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.
|