the floor, Davenport and the town council would be wiser to make a plan about the thousand-pound gorilla sitting in the room with them.
Which one poses the greater threat?
Jesse Pyrant Andrews
Halifax, VA
http://www.wpcva.com/articles/2009/10/28/chatham/opinion/opinion02.txt
Monday, October 26, 2009
Where do you stand on uranium mining in Virginia?
People of Virginia, just replace Australia with Virginia and this is the path the Leaders of Virginia is pushing our state, to Be the Nuke Power of the World, we do not want anything to do with uranium mining and we do not want to be the next Nuke Power!
Comment: McDonnell is somebody's puppet but whose?; France is not a good example for Nuke power: "Olkiluoto 3 Nuclear Plant Delayed Again, an Industrial Info News Alert": (http://nuclearstreet.com/blogs/green_energy_news/archive/2009/10/26/olkiluoto-3-nuclear-plant-delayed-again-an-industrial-info-news-alert.aspx). Plus France is not energy independents, they have no uranium, no coal, no anything, is France chasing Virginia's uranium, you bet! No to Uranium Mining, No to Nuke Power!
Bob McDonnell (R) Candidate for Governor:
"I think we've got a great capacity to have a vibrant nuclear power industry in Virginia. We've got Areva right here in the Lynchburg area. But I don't want to do anything or make any decision until this long-term study is done to see what impact this would have on the environment, on citizens here in the local area, on the water supply. I want to wait until that study's done to make any determination about whether it's a good idea."
Creigh Deeds (D) Candidate for Governor:
"After public safety, my first concern with uranium mining is the effect it could have on our water quality. I am not convinced we have a liner or a cap developed to protect the water supply from the radioactive millings that are a byproduct of mining. You’re talking about people all over Southside, from Danville to Virginia Beach , being contaminated if there’s a problem. Lets let the science speak first."
Read the complete post at:
http://www.wset.com/news/stories/1009/672188.html
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Probe into uranium mine leak continues
Comments: Listed below are several accidents and problems with modern uranium mining in Australia!
Thanks AC: The Ranger Uranium Mine is one of the most strictly regulated uranium mines in Australia and the Office of the Supervising Scientist is controlling, is supervising, very strictly the mine," he said. Do the words "strictly regulated" ease one's mind. regarding uranium mining and milling. when perusing the articles below? Should Virginia and surrounding states that share water be worried? Will/has the U.S. done a better job with "regulating" uranium mining activities than Australia?
Probe into uranium mine leak continues
Posted Tue Oct 20, 2009 9:26pm AEDT
The Commonwealth supervising scientist of the Ranger uranium mine at Kakadu National Park says investigations are continuing into water contamination at the site.
Energy Resources of Australia has conducted geophysical surveys to determine the impact and extent of leaking from a tailings dam at the mine.
Mr Hughes says the company has only preliminary results from the surveys and is not sure if ERA will make the findings public.
"I understand that they are having significant discussions with the traditional owners and the Northern Land Council about tailings and seepage issues on an ongoing basis," he said.
"So I imagine all the immediate stakeholders will be very well informed on the issue."
Greens Senator Scott Ludlam is demanding the report be made public as soon as possible.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/10/20/2719474.htm
Waste leak site clean: BHP Billiton
Posted Mon Mar 23, 2009 4:26pm AEDT
Updated Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:14pm AEDT
Olympic Dam uranium leak site ... BHP Billiton says it has now been cleaned. (ABC News: Friends of the Earth)
BHP Billiton says it has cleaned up the site of a radioactive waste leak at its Olympic Dam uranium mine in South Australia.
Green groups released photos they say were taken by a mine worker in December 2008, showing a clean-up operation outside a tailings dam.
The mining company says it notified the State Government and the Environment Protection Authority.
BHP Billiton says it has pumped the tailings back into the dam and that the wall is now secure.
Uranium mine water leak concerning, govt says
Posted Sun Mar 15, 2009 12:28pm AEDT
Updated Sun Mar 15, 2009 12:35pm AEDT
About 100,000 litres of contaminated water is seeping from a tailings dam at the mine every day. (AFP: Energy Resouces of Australia/SkyScans: file photo)
The Northern Territory Government says it will speak to mining company ERA and the office of the Commonwealth Supervising Scientist about contaminated water leaking from the Ranger Uranium Mine.
Environmentalists are calling for the mine's planned expansion to be put on hold.
The Office of the Supervising Scientist and ERA say the water is not seeping into Kakadu and there is no reason for concern.
"The Ranger Uranium Mine is one of the most strictly regulated uranium mines in Australia and the Office of the Supervising Scientist is controlling, is supervising, very strictly the mine," he said.
"I'm prepared to talk with the Office of the Supervising Scientist to find out exactly what's happening, " he said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/15/2516584.htm
Uranium mine water leaking into Kakadu
Posted Fri Mar 13, 2009 5:19pm AEDT
Updated Fri Mar 13, 2009 5:46pm AEDT
Tens of thousands of litres of contaminated water is leaking into Kakadu National Park every day from the Ranger Uranium Mine (AAP: Tara Ravens)
A Senate Committee has been told tens of thousands of litres of contaminated water is leaking into Kakadu National Park every day from a tailings dam at the Ranger Uranium Mine.
Mr Hughes also told the Committee he did not see any significant reason for concern.
The Ranger uranium mine is on a lease within the boundaries of the world-heritage listed Kakadu National Park .
The Greens are calling on the mining company ERA to explain how it intends to clean up the water.
"It's a vast quantity of water, contaminated water, with processed chemicals, heavy metals, and radinuclides seeping out from underneath the tailings dam," he said.
"And we are just very concerned to know how the company plans on remediating the vast quantity of contaminated water that's seeping out from under their tailings facility.
"I think the supervising scientist and the government is being incredibly casual, telling us not to be too worried, although they couldn't say how the company would remediate it, when they would be doing that.
"They couldn't even tell us the total volume of contaminated water that had leaked away."
The mining company ERA says it has a detailed plan to clean up the water.
"It's well monitored, it's well understood by us and the regulators.
