Word came Thursday that Virginia’s uranium mining study has gotten the go-ahead from a top panel of the National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences.
At last, science and rational thought seem to be prevailing in this decades-long dispute.
The National Research Council (NRC) is part of nation’s premier scientific organization. Earlier this year, the General Assembly voted to request the NRC study whether a 119 million pound deposit of uranium ore in neighboring Pittsylvania County could be safely mined and milled, without risk to the environment.
Since the early 1980s, Virginia has had a moratorium on mining and milling in place, due to concerns as to whether it could be done safely.
With global energy demand rising, the lure of the ore deposit, one of the largest in the nation, has grown.
Virginia Uranium Inc., the company that is seeking to mine and mill the Coles Hill deposit, successfully lobbied the General Assembly last session to ask for the study, laying the groundwork for the eventual lifting of the moratorium.
Unfortunately, the Assembly didn’t appropriate any money to pay for the study, estimated to cost approximately $1.9 million. Virginia Uranium, in an effort to keep the ball moving, offered to pay the study’s cost, working in tandem with the Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research at Virginia Tech.
That’s where diehard opponents of mining just went off the deep end in their battle against uranium mining.
Southside Concerned Citizens, chaired by Jack Dunavant of Halifax County, is one of the more rabid groups fighting Virginia Uranium and Coles family. They and their supporters called into question the impartiality of Virginia Tech, the energy research center and the National Academy of Sciences itself for being willing to conduct a study paid for with “tainted” money.
Well, as we said, science and rational thinking have prevailed.
At least for now.
When signalling the NRC would conduct the study, the executive committee of the governing board laid out several items of concern it wanted addressed, including a requirement for the total independence of the NRC and full transparency of the dollars coming from Virginia Uranium and other sources to pay for the work.
That’s small potatoes.
The upshot is that the study is highly likely to commence soon, with completion probably two years hence.
Uranium mining has been a contentious topic in Southside Virginia for decades. Politics and the lack of solid science about the safety of mining and milling have kept the moratorium in place for almost 30 years.
In today’s world of constantly rising demand for energy, however, if the science comes back in support of mining, it ought to be full-speed ahead for the project.
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