Navajos fight against uranium mining
By Jerry Spangler
Deseret Morning News
WASHINGTON — It is a story familiar to Utahns: A government leader lobbies Congress to block nuclear activities but watches helplessly as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission issues a license anyway.
But this time it isn't Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. fighting the losing battle with the NRC, which last week issued a license to a consortium of nuclear power utilities to store spent nuclear fuel on Goshute tribal lands in Skull Valley.
It is Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley, who is fighting his own losing battle to block uranium mining on tribal lands.
"We have control of our lands, but we do not have control of the NRC, and that is the reason I am here today," Shirley said in an interview.
The Navajo Nation, which straddles the borders of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, is locked in a fierce battle with the NRC, which has issued a license to Hydro Resources Crownpoint Uranium Project to mine at four sites in New Mexico — despite a Navajo law that prohibits it.
Shirley was in the nation's capital this week, lobbying members of Congress to support the tribal government's Dine Natural Resource Protection Act, passed last April, which prohibits new uranium mining on tribal lands.
The law is rooted in a long history of Navajos who worked in uranium mines and mills in the Four Corners area during the Cold War, and who were sickened and later died of radiation-caused cancers the U.S. government hid from the uranium workers.
"Uranium has killed too many of our people, and our elderly, who knew the sacred songs and sacred stories of life, are stricken with cancer on their death beds," Shirley told the Deseret Morning News. "Our culture is dying with them. Why should we have more uranium mining and afflict ourselves with more incurable cancers?"
The Navajo opposition to uranium mining and all things nuclear stands in stark contrast to the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes, who see nuclear waste as an economic ticket out of poverty. They stand to become fabulously wealthy, even though terms of the lease with the consortium, Private Fuel Storage, have not been released.
Shirley, who won election on a campaign to stop the uranium mines, said the opposition is not negotiable, even with the lure of jobs. All things nuclear, from raw uranium to spent fuel rods, are foreign concepts to the Navajo — and they reject them in totality, he said.
"Even making money galore is a concept that is foreign to us," Shirley said. "We are not interested in the money. Life is sacred."
The Navajos are still living with the deadly legacy of uranium mining from 1948 to 1971 when thousands worked in the mines and mills. They are eligible for compensation under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, originally sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.
Hatch spokesman Adam Elggren said the senator has worked to get RECA coverage for "as many deserving claimants as possible," but a problem with documentation seems to be more an administrative issue than a legislative one.
"We will certainly keep an eye on it," Elggren said.
The problem is many of the afflicted Navajos are traditionalists who do not have documents — things like birth and marriage certificates — required by the current legislation.
Shirley was hosted at a Thursday afternoon congressional briefing by Reps. Jim Matheson, D-Utah; Tom Udall, D-N.M., and Rick Renzi, R-Ariz. Shirley said he has found sympathetic ears everywhere he has turned in Washington.
"I went to sleep last night with a glad heart," he said.
But sympathy won't stop the mines. And like the state of Utah, the Navajo Nation will probably have to make its arguments in federal court, Shirley said.
Getting Congress to change RECA may be a lot easier than getting the NRC to change its mind. Shirley said the NRC has ignored the tribal government's laws and its scientific evidence.
"The NRC is not even looking at the scientific data we submitted as a nation," he said, "but the data submitted by mineral companies, well, (the NRC) listens to them. I would not be surprised if there is something in the works behind the scenes."
The NRC disputed Shirley's allegations, saying it "looks at all information provided to us during licensing reviews, including information from opponents of a proposed facility," according to NRC spokesman David McIntyre.
The Navajo Nation has made the argument — unsuccessfully, so far — that the mining proposal strikes at the heart of tribal sovereignty, threatens public health and could contaminate the regional aquifer that provides drinking water for 20,000 people.
The mining proposal is not the first time the Navajos have turned down economic development for environmental reasons.
Shirley said the same nuclear power utilities who now plan to send their waste to Goshute lands once approached the Navajo Nation about storing nuclear waste in a remote county there. The Navajos said no, and that position has never wavered.
"The Earth is sacred, and we will not introduce anything into it that is foreign," he said. "We will continue to say no."
============================================================
Navajo Nation seeks to block uranium development
By: Dorothy Kosich
Posted: '29-AUG-05 04:00' GMT © Mineweb 1997-2004
RENO--(Mineweb.com)The effort of the new national U.S. energy bill to revive the nuclear industry has not generated much enthusiasm among members of the Navajo Nation--which although it stands to benefit from grants and subsidies for power generation--banned uranium mining and processing last April.
Canadian junior uranium explorationist Strathmore Minerals (STM: TSX-V) and Navajo Nation officials are currently lobbying New Mexico state officials regarding Strathmore's effort to develop its Church Rock and Roco Honda uranium mines.
