Film on in situ mining of uranium

Hot Water: The Uranium Industry’s Dirty Little Story The only thing green about nuclear power are the people who think it’s safe. Lizabeth Rogers Activist Post 2 Oct 13, 

HOT WATER Documentary Trailer 

When you were growing up, how many people did you know who had cancer?
How many do you know today?
I began this odyssey, innocently enough in July 2009 when I led a filmmaking crew to South Dakota to investigate what we had heard was an abandoned uranium mine which had contaminated local groundwater and made local ranchers, their children and even their livestock sick. It was my own naïveté which kept me in the dark, and even though I had done a bit of research prior to leaving the driveway I still had no reasonable clue or expectation of the length and breadth of the problem, nor how many of us are affected by it every day.

I had no idea that there are more than 1,000 abandoned uranium mines in the southern Black Hills alone. There are countless abandoned mines elsewhere. I had no idea that there were over 4,000 abandoned test wells in the southern Black Hills…countless more elsewhere.

I had no idea, nor did any of the people I have interviewed, that the water that 38 million of us in the American southwest get from the Colorado River is filtered through 16 million tons of radioactive waste sitting less than 750 feet from the edge of the river in Moab, Utah.

None of these people, all of whom I would consider very “aware” individuals, knew anything about it, or that we taxpayers are paying for the cleanup because Atlas Mining Company filed for bankruptcy rather than try to address the problems they had created.

I, nor any of the people I interviewed knew that this waste is more toxic than the ore itself, with half lives of millions of years. Most of these people don’t know what a half life is…I didn’t when I started this project.

None of these people know that this is just one of thousands of these sites all over the U.S leaching radioactive waste into our groundwater and aquifers. Nor do they know that if the sites are being cleaned up at all, that the taxpayer is picking up the tab.

Tragically, our naïveté continues to cost us the lives and health of the innocent. We allow the environmental carnage to continue as we approve new uranium mining operations with no guarantee that the sites will be reclaimed to pre-mining condition. In-situ leach mines leak into our aquifers while mining companies claim that they are innocent of the cause, and none of the mining company executives would consider allowing their own children to drink the groundwater from one of these areas.

The mining companies know that if the leaching solution breaks into an aquifer, the water is contaminated and cannot be corrected. They cannot and will not guarantee it but will only promise to use the best available technology and make the best possible effort to correct the problem. Then as always, they will walk away with the ore and the profits and leave local residents and federal taxpayers to deal with the aftermath. As Powertech fights local residents of South Dakota over rights to drill new in-situ mines, facts are ignored as fantasy and false promises take center stage in Rapid City courtrooms…….http://www.activistpost.com/2013/10/hot-water-uranium-industrys-dirty.html

South Dakota – Sly media tricks by uranium lobby

Thoughts on the uranium debacle http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/local/communities/hot-springs/opinion/thoughts-on-the-uranium-debacle/article_f681dd4c-29ef-11e3-9acc-0019bb2963f4.html By Rebecca Leas, PhD  1 Oct 13 Unless you ‘ve been living in a cave, you know natural gas is the new major focus for energy. Natural gas has negatively affected the nuclear industry, resulting in decreased demand for uranium. Germany is nearly nuclear-free and other countries, including the United States, are closing down reactors. The U.S.’s reactors are in ill repair and very susceptible to weather events, earthquakes, and terrorism. Our storage of spent fuel is outdated, making our reactors very vulnerable. Europe uses a “HOSS” (Hardened On-Site Storage) system greatly reducing the risks.

The USA is shutting down reactors and has sufficient uranium available. France is perfecting a system of re-using uranium which will further decrease its demand.

Confusing the public are Powertech (PT) employees, shareholders and supporters writing Letters to the Editor, but not identifying themselves as such. This is important for the public to know.