And we have a comprehensive rehabilitation plan, to remedy any effects on the surrounding area."
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/13/2515907.htm
Cloncurry creek 'caustic' after mine leak
By Chrissy Arthur
Posted Thu May 21, 2009 7:35am AEST
Updated Thu May 21, 2009 10:51am AEST
Residents of the north-west Queensland community of Cloncurry are being warned to stay clear of a creek running through the town which has been contaminated by mine water.
The Cloncurry Shire Council says water from Coppermine Creek has been contaminated by a leak from a pipe at the Great Australia Mine near the town.
That has created a corrosive discharge into the waterway.
The Council says under no circumstances should anyone enter, touch or go near the creek.
The water is caustic and will irritate skin and eyes and could affect breathing.
He says there are also reports of fish kills at the Coppermine Creek Bridge near the town.
Mr Turnour says it is a serious incident.
"It's high in acid so if you touch it it'll be very bad for your skin, your eyes and so on," he said.
"This is going to hang around for a fair period of time.
"We're taking the matter quite seriously - even though this is not a Council matter, we're taking the responsibility to warn people."
The mining company has begun a clean-up.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/05/21/2576607.htm
Green group says Govt knew of radioactive leak
Posted Tue Mar 24, 2009 3:00pm AEDT
Friends of the Earth says it has known about a radioactive leak at Olympic Dam for three months, but only released the information to the media yesterday.
The group found out about the leak after a worker passed on photos showing the radioactive liquid collecting in unlined trenches.
Dr Jim Green, from Friends of the Earth, says the State Government has known about the problem since last April, but did not make the information public.
"We only became aware of the problem in December and we hear that BHP reported the problem to the State Government last April, as to why that was not made public earlier, you'd really have to put that to the State Government representative," he said.
The Environment Protection Authority says the information was not released because it did not present any risk to the public or to the environment.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/24/2524910.htm
Rio Tinto investigates chemical leak
Posted Wed Apr 1, 2009 10:36am AEDT
Updated Wed Apr 1, 2009 11:37am AEDT
Rio Tinto is investigating reports of a leak from one of the wastewater dams at its Alcan Gove bauxite mine and aluminium refinery in Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory.
The company says it is looking into an incident in which a man complained of a burning sensation on his skin after coming into contact with groundwater.
The company says it happened somewhere on the mine site in the middle of March.
But it did not start investigating until contacted by the ABC yesterday about reports of a leak from a waste water dam and a red plume streaming into Melville Bay.
The company says an inspection of the area was carried out yesterday and water samples were taken.
The Australian Conservation Foundation says the Territory Government is not doing enough monitoring of the environmental impacts of mines.
The foundation's Dave Sweeney says it is unacceptable that the Government relies on environmental impact information provided by mining companies.
"Self-regulation doesn't work," he said.
Click below to find links to stories:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/10/20/2719474.htm
Sunday, September 6, 2009
U: Father Frank urges caution on new uranium mining, nuclear
Comment: Is this Virginia future? Demand our government to ban uranium mining and milling now!
Greg Harman
gharman@sacurrent.com
Father Frank heard the call of the Church after spending a year working at a chemical plant in coal-rich Silesia, Poland.
It could have been worse. He tells me of another priest he knows who heard it only after staring at a mule’s butt year after year as he plowed his fields. Not exactly a Road to Damascus event in either case, but for Father Frank Kurzaj the industrial background was perfect staging ground for the ordeal ahead that was Panna Maria, Texas.
While others in Kurzaj’s family kept on with coal, Kurzaj, now the head of San Antonio’s St. Paul’s Catholic Church, wound up in the middle of a fight over toxic uranium mining, processing, and dumping in the South Texas Polish community of Panna Maria in Karnes County.
He counseled parishioners stricken with cancer, couples unable to conceive, labored over the faith-challenging questions that can follow birth defects, and worked with two families near the dump whose children were born dually sexed as hermaphrodites.
And he helped organize the Panna Maria Concerned Citizens to help give the community a voice in the public hearings taking place in the late 1980s.
Although the uranium boom that had swept across a wide band of South Texas — from Falls City clear down near Laredo — was already beginning to wane with the collapse of world uranium prices, it was the Chevron dump just west of Panna Maria that remained a huge source of tension thanks to the contaminated water beneath it.
While legal settlements have since sealed many mouths regarding the events of this time (just as a state Department of Health statistical report affectively smothered a more appropriate chromosomal study conducted by a UTMB toxicologist’s study, but that’s for another post), Kurzaj remains candid in his assessment, and cautious in his pronouncements.
Mining can be done, if it is done right, he says. However, the influence of money almost guarantees that public health rides in the back seat.
I spoke with this pragmatic priest last week to hear what advice he may have for San Antonio, preparing to vote on the expansion of the South Texas Project nuclear complex, and for South Texans, likely to see a significant return of uranium mining activity if the much-trumpeted Nuclear Renaissance ever actually flourishes.
[On that note, things seem to be dimming: According to The World Nuclear Industry Status Report, 2009:
Even if Finland and France each builds a reactor or two, China goes for an additional 20 plants and Japan, Korea or Eastern Europe add a few units, the overall worldwide trend will most likely be downwards over the next two decades. With extremely long lead times of 10 years and more, it will be practically impossible to maintain, let alone increase the number of operating nuclear power plants over the next 20 years. The one exception to this outcome would be if operating lifetimes could be substantially increased beyond 40 years on average; there is currently no basis for such an assumption.]
While the priest's actions in the field have earned Kurzaj veneration of many an anti-nuclear activist, the man is not reflexively anti-nuclear or against uranium mining. His utilitarian approach to nature (the Hawaiian islands were lifted from the sea so people would be able to live there, he suggests during our talk) put him in fairly conservative company.
“My personal view on this issue is that you can do this, if we have these natural resources, they are not given to us that they will stay there,” he said. “The earth serves a purpose and we can use the natural resources to benefit people and humanity, but we have to do it with some kind of respect, with some kind of understanding.”
That respect and understanding was deeply lacking in Karnes County, he says. And he is adamant that residents of Panna Maria were regularly lied to by industry and the state concerning the safety of mining, milling, and dumping.
