Virginia Beach Poses Questions for Mining Study

First, the Halifax County Chamber of Commerce weighed in with a list of questions it wants answered in a pending feasibility study of uranium mining in Virginia. Now it's the city of Virginia Beach's turn.

Virginia Beach Director of Public Utilities Thomas M. Leahy has written a four-page letter to Del. Lee Ware, who serves as chairman of a Virginia Coal and Energy Commission subcommittee studying uranium mining, that lists more concerns that the Virginia Beach City Council wants to see included in any mining study.

In his letter, dated Dec. 24,, Leahy sets forth additional comments from the Virginia Beach City Council, stressing six criteria that were included in a prior Council resolution on uranium mining.
In drafting that resolution, one Council member pointed out that Virginia Beach, which draws water from Lake Gaston downstream from the Coles Hill mining site in Pittsylvania County, said she felt "that Virginia Beach would not realize any of the potential benefits of the (uranium mining) project, but would suffer the damages in the event of an environmental catastrophe."

Not only does Virginia Beach get its water from the Lake Gaston pipeline, Leahy's letter notes, the city also furnishes water from the same system to the Cities of Norfolk and Chesapeake and is responsible for the safety of those water supplies.

Leahy wrote that Virginia Uranium should be required to produce a credible and detailed mining plan based on the most likely operating scenarios. He notes that the lack of a detailed plan makes complete evaluation of the Coles Hill project difficult, particularly for the public and individuals without a technical background.

"The State and the public should not have to make blind assumptions of what is involved in this process," Leahy's letter noted.

Leahy also argued the study must include a sediment transport and water quality model. "The study must include a sediment transport model that can accept as input various precipitation events ranging from the severe hurricanes and nor'easters that strike Virginia relatively frequently, such as the Nelson County Storm in August of 1969.

"While it has been suggested that the study would require some 18 months, Leahy argued, "It is unlikely that a sediment transport and water quality model could be constructed, calibrated, and tested in that time frame. The City's resolution specifically noted that adequate time and resources must be devoted to any study effort, if it is to be useful."

Stressing the study should include stringent safe drinking water act goals, Leahy wrote "the question is not whether the mining operation can be conducted without causing radioactivity levels to rise above legal standards, it is whether there is any reasonable possibility that the mining operation would significantly increase the existing low (and safe) levels."

He also called on the study to assess the feasibility of environmental cleanup following any catastrophic event such as the Nelson County storm of 1969.

Leahy also said the study must include input from the US Army Corps of Engineers and the State of North Carolina. "It does not appear that North Carolina or the Corps of Engineers have been solicited for their input or participation. The Corps of Engineers coordinates and manages the extensive series of hydroelectric and flood control impoundments in the Roanoke River Basin. It also owns and operates the largest impoundment in the basin, which happens to be immediately downstream of the mining proposal and provides about 93 percent of the inflow to Lake Gaston.

"The Corps is the acknowledged federal expert in hydrology, flooding, flood damage, and sediment transport, all of which are key issues in this study.

"Like Virginia, North Carolina has communities that obtain drinking water from Kerr Reservoir, which is even more susceptible to impact from the mining operation than is Lake Gaston, because Kerr is the first reservoir downstream of the proposed operation."

In closing, the public services director called on Ware's subcommittee to establish an independent peer review committee that includes representation from environmental, public health, water supply and water resource agencies.

Read the letter from Virginia Beach to the Uranium Mining Sub-Committee by clicking here

http://www.thenewsrecord.com/2009webfiles/20090101letter.htm