Ban uranium mining — Tory

[Oscar]

Ban uranium mining — Tory

Hants West MLA introduces private member’s bill

http://thechronicleherald.ca/NovaScotia/1146742.html

By GORDON DELANEY Valley Bureau Fri. Oct 9 - 4:46 AM

Tory MLA Chuck Porter wants a permanent ban on uranium mining in his riding.

The Hants West MLA introduced a private member’s bill in the legislature Wednesday that, if supported, would guarantee test drilling doesn’t take place.

It was a promise he made to his constituents during the last election campaign.

"It was a discussion that was had on the doorsteps during the campaign," Mr. Porter said Thursday in an interview.

"I spoke clearly about it . . . that I’m not in favour of it. And I assured people that I did not support uranium mining in Nova Scotia to any degree, and that I would be introducing legislation to ban it at least in Hants West."

An indefinite provincial moratorium was put in place in 1982.

Mining companies and advocates say the moratorium limits other mining activity.

The Uranium Mining Moratorium Act states that mining activities must halt and the company must contact the Natural Resources Department if uranium concentrations greater than 100 parts per million are discovered.

Opponents say the indefinite moratorium is not clear or strong enough.

One company, Capella Resources, announced last spring that it would begin conducting test drill holes at its Titus project at Falls Lake, about 20 kilometres south of Windsor.

The drilling would allow the company to extract small amounts of ore to determine the level of uranium that could potentially be extracted to create green energy.

Local residents are worried about the act not being enforced.

The announcement has also rekindled a long-standing debate over the safety of mining uranium for its nuclear properties to create a "clean" energy.

Opponents say the low-grade ore could increase carbon emissions and, in some cases, cause toxic contamination.

Mr. Porter said constituents are concerned about the health of their families and protection of their watersheds, and that there is too much flexibility within the act to reassure citizens of company compliance.

"In Hants West, we want it totally banned, legislatively and legally," he said.

Mr. Porter said the former Tory government he belonged to came out in support of mining, but not specifically uranium mining.

The Tories held a series of public meetings across the province last year to develop a new mineral strategy.

David Morse, the natural resources minister at that time, said that the province would lift the moratorium if it could be proven uranium mining could be done safely and benefit the provincial economy. Mr. Morse was defeated in the June election.

The Mining Association of Nova Scotia, which represents 150 companies, has argued for the moratorium to be lifted to increase all mining activity.

The association argues that mineral companies are spending millions more dollars in New Brunswick and Newfoundland, where uranium mining is still allowed.

It said some companies will not mine in Nova Scotia because they have to halt their activities if they come across uranium in greater concentrations than 100 parts per million.

Back in 1985, the McCleave inquiry concluded that it could be done safely.

"It’s not that I don’t support other mining, like gypsum and things like that," Mr. Porter said. "But I’m in no way, shape or form interested in talking about uranium mining in Hants West."

He said it will be up to the government to determine when the private member’s bill will be voted on.

"But I would like to see it come forward as soon as possible."

He said in a news release "the health and well-being of the people of Hants West must come first."

"For almost 30 years now, they have been fighting to make sure uranium mining stays out of their community. By enacting a moratorium, the province backed their stance, but we want to take it a step further and ask the NDP government to invoke a complete ban in Hants West."

In 2007, Halifax-Fairview MLA Graham Steele, now the minister of finance in the new NDP government, introduced a private member’s bill asking for a ban on uranium mining in Nova Scotia.

( gdelaney@herald.ca)

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Much more to the story

http://thechronicleherald.ca/Letters/1148004.html

The Oct. 9 article about a bill to block uranium mining contained a misleading statement: "Back in 1985, the McCleave inquiry concluded that it could be done safely."

I am sure my late father, inquiry commissioner and Judge Robert McCleave, would have cringed to read his lengthy findings summarized in that way. While the report noted that "methods exist by which uranium can be mined safely," in that sentence he was talking about advances in mining methods, not the tailings, and not even about whether safe mining methods could or would be used in Nova Scotia.

The report also said, for example, "The final stage of the mining process, the management of the tailings after the mine is closed down, was mentioned as a matter of concern by almost every presenter whether pro or con. The decay of uranium takes place over a long period of time … The principles concerns were whether containment devices such as dams or linings would remain intact, whether such holding areas could withstand natural disasters such as flooding, and whether the volatile nature of uranium’s decay into lead would play havoc with dams and linings. There can be no certain answer when the uranium age as we know it is only a minute part of several thousands of generations which will follow the 850,000 Nova Scotians who inhabit this province today."

If the McCleave report is to become part of public discussion once more, I would ask that it be cited with balance and fairness, and in context.

Rob McCleave, Dartmouth

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Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Uranium. (McCleave Report, 1)985 Open File Report ME 612, Government of Nova Scotia.

http://www.tmans.ca/MANS_files/document ... me_612.pdf

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Why Are We So Oblivious About The Hazards of Uranium?

http://forum.stopthehogs.com/phpBB2/vie ... =1355#1355

By Jim Harding

SASKATCHEWAN SUSTAINABILITY – for May 15, 2009 R-Town News

Uranium is a water soluble, toxic heavy metal that emits radiation until it stabilizes into lead in 4.5 billion years. One of its many carcinogenic byproducts is radon gas, the world’s second cause of lung cancer. No wonder jurisdictions concerned about environmental health want to keep it from being spread into watersheds, food chains and human bodies.

Many places “leave it in the ground.” B.C.’s uranium moratorium from 1977 was recently reaffirmed. Nova Scotia has had a ban since 1985, and Labrador just imposed one. Twenty Ontario municipalities including Ottawa have called for a ban. Virginia has had a ban since 1983, the Colorado Medical Association is calling for one, and a U.S. federal authority has proposed a ban throughout the complete Grand Canyon watershed.

