By The Editorial Board
To the editor:
In response to “Let’s wait on study before deciding” (May 29, page A11), I would like to take exception to the author’s claims of the qualities of the National Academy of Sciences.
I, too, shared the view of the NAS prior to its acceptance of $1.4 million fromVirginia Tech so that this “study” would fit the parameters of their mandates prohibiting funding from private corporations or individuals. In addition, the “study commission,” as you well know, is made up of mining and nuclear industry executives, and they are hardly representative of what anyonewould call “impartial panelists.”
In addition, the author wrote at some length to the existence of modern mining and waste management techniques in the uranium mining industry. Everyone studying the problem is privy to the same information. What that data says is that everywhere uranium has been mined— all over the planet— lives, health and livelihoods have been devastated by the pollution caused by mining uranium.
The NAS study will not state whether or not it is going to be safe to mine and mill uranium in Virginia. The scope of their study is clearly one of recommending a safe management system, i.e., how to go about this project with the least damage to health and the environment. As a result, VUI seems to be awaiting the results of the study before they publish a plan of action.
As for criticism of Mary Rafferty of the Sierra Club and her charges of negotiations “behind closed doors,” what do you expect when VUI has spent money with lobbyists to sway the General Assembly to lift the existing moratorium? To many of us, these charges are valid.
HUNTER AUSTIN
Hurt
http://www2.godanriver.com/news/2011/jun/06/nas-mining-study-fatally-flawed-ar-1088470/