Kelwona, British Columbia-based Strathmore has opened a uranium development office in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and is now pursuing feasibility studies and permitting for its Church Rock and Roco Honda properties. Updated resource calculations are being reviewed for both New Mexico properties, which are Strathmore's first two projects to be considered for production. The properties are located within the Grant Uranium Belt, which has historically produced more than 340 million pounds of uranium. Currently, one-fifth of U.S. energy comes from nuclear power, according to President George W. Bush.
Strathmore officials announced this month that they had met with state officials, including the governor's office, prompting Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley, Jr., to meet with New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson. Shirley, who had campaigned in opposition to uranium mining on Indian lands, asked Richardson to help the Navajo Nation uphold its ban. "The Navajo Nation as a government and a people has said we're not going to have uranium mining on Navajo land or in Navajo County. We'd like to see that law stick, " Shirley told the governor. The Church Rock project is located near Navajo lands.
"Because of exposure to uranium, many of my medicine people have died, many of my elderly have died. I would sure hate to go back there. Too many of my people have died," Shirley declared in a news release. "We have been through too much. We just do not want it."
Shirley has also sought the support of the United Nations Educational, Scientific & Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to help uphold the Dine Natural Resources Protection Act of 2005, which enacted the uranium ban.
Meanwhile, Strathmore had planned to meet with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) this month to discuss its projects. The company has retained subcontractors to prepare documentation for environmental, social and socioeconomic studies, which will accompany permit applications. Feasibility studies and core hold design work have commenced on the Church Rock property, which was previously studied by Kerr McGee Nuclear and Rio Algom.
Kerr McGee drilled Roco Honda from 1966 to 1977. Rio Algom then updated the results in 1995. Strathmore acquired Church Rock and Roco Honda in 2004. Historic estimates include 5.5 million pounds of contained U3O8 demonstrated resource for Church Rock and 11.3 million pounds of demonstrated resource for Roco Honda.
The new federal energy program provides billions in tax incentives in industries, including several billion dollars in incentives for nuclear power. President Bush said the program would lead to the construction of new power plants before the end of the decade. Uranium demand is expected to increase between 1% to 2% by 2010 as 30 reactors are being built internationally while another 34 are being planned. The first new nuclear U.S. power plant is scheduled to be built in the Athabascan community of Galena, Alaska, where 65% of the 700 residents are native American. The project was approved by the community as a source of electricity and is being constructed by Toshiba.
In situ leaching (ISL), also known as solution mining, is essentially a water-pumping activity, which leaves the ore in the ground, using liquids which are pumped through it to recover the minerals out of the ore by leaching. In-situ uranium plants are operating in Nebraska, Texas and Wyoming, the number one U.S. uranium producer. About a dozen small projects operate in the U.S. today. The production life of an individual ISL well is typically one to three years. Most of the uranium is recovered during the first 6 months of the operation. The most successful operations have achieved a total overall 80% recovery. ISL production is estimated at 16% of global production, according to an October 2004 paper published by analyst Jim Mustard of Haywood Securities.
Proponents assert it is environmentally benign because there is little surface disturbance and no tailings or waste rock generated. Nonetheless, the ore body needs to be permeable to the liquids used, and located so that they do not contaminate ground water away from the ore body. However, opponents of the system argue it can cause groundwater contamination, and contaminate formerly productive agricultural land.
The Navajo Nation is also opposed to a proposed in-situ uranium mining and milling project in Church Rock and Crownpoint, New Mexico to be operated by Albuquerque-based Hydro Resources (HRI). Attempts to develop Crownpoint began in 1998. Along the way environmental groups have filed legal challenges to the 1999 NRC license granted to Hydro Resources Inc. for the project. The opponents have raised various waste disposal issues concerning the proposal. However, the NRC ruled that a number of the environmental concerns stemming from conventional uranium mining will not apply to in-situ leach mining. The Interveners also raised concerns regarding HRI's ability to provide adequate financial assurance for the operation.
The battle between Hydro Resources and Mitchell and Rita Capitan, a Navajo couple who have opposed the project, has even been made into a film, "Homeland: Four Portraits of Native Action."
Nevertheless, the Navajo may find themselves facing an increasingly uphill battle. Three nations--Australia, Kazakhstan, and Canada--account for more than half of the world's ore reserves, according to Haywood's Mustard. Australia and Canada produce more than 50% of the world's uranium.
Mustard estimated that there are more than 100 junior companies looking for uranium. More than 15,000 new claims alone filed in the U.S. last year on properties with uranium prospects. However, the number of working uranium mines internationally remains about the same as existed prior to the current interest in nuclear power. Meanwhile, the World Nuclear Association states that demand from the world's 435 nuclear power plants is almost double the market supply. The price of uranium is trading around $30 per pound.
The Southwest Research and Information Center, which is based in New Mexico, has urged the thousands of abandoned uranium mines should be cleaned-up prior to developing new mines.
No comments:
Post a Comment