[korethr]

I will not disagree with the premise that our current and future energy needs require diversification into more nuclear generation, and that nuclear requires uranium. I will however, reject the notion that such necessarily means that what is happening at the mill and surrounding land is acceptable or can't be done any better.

My objections with the situation described in the article are twofold.

First, the mill is not a designed as a long-term waste storage facility and is being treated as such. My understanding from the article is that the mill was originally designed and intended to be there for 15 years, then reclaimed. But it's still in operation. The holding cells for tailings were designed for the original planned life of the mill, and are still in use. Generally, I like it when things are useful for a long time. But from the OP, the mill and its temporary waste storage is running well past its design lifetime, and more waste continues to be added to the site, allowing it to be treated as long-term radioactive waste disposal by loophole. That's not acceptable. I don't disagree with long-term radioactive waste storage. I do disagree with it being stored long term in a place not properly designed for it and where a containment failure, however small, endangers the health and safety of surrounding communities or otherwise general usefulness of the land. The article describes how the groundwater in the area has been acidifying. The locals worry that such is because of contamination caused by the mill's waste. The mill claims that such is a natural process that just happens sometimes. Regardless of who is (more) correct, those holding cells were designed when the groundwater (and thus soil) were far less acidic, and are being operated decades after their intended design lifetime. The water in the cells is measuring with a pH as low as 1. You can't tell me that's not creating a needless contamination risk.

Second, the age of the mill and thus their processes. As a millennial, I read "Built in the 1980s" and reflexively think "Oh, of course that's modern," because it's something that happened in my lifetime. But it's not; that's 30-40 years ago. I would be in no way surprised that the wastes produced by this mill are as dangerous as they are because of the process they use. From the description in the article, and on the NRC website[1][2] it sounds like this mill is using a conventional process (crush, leach out the uranium with sulfuric acid). Have there genuinely been no improvements in the conventional process over 30-40 years that improve its extractive efficiency, resulting in less radioactive tailings? Or improving the solvent recovery so the tailings don't acidify the soil and ground water so much over the long term? Or in extracting the other heavy metals, (lead, molybdenum, selenium), further reducing the the hazard of the tailings, and possibly providing a useful feedstock for other industrial processes? I find that unlikely, and would be disappointed if that were the case. Even if it doesn't make sense to retrofit such improvements to this mill (more capex on something already past its original design life, etc), the economic need for nuclear capability doesn't mean that this mill must remain. Is is genuinely so impossible to build a newer, better one?

1. https://www.nrc.gov/materials/uranium-recovery/extraction-me...

2. https://www.nrc.gov/materials/uranium-recovery/extraction-me...