Uranium push raises dissent in Virginia

Virginia Uranium Inc. project manager Patrick Wales operates a Geiger counter in a hole next to a road at the south field of a uranium deposit on the Cole Hill farm in Chatham, Va. Uranium mining is off-limits in the state.
Virginia Uranium Inc. project manager Patrick Wales operates a Geiger counter in a hole next to a road at the south field of a uranium deposit on the Cole Hill farm in Chatham, Va. Uranium mining is off-limits in the state.

— Geologist Patrick M. Wales held a Geiger counter as he walked the fence line of a field in the area of Virginia known as Southside.

Stopping to clear layers of wet leaves from a culvert, Wales cradled the detector in the middle of the trough he made. The instrument that had rhythmically clicked like a cicada seconds ago now emitted a steady, piercing shriek.

Uranium - enough to power every U.S. nuclear 1 power plant for 2 /2 years - lies beneath the rolling fields of Coles Hill, where beef cattle now graze.

The deposit typically runs deep, about 1,500 feet.

“This is really one of the areas where it just happens to pop up to the surface,” said Wales, a project manager for Virginia Uranium Inc.

The ore detected by the Geiger counter is the tip of an iceberg that is the largest known uranium deposit in the United States and among the largest in the world.

Today, the company’s bid to mine the 119 million pounds of the radioactive ore is churning the political landscape in Virginia. The state’s General Assembly is taking up the fiercely debated issue this session, and it’s a coin flip whether it will clear the way for the state to become the first on the East Coast to mine uranium.

Most U.S. uranium mining has occurred in the arid West. With Virginia prone to tropical storms, opponents fear a catastrophic storm could create an environmental nightmare if the mining and processing of the ore was allowed. Drenching rains and winds could carry radioactive waste to adjacent waters that are used for drinking supplies in the state’s largest city, Virginia Beach, and others in southeastern Virginia, they argue.

“We’re looking at an extraordinary high-stakes gamble, and it’s not a gamble the state of Virginia should take,” said Cale Jaffe, a leading voice against mining and director of the Charlottesville office of the Southern Environmental Law Center.

It’s not the mining that stirs the most concern, but the so-called milling - the separation of the ore from hard rock.

As rock and uranium are mined, they are crushed and then leached through a chemical process to extract the ore. Besides yellow cake, the fuel for nuclear power plants, the process creates huge amounts of waste called tailings, which must be stored for up to 1,000 years. Virginia Uranium, the company seeking the right to mine, has committed to storing the waste in below ground containment cells that it says would minimize the risk of the radioactive waste being released to local wells or public drinking sources.

Opponents have not been appeased.

They include the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation, the state’s largest farm lobby and traditionally pro-business; the NAACP; church groups; municipal organizations; water protection groups; and every environmental organization of note in the state.

Delegate Donald Merricks, a Republican whose district includes Pittsylvania County, said the creation of mining jobs got his interest but not his support.

It’s the milling that worries Merricks, and it’s a tough call as he ticks off the jobs and industries that have withered through the years. He’s quick to add, however, that he’s heard from people who have decided against locating in his district because of the fear of uranium mining.

“I know you cannot 100 percent guarantee anything to be safe, but I think you need to have some reasonable assurances that the process is not going to contaminate the environment,” he said. “Personally, I made the decision that I don’t think it’s worth the risk for the milling.”

The uranium deposit in Pittsylvania County was first detected in the 1950s but interest in mining it didn’t develop until nuclear power emerged as an energy source in the 1970s. The accident at Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island, then the Chernobyl nuclear accident in Ukraine, changed that. As uranium prices plummeted, interest in tapping the Southside deposit waned and the Legislature enacted a moratorium on mining the ore in the 1980s.

The uranium is located in two locations on Coles Hill, a 3,500-acre property in Pittsylvania County, about 20 miles from the North Carolina border.

Virginia Uranium was created a half-dozen years ago when the nation appeared poised for a nuclear power renaissance - which has yet to happen. The company notes that more than 90 percent of the nation’s 65 nuclear power plants get their fuel from foreign sources - Canada, Australia, Kazakhstan.

Virginia Uranium, which has ties to Canadian mining interests, has pushed hard to have the decades-old moratorium end so it can begin the lengthy permitting process.

The payoff is big: The company puts the value of the uranium at $7 billion. It would create about 300-350 high-paying jobs through the 35-year life of the mine and, according to some studies, pump hundreds of millions of dollars into the local economy by adding hundreds of other jobs related to the activity created by the mining.

But environmental issues are the sticking point.

The prospect of uranium mining in Virginia has spawned an avalanche of studies, none of which are definitive. A year-long analysis by a National Academy of Sciences panel is considered the gold standard among all the others, and supporters and critics of mining draw generously from its final report to argue their competing points.

Yes, the panel concludes, mining and milling in the West in the past has resulted in arsenic and uranium in local water supplies, but modern mining practices have the potential to reduce those risks.

Supporters of mining say popular images of nuclear power and the crises at Chernobyl and most recently Fukushima in Japan have created a climate of fear involving anything radioactive, including uranium.

Still others say to reject mining is contrary to the American can-do spirit. Lillian Gillespie, the former mayor of Pittsylvania County’s largest town, Hurt, is of that school. She left her native state of West Virginia to pursue a higher-paying job with a furniture manufacturer.

“We’ve sent men to the moon and brought them back,” she said. “I just believe we as a nation, as a state and a county can do something like this.”

Legislation has been submitted in the House of Delegates and the Senate to establish regulations for uranium mining, which would in effect end the 1982 moratorium.

While many expect a close vote, few are willingly to publicly venture a guess on the outcome. That’s because the issue defies party politics, geography and traditional alliances.

Ultimately, the decision could rest with the Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors, which would have to change Cole Hill’s agricultural zoning. Last Wednesday, the board voted 5-1 for a nonbinding resolution supporting the moratorium on uranium mining.

Business, Pages 19 on 01/28/2013

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