The last remaining uranium mill in the U.S. is located near Blanding. During the last two years monitoring has revealed that the mill’s waste pools are emitting dangerous amounts of radon gas. But despite those readings, regulators want to eliminate requirements for radon monitoring.
The White Mesa uranium mill is only three miles from the Ute Mountain Ute village of White Mesa. Recently tribal air quality experts reported what they call “alarming” findings concerning efforts to reduce radon emissions by covering toxic sludge ponds with radioactive water. The tribe has allied with several environmental groups to oppose the EPA’s intention to discontinue radon monitoring.
Effectively the EPA wants to not have any specific radon emission standard for conventional uranium mills.
Sarah Fields is the director of Uranium Watch, one of the groups concerned about this development.
“It would remove the requirement to monitor and report the radon emissions from the older tailings impoundments. It would keep the regulation that says for the newer tailings impoundments you don’t have to monitor any of the radon emissions or report them. Or if the radon emissions exceeded a certain standard, take effective corrective action to reduce the radon emissions. So effectively the EPA wants to not have any specific radon emission standard for conventional uranium mills,” Fields said.
But it’s a stretch to call White Mesa a “conventional” uranium mill. In recent years the mill has survived not by processing yellowcake ore, but by taking in radioactive wastes from around the country. Fields says the resulting waste lagoons are emitting at least five times as much radon as federal health standards call for.
“The EPA has told the public for decades that there are no radon emissions from the liquid impoundments, or the liquid ponds that are on top of solid tailings impoundments. But recent data and research by the Ute Mountain Ute tribe shows that the radon emissions from the liquid impoundments are quite high. And when radon is emitted, then it quickly breaks down into highly radioactive particles that can be inhaled, that are taken up by dust, that are dispersed,” Fields said.
Jennifer Thurston is a researcher and activist for the Information Network for Responsible Mining. She says it’s not a good time for the EPA to abandon radon enforcement.
“It was not a standard that was up to snuff, you know, in terms of what we think is important to protect public health today,” Thurston said. “The last time this rule was updated was in the 1980s. And so it has been a long time since the EPA, you know, even looked at the regulation, and what they’ve done is actually relaxed it at this point instead of tightening it and making it better.”
As the price of uranium continues to plummet, Energy Fuels, owners of the White Mesa mill, have announced that the mill will be idled at the end of the year, along with remaining uranium mines, including the mine at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.
“When they’re not really in the uranium business, and they’re not processing yellowcake, there’s definitely an impetus to produce and process more “alternate waste” materials,” Thurston said. “You know, the White Mesa Mill has kind of developed this sideline business, because there hasn’t been enough uranium mining to really keep it open, and the addition of those materials from different kinds of industries are problematic.”
Anne Mariah Tapp is a staff attorney and director of the energy program for the Grand Canyon Trust, another group that has taken sides with the Ute Mountain Ute tribe.
“Uranium mining and milling are inherently dangerous activities because of the radioactivity associated with uranium. And so all activities in the uranium industry need to occur with maximum compliance with the laws that are designed to protect public health and safety, and that includes the Clean Air Act.”
Tapp says her group fears that, like the Atlas mill in Moab, operators will walk away from the mess they have made after the price of uranium goes down.
The EPA is now studying comments from both the uranium industry and its critics, and it could be a year or more before the decision is made about radon monitoring. Meanwhile, opponents also plan to contest the mill’s upcoming license renewal.
