URI Files for Court Review over Churchrock Mine

by Kathy Helms, Diné Bureau
Gallup Independent
02 June 2009
   

WINDOW ROCK — Uranium Resources, Inc. announced Monday that it is filing a petition with the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver for an en banc, or full court review regarding its determination that URI’s proposed Section 8 mine is in Indian Country.

The April 17 opinion by the three-judge panel upheld a Feb. 6, 2007, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency land status determination that certain land owned by the company’s subsidiary, HRI, in the checkerboard area of northwestern New Mexico, lies within a dependent Indian community.

The ruling subjected HRI’s proposed uranium mine to EPA regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act, rather than under the jurisdiction of New Mexico Environmental Department, which previously had issued an underground injection control permit to the company for its proposed in-situ leach mining operation.

The permit continues to be in timely renewal, according to URI.

“As we’ve stated previously, we intend to proceed in a manner that will allow us to obtain an effective UIC permit.

Our objective remains to resolve issues with the Navajo Nation regarding uranium mining in New Mexico, so we can be well positioned to begin production as quickly and as safely as possible,” Dave Clark, president and CEO of URI, said.

URI had options of applying to U.S. EPA for the permit or challenging the decision before the full Appellate Court.

HRI acquired the land within the Navajo Nation’s Churchrock Chapter from United Nuclear Corp., which had purchased it from the United States in 1970. At that time, HRI also purchased UNC’s patents for uranium-mining claims on the Section 8 land.

The company has a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license to mine 15 million pounds of in-place mineralized uranium material at Churchrock using in situ recovery methods, which opponents contend will contaminate ground water.

An effective UIC permit from the appropriate governmental agency is the final permit needed before development can begin, according to URI.

The Navajo Nation imposed a ban on uranium mining and milling within Navajo Indian Country in April 2005, the same year HRI requested the underground injection control permit from the state Environment Department to operate the Section 8 mine in McKinley County, approximately 11 miles southwest of Gallup.

As a result, the state Environment Department formally requested EPA make a decision on the Indian Country status of Section 8 land, with the underlying issue being which was the appropriate agency to consider the permit application.

On Feb. 6, 2007, EPA found that Churchrock Chapter, which includes Section 8, is a “dependent Indian community” and that EPA was the proper authority to issue the permit.

According to the 2000 Census, more than 97 percent of the chapter’s residents are Navajo and most of the non-Indians living within the chapter are married to Navajos.

URI has 183,000 acres of uranium mineral holdings and 101.4 million pounds of in-place mineralized uranium material in New Mexico.

   

    


Reprinted as an historical reference document under the Fair Use doctrine of international copyright law. http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html