Nuclear debate, page-8

Sewell - your statements are correct; thank you for acknowledging them; let's take them one by one:

"For most open cut and underground uranium mines in secular equilibrium the tailings contain about 57% of the radioactivity originally in the ore"

Correct - the idea is to contain this remnant radio-activity which from your research is 43% less than what initially came out of the ground - none has been created - IT'S A REDUCTION. This means that the radium and its decay product (Radon) are REDUCED.

"There is a high probability that radium will be present in both the tailings dam and evaporation pond, in a form capable of being solubilized and mobilized by the passage of rainwater through the storage facilities in concentrations that are environmentally significant"

Correct - and if the original ore had been left in the ground the radium (in liquid phase) the radium in the ground water would have been 1/0.57= 174% greater.

If ISR was used (about 60% of all uranium produced) then this radium is still in the ground; hence a 43% reduction in radioactivity in the environment. With underground mining current practice is to dispose of the tailings into the mine so these tailing are then below ground and sequested. From this I assume that you are only objecting to open pit uranium mining? If so let's look at what happens to tails in open pit mines:

1. As I understand it the tailing (like rare earths and mineral sands) are put in a dam which is sealed below for uranium open pit mines they are also when filled covered with about 4 meters of clay or similar material thus sealing the tails
2. Uranium mine tailing dams are inspected by the EPA every 6 months to ensure their integrity
3. The longest lived isotope of radium has a half life of 1600 yrs and is found in almost all rocks and soils. On this basis it should be concluded the all open pit mining (particularly rare earth and mineral sand), blasting (granite has a lot of uranium/thorium and thus radium) and tunneling should be halted - that would kill our economy and reduce reduce overall radiation levels by the enormous amount of 0.01% (according to Cameco)
4. Much more radiation comes from coal fly ash and chimney emission from coal fired power stations. If you want to avoid radiation you would be better to not fly in airplanes; live in Denver, Nairobi; climb mountains of live in high altitude plateus such a Tibet, Nepal, north India, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Colorado, Utah, Mongolia, Switzerland, Austria, Georgia, Armenia etc