Uranium mining in VA >> "Just Nuts!"

(From the Virginian-Pilot 10/29/2007)

By Scott Harper

In his Virginia Energy Plan released this summer, thegovernor suggested that, in the name of greater energyindependence and cleaner-burning fuels, thePittsylvania County option remain on the table -- atleast for now.
Renewed interest in mining today also faces an armadaof concerned residents, environmentalists andpublic-health advocates.Opponents fear increased cancer risks among mineworkers and neighbors, diminished property values, abad image for Southside Virginia, as well as thepotential for radioactive pollution of groundwater,air quality and local streams and rivers.
"Our preference is that Virginia just stay away fromall of this," said Rick Parrish, a senior lawyer withthe Southern Environmental Law Center inCharlottesville."Uranium might be stable in the ground in rock form,"Parrish said, "but when you pulverize it, you open upthe whole thing to all kinds of potential problems andquestions."
Mike Town, state director of the Sierra Club, was more succinct."It's just nuts," Town said. "I mean, uranium mining?In Virginia?"
The operation would be the first commercial uraniummine east of the Mississippi River and would requireconstruction of an industrial mill nearby.Inside the mill, hard rock would be smashed to bits,thus freeing the coveted uranium ore, known as "yellowcake," because of its color and texture.Sandy wastes, called tailings, would be collected atthe mill, stored on site and likely reburied. Tailings harbor some radioactivity, as well as other heavymetals, and are what environmentalists worry about most.
The yellow cake would be packed into 55-gallon drumsand trucked out of Pittsylvania County, probably toIllinois and then Kentucky, where the powdery orewould be converted and enriched into nuclear fuelrods.Such rods are the catalysts for producing energy atVirginia's two nuclear power plants, in Surry andNorth Anna, as well as others across the country. As the United States grapples with global warming andits reliance on fossil fuels, nuclear power isexperiencing something of a renaissance. The Bush administration is supporting the shift, offering taxincentives and fast-track licensing.
Although no new commercial plant has been built inAmerica since the 1970s, at least 29 nuclear projectshave been proposed in recent years, including theprospect of constructing at least one new reactor atthe North Anna power station northwest of Richmond.Dominion Virginia Power, the state's largest electricutility, operates the North Anna and Surry stations. Acorporate spokesman was ambivalent about the potentialVirginia mine.
"We are trading in the world market for fuel and ableto secure uranium at competitive prices to help keepour costs down for our customers," Jim Norvelle, aDominion spokesman, said in a statement. "It's hard toknow right now whether having a uranium mine inVirginia would be economic for us."
In recent years, Coles said he has been approached by uranium companies from Canada, Australia, France andother countries, all asking if he would sell hismineral rights. Canada and Australia are two of theworld's largest producers of uranium ore, and Franceis a leading user of nuclear power.Instead, Coles said, he decided to "keep this aVirginia effort" and began organizing his own miningcompany.
A 2001 study by Virginia Tech, whichconfirmed that the deposit is neither moving norleaching underground, also motivated Coles to start his own company.
The president and chief executive officer of VirginiaUranium Inc. is Norman Reynolds, a Canadian geologistnow living in Chatham. Reynolds led efforts to mineColes Hill in the 1980s. He recalled how prospectorsfirst discovered uranium in Pittsylvania County morethan 25 years ago.Reynolds and others were intrigued by a longgeological scar called the Chatham Fault, whichextends piecemeal from Northern Virginia into NorthCarolina.
Hired crews crisscrossed the fault line in cars, holding devices out the windows that detectradioactivity.When driving past Coles Hill, the radiation levels"suddenly got very high," Reynolds said, "so we stopped and started looking around." They found rocksin roadside ditches that, when measured, also shotreadings off the chart."We knew we'd found a winner," he said.

Uranium mining in the United States has been conducted almost exclusively in dry, Western states. Theindustry's early history, dating to the 1950s, isdisastrous, filled with horror stories about sickenedworkers, homes built from uranium tailings that led tocancer deaths and failing lagoons that leakedradioactive wastes into public waterways.
Critics say Coles is missing a crucial point -- thatthe East Coast is vastly different from the West."Uranium never has been mined in such a denselypopulated area like this," said Eloise Nenon, whohelped to organize the group Southside ConcernedCitizens 25 years ago and is helping to jump-start thegroup now."The water table is higher here," Nenon said. "It'swetter, more humid. The trucks they use are enormous,and where are we going to put them? The risks ofradiation and water pollution could be catastrophic. "