Ore from last uranium boom still scattered on Colorado land

Photo by JOE HANEL/Herald
Leftover uranium ore (green and yellow) is seen on the road up Monogram Mesa, above Paradox Valley. The Department of Energy is offering tracts of land near the mine in hopes of starting a new uranium boom.

Herald Denver Bureau
Article Last Updated; Tuesday, August 11, 20091

PARADOX - From the road, it looks like a pile of gray rocks. But a closer inspection reveals flakes of yellow and lime green - telltale signs of uranium ore.

The pile and others like it make up some of the 5,000 tons of uranium ore that remains on the surface from Colorado's last boom, according to a Department of Energy environmental study.

Five thousand tons of rock is only a few months of production from a mid-sized mine, but it's enough to concern Travis Stills, a Durango lawyer leading the legal challenge to the Energy department's plan to lease Colorado land for uranium mining.

The Office of Legacy Management, which issues leases on federal uranium lands, cleaned up all its old mine sites by 2001, according to court filings by Andrew Smith, a Justice department lawyer who is representing the OLM.

Piles of waste rock at uranium mines could cause trouble if water runs off them into creeks, said Angelique Diaz, an environmental engineer for the Environmental Protection Agency's Denver office. The piles are radioactive and give off radon gas, but not in significant quantities, Diaz said.

The Colorado Division of Reclamation, Mining and Safety cleans mines that were abandoned before 1977, using mostly federal dollars but also money from state taxes on gas, oil and coal production.

With 17,000 abandoned mines in Colorado, the priority goes to open mine shafts that might be dangerous for hikers, said Loretta Pineda, director of the abandoned mines program.

"I do have some environmental funding, but it's pretty limited," Pineda said.

The BLM has asked the state to put several old mines in the Paradox Valley on its list, Pineda said. She had a project on tap near Uravan a few years ago, but it was put on hold when people started staking claims in the area. Anyone who opened a new mine would have to clean up the old pollution first.

For Stills, the cleanup of the old mines should happen now.

"Five thousand tons of uranium ore sitting on the surface should be somebody's priority," he said.

jhanel@durangoherald.com

http://www.durangoherald.com/sections/News/2009/08/1by By Joe Hanel

NM wants mine cleanup funds to go to uranium sites

Comment: Why does the present federal gov't want to start uranium mining again and they have not clean up from the last cold war? No to Uranium Mining!

By: SUE MAJOR HOLMES
Associated Press

08/06/09 10:30 AM PDTGALLUP, N.M. — The name Poison Canyon offers a hint of what's faced by those trying to clean up abandoned uranium mines in the West.

The area north of the village of Milan contains some of the 259 abandoned uranium sites in New Mexico that need cleanup. State officials are pressuring the federal government to direct more money to those areas because of their unique hazard of radioactivity.

"In this case, a pile of rocks is more than just a pile of rocks," said New Mexico Mining and Minerals Division Director Bill Brancard.

There are hundreds of thousands of safety issues at abandoned hardrock mines in 13 western states, according to the Government Accountability Office. Thousands of sites, many dating to the 19th century, also are considered environmentally damaged.

The GAO lists about 800 abandoned hardrock mine sites in New Mexico and says at least one-fourth have environmental problems such as radioactivity or chemical contamination. Half of Wyoming's 956 sites are environmentally degraded, as are 9,900 of Arizona's 50,000 abandoned sites and 5,200 of California's 47,000-plus sites.

Exposure to uranium dust can cause kidney toxicity, which can lead to acute kidney failure; exposure to radiation from uranium increases the chances of developing cancer, according to the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois.

Until two years ago, states could use abandoned mine cleanup grants on any site considered a serious threat to public health and safety, but the Bush administration interpreted changes Congress made in the law to mean most money should go to cleaning up coal mines.

New Mexico is more interested in abandoned mines for hardrock — such as gold, lead or uranium — and wants Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to reverse the solicitor general's opinion.

Kendra Barkoff, a spokeswoman for Salazar, called the matter "an important issue that has many implications for the West," and said Salazar was reviewing it.

New Mexico received $3.8 million this year from an expected $20 million over the next six years for abandoned mines and mills. Only $800,000 of this year's appropriation can go to hardrock sites.

"A lot of what we're doing now is trying to get a grasp on how big the problem is, how much disturbance is there, how high are the radiological readings, and ultimately try to figure out how much work needs to be done at these mines," Brancard said.

But, he said, "The scope of concerns related to hardrock and uranium mines is pretty vast," and $20 million isn't enough.

The Navajo Nation, which lists 520 abandoned uranium sites in Navajo country, is worried about an Obama administration proposal to eliminate a $142 million program for states and tribes certified as having completed coal mine remediation.

"We can't just do away with this program. Our (Navajo) Nation, we still have concerns with abandoned uranium mine sites," said Madeline Roanhorse, department manager for the Navajo Abandoned Mine Lands Program and Uranium Mill Tailings Removal Action Program.

According to her agency, without the federal program no one will be closing old mines on the reservation.

Stephen Etsitty, executive director of the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency, said the tribe was certified several years ago to use the funds for such purposes as uranium cleanup.

Etsitty said it's in the tribe's best interest to work with the state to get continued funding because of the amount of work left.

The focus of the Abandoned Mine Lands Program is reclamation, and "in a lot of instances reclamation is not the same as remediation," he said. Reclamation removes physical hazards, but remediation looks at environmental problems, such as removing contaminated soil or studying groundwater concerns.