“The dumping was done over there and people were not aware of the consequences of being in this area. They were lied to, simply by telling them everything is under control.”
It is that experience that suggests to Kurzaj that politics and greed make the safe use of nuclear energy highly unlikely.
He’s learned how language is manipulated to seal a deal. A “leak” becomes “seepage,” and “waste” becomes “by-product.”
“If the water is contaminated and the cattle and people cannot drink it, what this land is for? For nothing. Or if you cannot conceive over there, because genes are damaged? You can live there, you can have a nice home, but you cannot have kids. Maybe you do not want to have kids. That’s okay with me. But maybe you want to have kids. Then they’ll put a big beautiful sign: ‘The historical place of Panna Maria. Polish people came here in 1854 and noboby lives here because it’s contaminated.’”
Of course, people still live in Panna Maria. On the back side of the dump — the side the leak is reportedly on — goats and turkeys are being raised, apparently for meat. This is most likely one of the homes Chevron (or was it General Atomics, who later bought the dump and absorbed the liability?) piped potable water to. No one was home when I stopped by.
---
To hear from others who lived through the Panna Maria fight, you can check out the testimonies collected by Sharon Stewart as part of her Toxic Tour of Texas.
Posted by gharman on 9/6/2009 2:22:07 PM
http://www.sacurrent.com/blog/queblog.asp?perm=69921
Greg Harman
gharman@sacurrent.com
Father Frank heard the call of the Church after spending a year working at a chemical plant in coal-rich Silesia, Poland.
It could have been worse. He tells me of another priest he knows who heard it only after staring at a mule’s butt year after year as he plowed his fields. Not exactly a Road to Damascus event in either case, but for Father Frank Kurzaj the industrial background was perfect staging ground for the ordeal ahead that was Panna Maria, Texas.
While others in Kurzaj’s family kept on with coal, Kurzaj, now the head of San Antonio’s St. Paul’s Catholic Church, wound up in the middle of a fight over toxic uranium mining, processing, and dumping in the South Texas Polish community of Panna Maria in Karnes County.
He counseled parishioners stricken with cancer, couples unable to conceive, labored over the faith-challenging questions that can follow birth defects, and worked with two families near the dump whose children were born dually sexed as hermaphrodites.
And he helped organize the Panna Maria Concerned Citizens to help give the community a voice in the public hearings taking place in the late 1980s.
Although the uranium boom that had swept across a wide band of South Texas — from Falls City clear down near Laredo — was already beginning to wane with the collapse of world uranium prices, it was the Chevron dump just west of Panna Maria that remained a huge source of tension thanks to the contaminated water beneath it.
While legal settlements have since sealed many mouths regarding the events of this time (just as a state Department of Health statistical report affectively smothered a more appropriate chromosomal study conducted by a UTMB toxicologist’s study, but that’s for another post), Kurzaj remains candid in his assessment, and cautious in his pronouncements.
Mining can be done, if it is done right, he says. However, the influence of money almost guarantees that public health rides in the back seat.
I spoke with this pragmatic priest last week to hear what advice he may have for San Antonio, preparing to vote on the expansion of the South Texas Project nuclear complex, and for South Texans, likely to see a significant return of uranium mining activity if the much-trumpeted Nuclear Renaissance ever actually flourishes.
[On that note, things seem to be dimming: According to The World Nuclear Industry Status Report, 2009:
Even if Finland and France each builds a reactor or two, China goes for an additional 20 plants and Japan, Korea or Eastern Europe add a few units, the overall worldwide trend will most likely be downwards over the next two decades. With extremely long lead times of 10 years and more, it will be practically impossible to maintain, let alone increase the number of operating nuclear power plants over the next 20 years. The one exception to this outcome would be if operating lifetimes could be substantially increased beyond 40 years on average; there is currently no basis for such an assumption.]
While the priest's actions in the field have earned Kurzaj veneration of many an anti-nuclear activist, the man is not reflexively anti-nuclear or against uranium mining. His utilitarian approach to nature (the Hawaiian islands were lifted from the sea so people would be able to live there, he suggests during our talk) put him in fairly conservative company.
“My personal view on this issue is that you can do this, if we have these natural resources, they are not given to us that they will stay there,” he said. “The earth serves a purpose and we can use the natural resources to benefit people and humanity, but we have to do it with some kind of respect, with some kind of understanding.”
That respect and understanding was deeply lacking in Karnes County, he says. And he is adamant that residents of Panna Maria were regularly lied to by industry and the state concerning the safety of mining, milling, and dumping.
“The dumping was done over there and people were not aware of the consequences of being in this area. They were lied to, simply by telling them everything is under control.”
It is that experience that suggests to Kurzaj that politics and greed make the safe use of nuclear energy highly unlikely.
He’s learned how language is manipulated to seal a deal. A “leak” becomes “seepage,” and “waste” becomes “by-product.”
“If the water is contaminated and the cattle and people cannot drink it, what this land is for? For nothing. Or if you cannot conceive over there, because genes are damaged? You can live there, you can have a nice home, but you cannot have kids. Maybe you do not want to have kids. That’s okay with me. But maybe you want to have kids. Then they’ll put a big beautiful sign: ‘The historical place of Panna Maria. Polish people came here in 1854 and noboby lives here because it’s contaminated.’”
Of course, people still live in Panna Maria. On the back side of the dump — the side the leak is reportedly on — goats and turkeys are being raised, apparently for meat. This is most likely one of the homes Chevron (or was it General Atomics, who later bought the dump and absorbed the liability?) piped potable water to. No one was home when I stopped by.
---
To hear from others who lived through the Panna Maria fight, you can check out the testimonies collected by Sharon Stewart as part of her Toxic Tour of Texas.
Posted by gharman on 9/6/2009 2:22:07 PM
http://www.sacurrent.com/blog/queblog.asp?perm=69921
U: Toxic legacy of South Texas uranium mining
One of 32 abandoned uranium mines on private ranches across South Texas. The hill to the right is a pile of uranium mine tailings.
