Lawmakers find uranium mining still a hot issue

RICHMOND

The official debate over uranium mining in Virginia began anew Monday, some 20 years after the issue quietly died for financial reasons and a state ban on extracting the radioactive mineral became law.

A t a packed Senate hearing, the same opinions and anxieties took center stage again, a reminder that any decision – even on whether to study a possible mining project in Pittsylvania County – would not be easy.

In the end, the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources agreed that members could not agree on a proper study, at least not on this day. Instead, an ad hoc subcommittee was created to review different proposals, which would be voted on next Monday.

“Obviously, this needs more time,” said the committee chairwoman, state Sen. Patricia S. Ticer, D-Alexandria, after more than an hour of testimony.

Opponents wore green hats and lined up to tell lawmakers that the environmental and health risks are not worth the potential rewards of tapping what most experts say they think is the largest uranium deposit in the United States.

As much as 110 million pounds of uranium ore, which then could be milled on the site into processable “yellowcake,” is thought to lie beneath rolling farms and grazing fields near the historic Southside town of Chatham.

Proponents tried to counter the scary claims by saying they only want to study whether mining can be done safely. If so, they argued, regulations might then be crafted to govern such a project, which could bring jobs and as much as $10 billion in revenues to the financially troubled Southside, as well as provide more fuel for nuclear power in Virginia and elsewhere.

The mining and milling proposal in Pittsylvania County was “safe back then and will probably be shown to be safe now,” said John Donaldson, a nuclear engineer from nearby Danville.

He testified in favor of a new scientific study and the creation of a special uranium commission to oversee it, as compiled into one bill, SB525, sponsored by Sen. Frank W. Wagner, R-Virginia Beach.

Wagner said he is spearheading a project far from his district because he is an advocate for domestic energy production, especially clean energy such as nuclear power. Virginia is “blessed or cursed, depending on how you look at it,” he said, by its robust nuclear industry and the uranium deposit.

Donaldson studied the last uranium-mining debate in the 1980s while a student at the University of Virginia. He now buys uranium for a living and said a new push for nuclear power worldwide will require more raw uranium.

But Georgia Herbert, an environmentalist and attorney, who followed the last debate, noted that uranium markets are weak because one of the largest mines remains closed as a result of environmental problems.

“That’s the kind of thing that made people step back and say, 'Whoa, now wait a minute,’ when we saw another proposal surfacing here in Virginia,” Herbert said.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine has said he favors uranium mining if a study proves it can be done safely and cleanly in Pittsylvania County. Kaine also supports Wagner’s study bill.

But other Democrats are not so sold. Sen. R. Creigh Deeds, D-Hot Springs, who is running for governor in 2009, asked a series of pointed questions at Monday’s hearing, including one aimed at Wagner: “Exactly what’s changed since 1984?” when the state last wrapped up a scientific review.

Wagner replied that environmental science has grown in sophistication by “leaps and bounds” since the 1980s.

“We’re not saying, 'Let’s go do it now,’” Wagner said. “We’re saying, 'Let’s look at the state of the art, then ask ourselves, can we do this safely?’”

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com