For example, Rep. Mike Verchio stated cancer wasn’t a problem in Fall River County but cited no source. He failed to mention that he helped write and pass SB-158 taking away our state protection (along with legislators Russell, Rampleberg, Gosch and Lust). Randy Brich’s letter failed to mention his beneficial PT relationship and his wife’s being a PT lobbyist in Pierre. He claims the Crawford, Neb., mine has no problems but government documents show otherwise. Cindy Turner wrote a forum bemoaning the Rapid City Council’s resolution, comparing the proceedings to the Salem Witch Trials and calling Dakota Rural Action an “environmental extremist group” and then threw in pine beetles!

Bev Gehman wrote an outrageous Rapid City Journal forum, engaging in extreme name calling against an Edgemont rancher and Bill Curran refers to opponents as “Chicken Littles.” Representative Mark Kirkeby called Mayor Sam Kooiker a liar. Jeepers, what was that about? Do these people have shares, leases or both?

Powertech CEO Clements’ article belittled a Rapid City church for opposing the mine and stated “ISL mining is intrinsically safe”- contrary to EPA admittance that in-situ leach technology is way ahead of its health and safety knowledge! Clements’ claims of safety are unethical and without scientific support. In fact, because the damage done underground is “hidden” and we can’t observe it nor perfectly predict what occurs, the likelihood of even greater long-term damage occurring is increased.

Powertech’s Hollenbeck wrote “In-situ uranium recovery: facts not fear.” Interestingly, if one reads the NRC, EPA and USGS literature; as well as studies from premiere geology programs, one concludes this is bad business. Hollenbeck’s statements are mere conjecture, not fact.

Citizens should read the scientific documents themselves and not rely on what a company “claims” it will do – that is called a “sales pitch,” not fact.

Citizens opposing uranium mining HAVE been reading scientific documents and in their letters to the editor have repeatedly referred to government documents and scientific sources. Peer-reviewed science, not sales pitches, is what our state leaders should use to guide S.D.’s future.

Beware: water will be the delimiting factor for future economic growth and sustainability.

Rebecca Leas is a Health, Wellness and Fitness Professional who lives in Rapid City. She holds a PhD in Education.

Australia’s media irresponsibly silent on the dire state of the uranium industry

the media hasn’t responded at all. In March 2013, Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics reduced its mid-term forecast for uranium revenue by nearly half, and the media was silent. The Australian Conservation Foundation released a detailed, factual report on April 26 exposing the uranium industry’s economic misinformation, and the media was silent.

the economic benefits are grossly overstated (and amplified and regurgitated) and contrary facts are ignored.

Uranium – fool’s oil  http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2013/5/7/climate/uranium-fools-oil#ixzz2SlerByPC Jim Green 

In the mid-2000s, uranium was the ‘new black’ as The Bulletin put it and investors could take their pick in this “radioactive heaven”. The number of listed uranium juniors doubled, and doubled again … and again and again.

A company sent radioactive drill samples for assay and quickly became the most traded stock on the ASX (leading to a suspension of share trading). Residents of the small Pacific Island Niue were surprised to learn from an Australian company that they might be sitting on 10 per cent of the world’s uranium, and surprised again when the project was abandoned two months later − easy come, easy go. The uranium spot price increased ten-fold and more, peaking at $US138/lb in June 2007.

Michael Angwin, the Australian Uranium Association’s Executive Director, said in 2008 that Australia “has enough reserves to be to uranium what Saudi Arabia is to oil.” Only a pedant would note that Saudi oil generates 466 times as much revenue as Australian uranium (and that most of ‘our’ uranium revenue never comes anywhere near Australia because of the high level of foreign ownership).

Politicians from the major parties have been only too happy to regurgitate uranium industry propaganda – for example former SA politicians Mike Rann and Kevin Foley have made the comparison with Saudi oil.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission could hold uranium miners and wannabes to account for peddling misinformation – but it doesn’t. Business journalists could hold the uranium industry to account − but they usually don’t.Claims that nuclear power growth in China, India and Russia will drive huge increases in uranium exports are routinely and uncritically regurgitated yet they don’t withstand the simplest calculations. For example it is routinely claimed that uranium sales to Russia will generate $1 billion annually − but Australia would need to supply entire Russian demand twice over to generate that amount of export revenue.