Comment: No to uranium mining and Nuke Power NOW!
Greg Harman
gharman@sacurrent.com
“Prepare to meet thy God,” reads the small black-and-white sign in the yard at the end of this dusty county road in Karnes County. I’m looking for a string of open-pit uranium mines, now filled with water, where some locals fish, swim, and practice their water skiing.
A San Antonio mechanic and Karnes County resident lost his 30-some acre lake (and former uranium mine) last year when the Texas Railroad Commission pumped out more than 122 million gallons, transferred about 70 foot-long big mouth bass to a nearby stock tank, and left him with a dry graded pit.
“They left me with what’s going to end up being a pretty good pond — if it ever rains.”
There are plenty of these former uranium mines sitting on private ranches across South Texas.
Greg Harman
gharman@sacurrent.com
“Prepare to meet thy God,” reads the small black-and-white sign in the yard at the end of this dusty county road in Karnes County. I’m looking for a string of open-pit uranium mines, now filled with water, where some locals fish, swim, and practice their water skiing.
A San Antonio mechanic and Karnes County resident lost his 30-some acre lake (and former uranium mine) last year when the Texas Railroad Commission pumped out more than 122 million gallons, transferred about 70 foot-long big mouth bass to a nearby stock tank, and left him with a dry graded pit.
“They left me with what’s going to end up being a pretty good pond — if it ever rains.”
There are plenty of these former uranium mines sitting on private ranches across South Texas.
The RRC insists they don’t have responsibility for them since they were dug and abandoned prior to passage of a 1970s federal mining law that first required companies to post bonds up front to guarantee later cleanup.
Using federal monies as they have become available, the state has led and completed 15 mine reclamations, leaving 17 former uranium mining sites still unaddressed, according to Ramona Nye, spokesperson for the agency.
I was stunned to hear from a former Karnes County resident who spoke about learning to water ski on one of the water-filled pits (So far, just one tumor, he said.)
Mining, milling, and dumping of uranium across South Texas has fouled numerous aquifers, and some claim the tailings continue to cause a health hazards by allowing alpha radiation to blow freely on the breeze.
While open-pit uranium mining in Texas dates back to the 1950s, past abuses continue to pose a risk to the living. Waste pits like these in South Texas will remain toxic for hundreds of thousands of years, even as a new generation of mines prepares to move into production.
All these companies require is an uptick in the global economy and a commitment by utilities such as CPS Energy, owned by the City of San Antonio, to give nuclear power another go.
The mining technology preferred today, in-situ mining, utilizes an assortment of injection and extraction wells which force the uranium into the water column where it can be pumped to the surface and separated out.
The method is cheaper than open-pit and less visually damaging. Problem here is ever getting this water clean again. There have been problems with pollution the world over.
Using federal monies as they have become available, the state has led and completed 15 mine reclamations, leaving 17 former uranium mining sites still unaddressed, according to Ramona Nye, spokesperson for the agency.
I was stunned to hear from a former Karnes County resident who spoke about learning to water ski on one of the water-filled pits (So far, just one tumor, he said.)
Mining, milling, and dumping of uranium across South Texas has fouled numerous aquifers, and some claim the tailings continue to cause a health hazards by allowing alpha radiation to blow freely on the breeze.
While open-pit uranium mining in Texas dates back to the 1950s, past abuses continue to pose a risk to the living. Waste pits like these in South Texas will remain toxic for hundreds of thousands of years, even as a new generation of mines prepares to move into production.
All these companies require is an uptick in the global economy and a commitment by utilities such as CPS Energy, owned by the City of San Antonio, to give nuclear power another go.
The mining technology preferred today, in-situ mining, utilizes an assortment of injection and extraction wells which force the uranium into the water column where it can be pumped to the surface and separated out.
The method is cheaper than open-pit and less visually damaging. Problem here is ever getting this water clean again. There have been problems with pollution the world over.
Also, in-situ uses a lot of water. Uranium Resource's Kingsville Dome mine at Ricardo (operating on a skeleton crew due to the economic downturn), was buying more than a million gallons of water per month from the local water district last summer.
While my Karnes County source tells me the water in his lake wasn’t dangerous (“We had it tested 25 years ago,” he says during a telephone interview. “We didn’t want to pump poison on our crops.”), there is a nearby “lake” that has tested higher for toxics. It’s only been sitting contaminated for decades, a short distance from a string of now infamous radioactive dumps outside Falls City and Panna Maria.
As the San Antonio City Council prepares to vote on whether to participate in the expansion of the South Texas Project nuclear complex outside Bay City, there has been very little discussion of the environmental and public health consequences of nuclear power — from the full impact of mining to the ethical questions surrounding our right to create radioactive poisons in the first place, wastes that will remain toxic to biological lifeforms for hundreds of thousands and even millions of years.
The San Antonio City Council vote in October is significant. As the proposed doubling of the South Texas Project nuclear complex represents the first new construction application filed in almost 30 years, it is also the top-ranked project in line for guaranteed federal loan subsidies from the U.S. Department of Energy.
With a nod to nukes, the San Antonio City Council will be offering the uranium market its encouragement and may help ease the return of uranium mining activity across the region. And it gives steam to other nuclear power projects to come.
Prior to the vote, San Antonio must be able to answer a number of questions. With regards to mining, we must ask if people are still suffering from past mining mistakes and if current mining practices are safe for our limited groundwater resources and communities.
These are the sorts of things we’ll be asking at the Current over the next month. You can participate in this conversation by following our updates at Queblog and by following our weekly coverage, set to launch September 16.
Nuclear power in San Antonio is truly an "outsourced power source." The risk of meltdown is most acute for those living 200 miles to the southeast; the damages of uranium mining are the dominion our southern neighbors; and those who must confront the potential damages from waste disposal live another several hundred more miles to the northwest.
For that reason, it's easy to see how our leaders would overlook or undervalue these concerns. But from a historical perspective it does not make it pardonable.
Ultimately, our hope is that the observations we offer will contribute to a sound decision on one of the most pressing issues of our time. What cost energy?