Why are we so oblivious to this? Is it because the Blakeney NDP government promised “untold wealth” from mining high-grade uranium as public enterprise? Because Cameco’s tax-deductible donations to health, education and cultural groups make us feel involved? Because uranium mining occurs far away from our towns and cities, near sparsely populated First Nations and Métis communities!

Perhaps we can get perspective from Nova Scotia’s 1982 Inquiry. In its Final Report Judge McCleave said “One could live near uranium, or one of the elements in its cycle, and not immediately recognize the hazards; the radiation from such sources has no taste, no sound, no form by which it can be see, and no ordour. Its damages can be devastating. This lack of taste, noise, sight and smell make it a formidable enemy indeed) (p. 17)

Elsewhere he wrote: The most common argument against the development of uranium holdings was the long-term management of the waste or tailings since the problem raised is less than fifty years and the decay in the tailings is to last for tens of thousands of years, there is no absolute answer (p. 27).

The public outcry that led to McCleave’s inquiry and the Nova Scotia moratorium was triggered by uranium exploration. The “free entry” of mining companies to stake on cottage, farm and Aboriginal land during the uranium bull market in 2008 also sparked the coalition to ban uranium exploration in the Ottawa Valley, as well as New Brunswick protests leading to changes to the Clean Water Act to protect drinking water sources from uranium contamination.

Here it’s “out of sight-out of mind.” The 1982 Charter of Rights and the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples require “prior, informed consent” for exploration to occur where Aboriginal rights are involved. But uranium mining was initiated here in the secrecy of the nuclear arms race. Aboriginal rights were then summarily ruled out of the 1978 Cluff Lake Inquiry, making Saskatchewan more appealing to uranium multinationals than uranium-rich Australia, where Aboriginal rights were considered.

It might have been different, for a moratorium was recommended at the Saskatchewan NDP’s 1976 convention, but proponents were out-maneuvered by Blakeney’s Ministers who were already negotiating uranium exports. With loyal pronuclear Commissioners, the Cluff Lake Inquiry was a safe “compromise” which ruled out the forthright investigation that led to Nova Scotia’s moratorium.

The imperative of sustainability requires that we look back with open eyes and an open heart, learn where things went wrong, and start anew. There is an opportunity to do this NOW. Let’s not miss it.

Jim Harding is a retired professor of environmental and justice studies who resides in the Qu’Appelle Valley.

[Oscar]

RESOLUTION: Global call to action for a ban on uranium mining

http://pgs.ca/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/
IPPNW-Resolution-Uranium-Ban-Engl1.pdf

INTERNATIONAL PHYSICIANS FOR THE PREVENTION OF NUCLEAR WAR
19th World Congress – Basel, Switzerland - March 25 – 30, 2010
RESOLUTION Adopted on August 29, 2010
Title of Resolution: Global call to action for a ban on uranium mining
Submitted By: Helmut Lohrer
Affiliates: IPPNW Germany and PSR/IPPNW Switzerland
Date Submitted: August 18, 2010

BE IT RESOLVED THAT:

Uranium ore mining and the production of uranium oxide (yellowcake) are irresponsible and represent a grave threat to health and to the environment. Both processes involve an elementary violation of human rights and their use lead to an incalculable risk for world peace and an obstacle to nuclear disarmament.

The International Council of IPPNW therefore resolves that:

IPPNW call for appropriate measures to ban uranium mining worldwide.

Reasons for Above:

Uranium mining contaminates groundwater and radioactivity remains in the heaps, tailings and evaporation ponds. Uranium and its radioactive decay elements are highly toxic. They attack inner organs and the respiratory system. Scientific studies have shown that the following diseases are caused by exposition to radon gas, uranium and uranium’s decay elements: Bronchial and lung cancer; cancer of the bone marrow, stomach, liver, intestine, gall bladder, kidneys and skin, leukemia, other blood diseases, psychological disorders and birth defects. Approximately three-quarters of the world’s uranium is mined on territory belonging to indigenous peoples. The inhabitants of affected regions are (for the most part) vulnerable to exposure from radioactive substances that threaten them with short- and long-term health risks and damaging genetic effects.

As well as the direct health effects from contamination of the water, the immense water consumption in mining regions is environmentally and economically damaging – and in turn detrimental for human health. The extraction of water leads to a reduction of the groundwater table and thereby to desertification; plants and animals die, the traditional subsistence of the inhabitants is eliminated, the existence of whole cultures are threatened. This is not all. Ending uranium mining also because of its relevance to the processing of uranium, its military use, the production of nuclear energy and the unresolved problem of how to permanently dispose of nuclear waste would represent a provision of preventive health care, as well as a policy of peace and reason.

Banning uranium mining would reduce the risk of proliferation. It would make uranium resources more scarce, thus accelerating the abandonment of the civil use of nuclear energy. The pressure on political decision-makers to find safe methods of permanently disposing of nuclear waste would increase. Banning uranium mining would thus promote the phasing-out of the irresponsible practice of using nuclear energy and increase pressure globally to force a change-over to renewable energies.

Describe how this resolution might be implemented and by whom:
In order to achieve the goal of an international ban, IPPNW will strengthen its public education on this issue and exert influence on both national and international political decision!makers.

Estimate for amount of staff time and resources required to implement this resolution:
Minimal staff time will be required, mainly for coordination of activities and communication between activists.

Estimated expenses and sources of funding:
Minimal cost for shipment of information material.