"That's the other shoe that still hasn't dropped yet," Etsitty said. "We know now a lot more about the contaminants in the soil and the ground. But we don't know how this is now potentially impacting our groundwater resources."

Robinson Kelly, vice president of the tribe's Church Rock Chapter in New Mexico, complained at a public hearing in June about a federal government proposal to cover but leave radioactive uranium tailings at one site.

"We don't want it just covered," he said during a demonstration last month marking the 30th anniversary of a tailings spill that sent millions of gallons of acidic water into the Rio Puerco.

"How long is that cover going to last? When it deteriorates, it's going to start emitting radiation," Kelly said.

Uranium has become a focus partly because of concern that new mines are being considered when old ones have never been cleaned up.

Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., introduced legislation this spring that would establish a fund to reclaim abandoned hardrock mines in the West, partly supported by a fee based on the value of production.

The measure was heard by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last month. A committee vote is expected this fall.

The abandoned mines were opened before 1977, when the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act required owners to put up financial assurance that an area would be reclaimed once mining ended.

New Mexico was a leading uranium producer from the 1950s to the 1980s. Until the 1970s, uranium went to defense.

That history obligates the federal government to help with reclamation, said Brancard and Democratic Rep. John Heaton of Carlsbad, vice chairman of the New Mexico Legislature's radioactive and hazardous materials committee.

"There's a national responsibility," Heaton said.

http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/ap/52592622.html

'Hot' fill frosts builder

Comment: This is a horrible mistake about the problems of uranium mining!

By CYNDY COLE
Sun Staff Reporter
Sunday, August 02, 2009

VALLE -- An attempt to clean up radioactive waste at a closed uranium mine on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon may have gone partially haywire.

A mix of clean gravel and radioactive rock may have been inadvertently sold to a businessman in Valle to use as fill material for a parking lot and the foundation of a new building. Officials with the National Park Service, the emergency response branch of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality and a state radiation regulatory agency are investigating whether some of the rock and dirt near the Orphan Mine was removed along with a newly built road and hauled to private property in the town of Valle, about 30 miles south.

Data from one device used to test radioactivity showed Saturday that the material was indeed radioactive.

The Park Service is in the middle of evaluating and hauling away some radioactive materials from the former high-grade uranium mine that extended 1,600 feet below the rim of the Grand Canyon.

Contractors working on behalf of the Bureau of Reclamation and National Park Service removed man-made structures from the rim area of the mine from November through April, screening them for radioactivity, said Greg Nottingham, National Park Service project manager for the Orphan Mine cleanup.

This included a metal tower, scrap metal, concrete that was the foundation of a few buildings, a water tower, and a bin formerly used to hold high-grade uranium ore.

Those materials that were radioactive were supposed to go to a facility in Colorado. Those that weren't radioactive were supposed to be sent to a landfill.

10 TRUCKLOADS FOR $1,000

Mining at the Orphan Mine ended in 1969, but the Park Service is investigating whether radioactive materials remain.

"Preliminary data suggests that we do have elevated levels of contaminants at the site," Nottingham said.

To get to the site during the winter and spring, a gravel road or driveway was built into the Orphan Mine area to a place where ore was formerly trucked away.

Two sources who spoke on condition of anonymity but with first-hand knowledge of the project say that after contractors finished hauling out the large manmade structures, they excavated and removed the road as planned, but then sent that material to Valle.

Valle businessman Robb Baldosky bought truckloads -- 10 large piles -- of fill material heading out of the Orphan Mine area for $1,000 in May, intending to use it to improve a parking area and build a foundation for a new parts shop, he said.

He's now asking the Park Service whether he should use it.

"If it's safe, I'd like to put it down," he said. "If it's not, it's gotta go."

100 TIMES MORE RADIOACTIVE

As Baldosky spoke Saturday morning at his Valle business standing near the piles, an employee with the company hired to do the cleanup work at the Orphan Mine, Pangea Group, approached in his car with equipment to measure radioactivity.

The employee did not approach the piles with the equipment as a reporter stood by, but began taking statements from others.

Meanwhile, another individual measured radioactivity in some parts of the piles.

Levels sometimes hit the limit of what his scintillometer could measure.

The measurements were as much as 100 times more radioactive than the nearby landscape, making some segments of the piles nearly as potent as uranium ore.

The Pangea employee declined comment.

The National Park Service said it would send personnel out to investigate over the weekend.

"We are taking very seriously and we are looking into" assertions that the material sent to Valle was radioactive, Nottingham said.

Cyndy Cole can be reached at 913-8607 or at ccole@azdailysun.com.

The Oprhan Mine: A brief history

Discovered in the 1800s and patented as a copper mine, the Orphan Mine was found to be a source of very concentrated uranium in 1951.

Its first shipment of uranium ore to the Atomic Energy Commission was in 1956.

The Orphan Mine pre-dated the Grand Canyon becoming a national park, leading to a later dispute when the owners wanted to mine beneath the park. That dispute was ultimately settled by Congress and President Kennedy, with a provision that the mine become national park property in 1987.

The property is now part of the national park, but the argument of who is financially responsible for cleanup is a case being argued in Coconino County Superior Court.

One hole and a pile of remnants from the mine, on the upper slope of the South Rim, is visible from Maricopa Point.

The National Park Service plans to investigate the risks associated with the mine by 2010 and hold public meetings to discuss any plans for further cleanup.

http://azdailysun.com/articles/2009/08/02/news/20090802_front_200981.txt