Posted by gharman on 9/6/2009 12:59:07 PM
http://www.sacurrent.com/blog/queblog.asp?perm=69920
While my Karnes County source tells me the water in his lake wasn’t dangerous (“We had it tested 25 years ago,” he says during a telephone interview. “We didn’t want to pump poison on our crops.”), there is a nearby “lake” that has tested higher for toxics. It’s only been sitting contaminated for decades, a short distance from a string of now infamous radioactive dumps outside Falls City and Panna Maria.
As the San Antonio City Council prepares to vote on whether to participate in the expansion of the South Texas Project nuclear complex outside Bay City, there has been very little discussion of the environmental and public health consequences of nuclear power — from the full impact of mining to the ethical questions surrounding our right to create radioactive poisons in the first place, wastes that will remain toxic to biological lifeforms for hundreds of thousands and even millions of years.
The San Antonio City Council vote in October is significant. As the proposed doubling of the South Texas Project nuclear complex represents the first new construction application filed in almost 30 years, it is also the top-ranked project in line for guaranteed federal loan subsidies from the U.S. Department of Energy.
With a nod to nukes, the San Antonio City Council will be offering the uranium market its encouragement and may help ease the return of uranium mining activity across the region. And it gives steam to other nuclear power projects to come.
Prior to the vote, San Antonio must be able to answer a number of questions. With regards to mining, we must ask if people are still suffering from past mining mistakes and if current mining practices are safe for our limited groundwater resources and communities.
These are the sorts of things we’ll be asking at the Current over the next month. You can participate in this conversation by following our updates at Queblog and by following our weekly coverage, set to launch September 16.
Nuclear power in San Antonio is truly an "outsourced power source." The risk of meltdown is most acute for those living 200 miles to the southeast; the damages of uranium mining are the dominion our southern neighbors; and those who must confront the potential damages from waste disposal live another several hundred more miles to the northwest.
For that reason, it's easy to see how our leaders would overlook or undervalue these concerns. But from a historical perspective it does not make it pardonable.
Ultimately, our hope is that the observations we offer will contribute to a sound decision on one of the most pressing issues of our time. What cost energy?
Posted by gharman on 9/6/2009 12:59:07 PM
http://www.sacurrent.com/blog/queblog.asp?perm=69920
Friday, July 10, 2009
Midnite Mine
Comment: Virginia does not need any open pit uranium mine! We do not want to be the future superfund site, 30 years from now!Public comment period open from May 20, 2009 to July 20, 2009.
The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) requests comments on its Public Health Assessment for Midnite Mine (PDF) (126 pp. 1.6MB). Comments must be submitted by July 20, 2009.
Please address comments regarding this report to:
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry
Attn: Records Center
1600 Clifton Road, N.E., MS F-09
Atlanta, Georgia 30333
You may contact ATSDR Toll Free at 1-800-CDC-INFO or visit their website at http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov.
Summary
Midnite Mine is an inactive former uranium mine in the Selkirk Mountains of eastern Washington. Located within the reservation of the Spokane Tribe of Indians, the mine was operated from 1955 until 1981.
Two open pits, backfilled pits, and a number of waste rock piles and ore/protore stockpiles remain on site. In addition to elevated levels of radioactivity, heavy metals mobilized in acid mine drainage pose a potential threat to human health and the environment. The site drains to Blue Creek, which enters the Spokane Arm of Franklin D. Roosevelt Lake. Contaminated water emerging below the waste rock and ore piles is currently captured for treatment in an on-site treatment system.
The final cleanup plan (Record of Decision, or ROD) for the site was issued September 29, 2006.
Record of Decision
Midnite Mine Superfund Site Spokane Indian Reservation Washington Record of Decision (PDF) - September 2006 (248pp., 6.2MB, About PDF)
Record of Decision, Revised Table 7-6 (1pp., 73K, PDF)
The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) requests comments on its Public Health Assessment for Midnite Mine (PDF) (126 pp. 1.6MB). Comments must be submitted by July 20, 2009.
Please address comments regarding this report to:
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry
Attn: Records Center
1600 Clifton Road, N.E., MS F-09
Atlanta, Georgia 30333
You may contact ATSDR Toll Free at 1-800-CDC-INFO or visit their website at http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov.
Summary
Midnite Mine is an inactive former uranium mine in the Selkirk Mountains of eastern Washington. Located within the reservation of the Spokane Tribe of Indians, the mine was operated from 1955 until 1981.
Two open pits, backfilled pits, and a number of waste rock piles and ore/protore stockpiles remain on site. In addition to elevated levels of radioactivity, heavy metals mobilized in acid mine drainage pose a potential threat to human health and the environment. The site drains to Blue Creek, which enters the Spokane Arm of Franklin D. Roosevelt Lake. Contaminated water emerging below the waste rock and ore piles is currently captured for treatment in an on-site treatment system.
The final cleanup plan (Record of Decision, or ROD) for the site was issued September 29, 2006.
Record of Decision
Midnite Mine Superfund Site Spokane Indian Reservation Washington Record of Decision (PDF) - September 2006 (248pp., 6.2MB, About PDF)
Record of Decision, Revised Table 7-6 (1pp., 73K, PDF)
The cleanup plan calls for a cap over an area of pits filled with waste during mining, consolidation and engineered containment of remaining waste in the two open pits, removal of water entering the pits, and operation of a treatment system to treat contaminated water from the pits and seeps.
The Record of Decision initiates the design phase. Design of the cleanup will include data collection to support detailed construction plans and is expected to take several years.
The Record of Decision initiates the design phase. Design of the cleanup will include data collection to support detailed construction plans and is expected to take several years.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
A Look at Uranium Mining
Comment: A great article, Thanks to the Public Citizen Texas! Virginia maybe faced with future open pit uranium mine and send this article to all State leaders and the uranium study bunch!
July 8, 2009 by Public Citizen Texas
An Open Pit Uranium Mine
Proponents of nuclear power do a lot to paint it as an environmentally friendly, cheap fuel source. It is not, and we at Public Citizen work hard to dispel these kinds of myths. We have said a lot about how expensive a major nuclear undertaking can be (San Antonio is on verge of dumping several billion dollars into one of these projects) and how they emit radiation into the air and produce radioactive waste that hangs around for thousands of years and can be a huge contamination risk. None of this gets much attention in mainstream discourse, so it is up to concerned citizens like us to shed light on these things.