Milk and cream generate almost twice as much revenue as uranium − so where are the newspaper column-inches with pithy headlines about corporate ‘moovers and shakers’; where the ponderous weekend think-pieces about how the nation that once rode on a sheep’s back is now attached to a cow’s udder? Why isn’t milk the ‘new black’?

We could turn to academia for some common sense. There we find Professor George Dracoulis − a member of the 2006 Switkowski Panel − wondering aloud whether uranium will “make or break Australia as an exporter.” Hardly – Australia could supply entire world demand and uranium would account for just 3 per cent of national export revenue and it would still fall short of iron ore export revenue by a factor of 6.5.

There we find Professor Barry Brook insisting that there was no credible risk of a serious accident at Fukushima even as nuclear meltdown was in full swing − his follow-up act is a prediction of a four-fold expansion of uranium exports. And there we find Ian Plimer and Haydon Manning drawing comparisons between Australian uranium and Saudi oil.

Even with the uranium price tanking in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, the Global Financial Crisis, and the failure of the nuclear ‘renaissance’ to materialise, journalists are still reading from the same script. Significant, protracted price falls are met with predictions that the market will soon turn. A November 2012 article in The Australian, titled ‘Yellowcake starts to glow again’, speculated that the uranium price may be close to bottoming.

A March 2012 report by the federal government’s Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics predicted a near three-fold increase in uranium exports by 2016/17 and The Australian responded with an article titled ‘Global uranium demand expected to skyrocket’. So how has the media responded to the further decline in the uranium sector over the past year?

The short answer is that the media hasn’t responded at all. In March 2013, Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics reduced its mid-term forecast for uranium revenue by nearly half, and the media was silent. The Australian Conservation Foundation released a detailed, factual report on April 26 exposing the uranium industry’s economic misinformation, and the media was silent.

The bottom line is that when the industry has some ‘good’ news to spruik, it will surely be amplified by dullard politicians, academics, industry ‘analysts’ and Paul Howes – and it will surely be regurgitated by sections of the media. But if you’ve got a story about industry stagnation and decline, forget it. If it’s not good news, it’s not news.

Simple facts − uranium accounting for 0.19 per cent of national export revenue and 0.015 per cent of all jobs in the past financial year − are easily dismissed by talking up the ‘potential’ of the industry. But as Richard Leaver from Flinders University notes:

“Any individual, firm, or sector deemed to have potential is relieved of a massive and perpetual burden – the need to account for past and present achievements (or, more probably, the lack of them). … The history of Australian involvement in the civil uranium industry offers an excellent example of this alchemy at work.”

There are real-world consequences to yellowcake fever − many ‘mum and dad’ investors have been burnt. That problem was most acute during the speculative price bubble in the mid-2000s when small investors were spending big on penny dreadfuls while at least three major utilities were selling shares in Rio Tinto-controlled Energy Resources of Australia. As Tim Treadgold wrote in the West Australian in 2005, “smart money” was selling “while less clued-up people continue to buy uranium penny dreadfuls rather than do something sensible, like bet the house (the wife and the kids) on the horse carrying the jockey wearing pink polka dots in the fourth at Ascot next Saturday.”

There is another problem associated with yellowcake fever. A sober assessment of the economics benefits and the problems and risks associated with the uranium industry is required, but there’s precious little chance of that when the economic benefits are grossly overstated (and amplified and regurgitated) and contrary facts are ignored.

Perhaps the worm will turn after a few more years of industry stagnation. Already there’s plenty for a contrarian journalist to hang a story on. BHP Billiton, for example, has not only cancelled the planned expansion of Olympic Dam but has also disbanded its uranium division and sold the Yeelirrie uranium lease in Western Australia for just 11 per cent of the nominal value of the resource.

Lynas rare earths company suing news agencies

Local regulators Atomic Energy Licensing Board (AELB) had said in January it would approve a TOL subject to added conditions including identifying a suitable long-term waste disposal site.

