TV show reveals radioactive risk

February 13, 2009

FEARS that radioactive material taken from France’s old uranium mines has been used in construction have been raised by a TV documentary.

According to investigators for the programme Pièces à Conviction (Incriminating evidence), there are many sites where radioactive material is a potential health risk including schools, playgrounds, buildings and car parks.

Very little uranium is now mined in Europe, but France carried out mining from 1945 – 2001 at 210 sites which have now been revealed by IRSN, the Institute of Radioprotection and Nuclear Safety on its website - click here.

Uranium is naturally weakly radioactive and emits a radioactive gas, radon.Problems stem from millions of tonnes of reject rock which contained small amount of uranium which are still stocked at some of the sites along with 50 million tones of waste from extraction factories.

The documentary on France 3 also revealed that some reject rock has also been used as construction rubble in areas used by the public, that there have been some radioactive leaks into the environment from waste and that some “rehabilitated” areas where building has been taken place had been contaminated with radon.

Reject rock has been used at sites including carparks, buildings, roads and even schools and children’s playgrounds, the programme said.

Volunteers with Geiger counters have found that some sites where it was used have worryingly high radiation levels.The programme makers said they had “opened a national debate on uranium waste in France”.

Environment Minister Jean-Louis Borloo has admitted that uranium extraction had little state regulation and has called on the firm which was responsible for most of the sites, Areva, to “do its job” and to take better safety measures regarding the waste.

Before the programme went out Areva had lodged a complaint about it with the Conseil Supérieur de l’Audiovisuel concerned that its intention was to make accusations against the firm.