There is one destructive aspect of nuclear power that public discourse tends to be especially silent on. Just as coal industry apologists brush over the enormous damage caused by coal mining, any discussion of nuclear is power is likely to be silent on the damage done by uranium mining.
The damage to human health associated with uranium mining is huge. Historically, uranium miners have had a significantly higher risks of developing small cell Carcinoma, which is a likely product of their exposure to Radon-222 — a cancer causing agent created by decaying uranium. The presence of Radon gas also makes uranium mines a very dangerous work environment. This led to the 1990 passage of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), which awards $100,000 to miners, millers, and transporters who subsequently got cancer after exposure to uranium — though families of many of the victims have had difficulty receiving this money (many cancer stricken miners were Navajo, and their marriage licenses were not universally recognized).
Last year the French mining company Areva was nominated for a Public Eye Award (a recognition intended for companies who brought about the most social or ecological damage) by Pro Natura (Switzerland’s branch of Friends of The Earth), and the Berne Declaration development campaign. The nomination came from the company’s perceived failure to adequately disclose the risks associated with uranium mining to its workers in Niger, as well as neglecting to treat patients who are unable to pay at company hospitals. Workers also mentioned deaths caused by radioactive contamination of air and ground water.
Aside from the dangers of uranium exposure, mining projects also cause considerable damage to the local environments and to the health of people who live nearby. The American Southwest is covered with abandoned uranium mines from the Cold War Era that have yet to be cleaned up, not to mention waste piles, open tunnels, and pits — all of which emit cancer causing radiation and leach arsenic and heavy metals into the soil and drinking water. Oddly enough, much of this radioactive debris eventually came to be used as building material for local houses. It is likely that exposure to this material is at least partially responsible for the increased cancer rates among Navajos (from almost non-existent) to well above the national-average by the end of the cold war.
Currently all uranium mining done in the United States is in the form of in-situ leaching, a process in which boreholes are drilled into a deposit, it is filled with an acid or alkali, and the dissolved ore content is pumped to the surface for recovery. It is a controversial process, often objected to by local land owners, because it acidifies ground waters and can release toxic heavy-metals as well as radioactive materials. There have also been concerns about spillage of acid leachates into the soil or water supplies. In other parts of the world, open pit mines and underground mines are still used, which continue to expose workers to danger, damage the local landscapes, and create waste heaps of toxic and radioactive waste rock.
There are a lot of hidden expenses and environmental as well as human health problems with nuclear power, despite claims that it is a “clean” fuel source. I think we need to be a lot more skeptical and a lot more forward in our rejections of these claims. I also think that the dangers of uranium mining give us another reason to support new clean energy sources like wind and solar power.
The Disappointed Environmentalist
http://texasvox.org/2009/07/08/a-look-at-uranium-mining/
July 8, 2009 by Public Citizen Texas
An Open Pit Uranium Mine
Proponents of nuclear power do a lot to paint it as an environmentally friendly, cheap fuel source. It is not, and we at Public Citizen work hard to dispel these kinds of myths. We have said a lot about how expensive a major nuclear undertaking can be (San Antonio is on verge of dumping several billion dollars into one of these projects) and how they emit radiation into the air and produce radioactive waste that hangs around for thousands of years and can be a huge contamination risk. None of this gets much attention in mainstream discourse, so it is up to concerned citizens like us to shed light on these things.
There is one destructive aspect of nuclear power that public discourse tends to be especially silent on. Just as coal industry apologists brush over the enormous damage caused by coal mining, any discussion of nuclear is power is likely to be silent on the damage done by uranium mining.
The damage to human health associated with uranium mining is huge. Historically, uranium miners have had a significantly higher risks of developing small cell Carcinoma, which is a likely product of their exposure to Radon-222 — a cancer causing agent created by decaying uranium. The presence of Radon gas also makes uranium mines a very dangerous work environment. This led to the 1990 passage of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), which awards $100,000 to miners, millers, and transporters who subsequently got cancer after exposure to uranium — though families of many of the victims have had difficulty receiving this money (many cancer stricken miners were Navajo, and their marriage licenses were not universally recognized).
Last year the French mining company Areva was nominated for a Public Eye Award (a recognition intended for companies who brought about the most social or ecological damage) by Pro Natura (Switzerland’s branch of Friends of The Earth), and the Berne Declaration development campaign. The nomination came from the company’s perceived failure to adequately disclose the risks associated with uranium mining to its workers in Niger, as well as neglecting to treat patients who are unable to pay at company hospitals. Workers also mentioned deaths caused by radioactive contamination of air and ground water.
Aside from the dangers of uranium exposure, mining projects also cause considerable damage to the local environments and to the health of people who live nearby. The American Southwest is covered with abandoned uranium mines from the Cold War Era that have yet to be cleaned up, not to mention waste piles, open tunnels, and pits — all of which emit cancer causing radiation and leach arsenic and heavy metals into the soil and drinking water. Oddly enough, much of this radioactive debris eventually came to be used as building material for local houses. It is likely that exposure to this material is at least partially responsible for the increased cancer rates among Navajos (from almost non-existent) to well above the national-average by the end of the cold war.
Currently all uranium mining done in the United States is in the form of in-situ leaching, a process in which boreholes are drilled into a deposit, it is filled with an acid or alkali, and the dissolved ore content is pumped to the surface for recovery. It is a controversial process, often objected to by local land owners, because it acidifies ground waters and can release toxic heavy-metals as well as radioactive materials. There have also been concerns about spillage of acid leachates into the soil or water supplies. In other parts of the world, open pit mines and underground mines are still used, which continue to expose workers to danger, damage the local landscapes, and create waste heaps of toxic and radioactive waste rock.
There are a lot of hidden expenses and environmental as well as human health problems with nuclear power, despite claims that it is a “clean” fuel source. I think we need to be a lot more skeptical and a lot more forward in our rejections of these claims. I also think that the dangers of uranium mining give us another reason to support new clean energy sources like wind and solar power.