Lynas had said last month that identifying this site “is a work in progress.” It also said prior to AELB’s decision that a permanent depository facility (PDF) will only be needed in a “worst-case scenario” where it is unable to reprocess the waste into a commercial product. 

Lynas sues news portal, protest groups for defamation, The Malaysian Insider, By Anisah Shukry April 20, 2012 KUALA LUMPUR, — Lynas Corp has filed a defamation suit against online news portal Free Malaysia Today for “false and misleading statements” in a recently published article.
The Australian mining group is also suing Save Malaysia, Stop Lynas’s (SMSL) directors and committee members over an open letter published on the group’s web site…..

Lynas has faced fierce protests from Kuantan residents and opposition politicians who say that the RM2.5 billion rare-earth refinery in nearby Gebeng will cause radiation pollution despite the Sydney-based firm insisting it has met and
exceeded local and international safety standards.

Australia’s uranium mining industry propaganda – not very confident

“…an extended period of uncertainty…..A mistake by one operator or explorer or project developer in our industry affects all of us.”

Fukushima puts Australia’s uranium industry on the defensive Independent Australia, 2 Sept 11, The Australian nuclear industry feels the heat after the Fukushima calamity, but spins on gamely. Noel Wauchope reports.

With plummeting uranium prices, and increasinglybad news about Fukushima radiation, Australia’s uranium industry is well and truly on the back foot. But the industry battles on with religious fervour in its belief in the future uranium boom.

Wikileaks exposes story of uranium thefts

The leaked cables tell hair-raising tales of casks of uranium found in wicker baskets in Burundi, a retired Russian general offering to sell “uranium plates” in Portugal, and a radioactive Armenian car on the Georgian border.

WikiLeaks cables: How US ‘second line of defence’ tackles nuclear threat Diplomatic dispatches reveal world of smugglers, ex-military fixers and radioactive materials found in unlikely locations Julian Borger and Karen McVeigh * guardian.co.uk, Sunday 19 December 2010

Niger’s anti uranium radio station re-opens

….who announced in January 2008 a campaign against uranium mining, including by French state-controlled nuclear company Areva, in the north..

Niger radio in rebel area back on air after 2 years , Google hosted news 15 June 2010, NIAMEY — The main private radio station in uranium-rich northern Niger was on air again on Monday after being closed two years earlier by the deposed president following broadcasts linked to the Tuareg rebellion.

“The National Observatory of Communication has given us permission and we have already started transmitting again,” said the head of private Sahara FM, Ahmed Raliou, in the northern capital Agadez………..

Before being bought out in 2004, Sahara FM belonged to the head of the Tuareg rebellion, Rhissa Ag Boula, who announced in January 2008 a campaign against uranium mining, including by French state-controlled nuclear company Areva, in the north…….It has also broadcast extracts from an article that appeared in a local newspaper about the risks of radioactive contagion of the groundwater from uranium extracted in the area, he said.

Deeply poor Niger is the world’s third largest uranium producer.

AFP: Niger radio in rebel area back on air after 2 years

Mainsream media – self-censoring the issue of depleted uranium?

Depleted Uranium: A War Crime Within a War Crime, Creative-i ,  By William Bowles, 18 March, 2010 — Creative-i.infoAs if destroying a country and its culture ain’t bad enough, how about destroying its future, its children? I want to scream it from the rooftops! We are complicit in crimes of such enormity that I find it difficult to find the words to describe how I feel about this crime committed in my name! In the name of the ‘civilized’ world?…..

Even the BBC was forced to acknowledge the reality (Listen: ‘Child deformities ‘increasing’ in Falluja’ 4 March, 2010). True to form I searched the BBC Website in vain for the video clip I watched last week, so you are spared the horrific scenes I witnessed, recorded in Fallujah’s main hospital. Had this been Saddam’s legacy, we would have seen images like the one above endlessly repeated in mass media, complete with UN resolutions and the like.

So how come this isn’t a headline?

Creative-i / Depleted Uranium: A War Crime Within a War Crime By William Bowles