The Disappointed Environmentalist
http://texasvox.org/2009/07/08/a-look-at-uranium-mining/
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Uranium and Coal Mining
June 10, 2009 By: Darrr
While I was doing some research on the types of natural resources that are currently mined on the Navajo Reservation, I came across a research report that was done by Erin Klauk as part of educational materials that she was gathering for the University of Montana and the Science Education Resource Center (SERC).
Her studies and research helped me to gain a better understanding of the Uranium mining that has taken place and impacted the health of not only the Navajo People, but the livestock they raise and the crops they grow.
According to her study, the radiation levels from the abandoned mines were found to exceed acceptable limits as far back as 1959. 80 percent or more of the Navajo mine workers died from various forms of cancer and fibrosis. While uraninum mining and milling are now illegal on the Navajo reservation, the people suffering from the results of poor mining oversight and closure are still reported in great numbers.
In the same study, Ms. Klauk included information of the Coal Mining that has has taken place on the reservation for over 30 years. At the time of her study, there were plans in motion to expand the operations, despite strong protest from the Navajo People.
To learn more or to read this report in its entirety, please visit serc.carleton.edu
http://blinkything.com/?p=22
While I was doing some research on the types of natural resources that are currently mined on the Navajo Reservation, I came across a research report that was done by Erin Klauk as part of educational materials that she was gathering for the University of Montana and the Science Education Resource Center (SERC).
Her studies and research helped me to gain a better understanding of the Uranium mining that has taken place and impacted the health of not only the Navajo People, but the livestock they raise and the crops they grow.
According to her study, the radiation levels from the abandoned mines were found to exceed acceptable limits as far back as 1959. 80 percent or more of the Navajo mine workers died from various forms of cancer and fibrosis. While uraninum mining and milling are now illegal on the Navajo reservation, the people suffering from the results of poor mining oversight and closure are still reported in great numbers.
In the same study, Ms. Klauk included information of the Coal Mining that has has taken place on the reservation for over 30 years. At the time of her study, there were plans in motion to expand the operations, despite strong protest from the Navajo People.
To learn more or to read this report in its entirety, please visit serc.carleton.edu
http://blinkything.com/?p=22
Friday, May 15, 2009
BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE
Comment: Is this the future of Virginia, someone else may own the mineral rights for uranium mining, scary - duh - Demand Virginia to ban Uranium Mining & Milling!!
COTTAGE COUNTRY / MINING V. RECREATION
BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE
COTTAGE COUNTRY / MINING V. RECREATION
BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE
Cottagers returning to their retreats this weekend may be surprised to find that they don't own the mineral rights to their properties, Allan Britnell reports, and someone else has staked a claim, leaving them ...
ALLAN BRITNELL
Special to The Globe and Mail
May 15, 2009
It was two years ago that Robin Simpson spotted some damage to the trees lining his property near Gooderham, Ont., in the rolling Haliburton Highlands. "They'd slashed the sides of trees in a line every 400 feet," Mr. Simpson says.
Following the marked trail he eventually came to a tree that had been cut off about four feet above ground. Attached to it was an aluminum tag issued by the provincial Ministry of Northern Development and Mines. It was the first hint that a prospector had been on his property, unannounced and uninvited, to stake a mining claim on the land. Later, digging through the MNDM website, he discovered that his property - and thousands of acres of surrounding Crown and private land - had been staked for a potential open-pit uranium mine.
It's entirely possible that cottagers returning to their lakeside retreats this weekend could make a similar discovery. A small percentage of landowners in Ontario, including Mr. Simpson, only own the "surface rights" to their property, while the Crown retains the below-ground "mineral rights." (The separation of surface and mineral rights is "fairly common" from the Maritimes to British Columbia, says Ramsey Hart of MiningWatch Canada. In Ontario, landowners can check for any claims on their property on the CLAIMaps at the MNDM website.) As a result, anyone who has paid $25.50 for a prospector's licence is free to enter those lands and mark off old-fashioned mining claims.
The provincial government estimates that only 1.4 per cent of all the land in Southern Ontario is "surface rights only."
CAN SCIENCE SAVE THE OIL SANDS?
Special to The Globe and Mail
May 15, 2009
It was two years ago that Robin Simpson spotted some damage to the trees lining his property near Gooderham, Ont., in the rolling Haliburton Highlands. "They'd slashed the sides of trees in a line every 400 feet," Mr. Simpson says.
Following the marked trail he eventually came to a tree that had been cut off about four feet above ground. Attached to it was an aluminum tag issued by the provincial Ministry of Northern Development and Mines. It was the first hint that a prospector had been on his property, unannounced and uninvited, to stake a mining claim on the land. Later, digging through the MNDM website, he discovered that his property - and thousands of acres of surrounding Crown and private land - had been staked for a potential open-pit uranium mine.
It's entirely possible that cottagers returning to their lakeside retreats this weekend could make a similar discovery. A small percentage of landowners in Ontario, including Mr. Simpson, only own the "surface rights" to their property, while the Crown retains the below-ground "mineral rights." (The separation of surface and mineral rights is "fairly common" from the Maritimes to British Columbia, says Ramsey Hart of MiningWatch Canada. In Ontario, landowners can check for any claims on their property on the CLAIMaps at the MNDM website.) As a result, anyone who has paid $25.50 for a prospector's licence is free to enter those lands and mark off old-fashioned mining claims.
The provincial government estimates that only 1.4 per cent of all the land in Southern Ontario is "surface rights only."
CAN SCIENCE SAVE THE OIL SANDS?
But there are thousands of hectares of unprotected Crown land surrounding cottage communities throughout the province, and the country, that could potentially be turned into working mines.
After decades of complaints from cottagers and rural residents, environmental groups and native communities, last year the MNDM began holding consultations on modernizing the 141-year-old Mining Act. The result, Bill 173, the Mining Amendment Act, is currently working its way through the legislature.
One immediate result was that on April 30, the MNDM temporarily withdrew lands where owners held only the surface rights from potential prospecting anywhere south of Lake Nipissing and the French and Mattawa rivers. For surface-rights holders north of that boundary, including Lake of the Woods, the status quo remains. The order also grandfathered any claims already staked. Still, Bill 173 falls far short of what anti-mining activists had hoped for.
"We're not very happy, to be honest," says Mr. Simpson, who participated in stakeholder meetings on Mining Act reform. "We're asking that Crown land be taken off the map in Southern Ontario."
Ted Spence, a director with the Federation of Ontario Cottagers' Associations, agrees. "The biggest threat to cottagers is that the Crown land that surrounds them is completely vulnerable to mining."
Currently, once a claim has been staked, a mining company could start exploration work with as little as 24 hours notice, and no environmental assessment is required.
After decades of complaints from cottagers and rural residents, environmental groups and native communities, last year the MNDM began holding consultations on modernizing the 141-year-old Mining Act. The result, Bill 173, the Mining Amendment Act, is currently working its way through the legislature.
One immediate result was that on April 30, the MNDM temporarily withdrew lands where owners held only the surface rights from potential prospecting anywhere south of Lake Nipissing and the French and Mattawa rivers. For surface-rights holders north of that boundary, including Lake of the Woods, the status quo remains. The order also grandfathered any claims already staked. Still, Bill 173 falls far short of what anti-mining activists had hoped for.
"We're not very happy, to be honest," says Mr. Simpson, who participated in stakeholder meetings on Mining Act reform. "We're asking that Crown land be taken off the map in Southern Ontario."
Ted Spence, a director with the Federation of Ontario Cottagers' Associations, agrees. "The biggest threat to cottagers is that the Crown land that surrounds them is completely vulnerable to mining."
Currently, once a claim has been staked, a mining company could start exploration work with as little as 24 hours notice, and no environmental assessment is required.
That work can be devastating to the landscape. "They can remove up to 1,000 tonnes of material. That's a lot of earth and rock," says Mary Loucks, who's been fighting a proposed graphite mine on and around her 400-acre Long Pond Lake property, near Westport, Ont., since 1992.
After seeing the results of other nearby exploration work - "it looked like the trenches in France during the First World War" - she and her late husband, Don, helped form Bedford Mining Alert, a lobby group.
"It's even more destructive than clear-cutting," says Susanne Lauten, who became so incensed when she learned about the possibility of a uranium mine opening up less than 20 kilometres from her Gull Lake cottage, she started up Cottagers Against Uranium Mining and Exploration. "At least with clear-cutting you can plant trees. With open-pit mining that land is gone. All you're left with is a gaping hole."
On the other hand, without mining, industry advocates argue, there are lot of other things we'd be left without. "If you ban mining in Southern Ontario, you won't have any materials to build your roads, or make bricks or concrete," says Garry Clark, executive director of the Ontario Prospectors Association. "You won't have any salt for highways in the winter. Mining's an integral part of society."
Ultimately, the issue comes down to a battle between competing multibillion-dollar industries: mining, and tourism and recreation. "In Southern Ontario, the economy has shifted entirely away from mining and forestry to tourism," Mr. Spence says. With the economy tailing off, prices for minerals have dropped significantly, putting many potential operations on indefinite hold. (The contact number and e-mail for Bancroft Uranium Inc., the company that controls mining rights to 9,000 acres in and around Mr. Simpson's property, for example, are out of service.) But when prices start to rise again, so will interest in mining.
"Mining is still a very powerful sector, even under the proposed act. We have to be fairly watchful throughout the regulation stage. A lot can happen," Mr. Spence says.
In the meantime, cottagers should keep a close eye on their back forty, and look to others for help if they discover miners on their doorstep. (Ms. Lauten's group is holding an anti-uranium mining rally at Queen's Park in Toronto on Sept. 27.)
Several months after the area around Lyn Sparling's Mellon Lake cottage, near Kaladar, Ont., had been presumably protected as a Conservation Reserve, she literally felt the first rumblings of exploration work on a granite deposit.
"It's even more destructive than clear-cutting," says Susanne Lauten, who became so incensed when she learned about the possibility of a uranium mine opening up less than 20 kilometres from her Gull Lake cottage, she started up Cottagers Against Uranium Mining and Exploration. "At least with clear-cutting you can plant trees. With open-pit mining that land is gone. All you're left with is a gaping hole."
On the other hand, without mining, industry advocates argue, there are lot of other things we'd be left without. "If you ban mining in Southern Ontario, you won't have any materials to build your roads, or make bricks or concrete," says Garry Clark, executive director of the Ontario Prospectors Association. "You won't have any salt for highways in the winter. Mining's an integral part of society."
Ultimately, the issue comes down to a battle between competing multibillion-dollar industries: mining, and tourism and recreation. "In Southern Ontario, the economy has shifted entirely away from mining and forestry to tourism," Mr. Spence says. With the economy tailing off, prices for minerals have dropped significantly, putting many potential operations on indefinite hold. (The contact number and e-mail for Bancroft Uranium Inc., the company that controls mining rights to 9,000 acres in and around Mr. Simpson's property, for example, are out of service.) But when prices start to rise again, so will interest in mining.
"Mining is still a very powerful sector, even under the proposed act. We have to be fairly watchful throughout the regulation stage. A lot can happen," Mr. Spence says.
In the meantime, cottagers should keep a close eye on their back forty, and look to others for help if they discover miners on their doorstep. (Ms. Lauten's group is holding an anti-uranium mining rally at Queen's Park in Toronto on Sept. 27.)
Several months after the area around Lyn Sparling's Mellon Lake cottage, near Kaladar, Ont., had been presumably protected as a Conservation Reserve, she literally felt the first rumblings of exploration work on a granite deposit.
It took her group, No Quarry @ Mellon Lake, six years to convince the government to deny the mining company, Palu-Corbelli Corp., a permit on environmental grounds. "We are, of course, very happy with the outcome of the Mellon Lake quarry battle," Ms. Sparling says. "But just as important to us is the example we set for others.
A small group of determined and dedicated people can make a difference."
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