Sunday March 16, 2008, 4:31 pm
The Centre for Biological Diversity, the Sierra Club and the Grand Canyon Trust have filed a joint suit in the US District Court in Prescott, Arizona, claiming the government approved drilling without full environmental reviews and in so doing violated several environmental and other laws.

"Grand Canyon simply isn't the place for uranium development," said Taylor McKinnon of the Centre for Biological Diversity. "Our national treasures deserve better than the calamity of an adjacent industrial zone."

The suit claims the Forest Service violated the National Environmental Policy Act and others when it approved exploration using the least rigorous analysis available to the agency. This analysis, the environmentalists say, failed to consider the controversy attending uranium development, the significance of its proximity to the Grand Canyon, and the cumulative impacts of four other future uranium exploration projects and the potential opening of Denison Corporation's Canyon Mine – all located in the same area.

Fuelled by the fifteen-fold price increase in uranium during the past eight years, planned development has increased enormously on federal lands immediately south of the canyon. The boom provoked a unanimous resolution from the Coconino County Board of Supervisors earlier in the year opposing uranium development around the Grand Canyon – the Vane exploration specifically – and supporting congressional efforts to protect the area from development.

"Some places should be off-limits to noise, heavy- equipment traffic, drilling and potential contamination from uranium exploration and drilling," said Dave Gowdey, from the Grand Canyon Trust.

The court action follows a letter from the same groups outlining legal problems with the approval and requesting that the Forest Service withdraw it. A spokeswoman for the Kaibab National Forest said it had followed the rules in allowing the exploration.

The Vane spokeswoman said it had gone through all the correct procedures. At any site where uranium was mined, the area would be restored to its original states, she said.

Concerns about the Grand Canyon's environmental health are being aired in a new film narrated by Robert Redford – as reported in yesterday's Independent – which highlights threats to the Colorado river at the canyon's base.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 4:34 pm
Good story. Noted with thanks Boots.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 4:52 pm
Noted, tnx Boots.
Now why do English companies do drilling projects in the Grand Canyon Trust
There must have been some political approval, either localy, or from the national government.
Another example of strange things, happening nowadays.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:09 pm
Noted/is there no end to the damage of uranium? If it is mined for power plants, then the depleted left overs will be used in weapons and protective armor on tanks etc. All of which is pollution for the DNA of any and all who come in contact, with earth etc. People you must stand against the "powers that be" or your desendents will end up looking like the underground workers of evil, of Tolkein's Two Towers, The Rings. Do you really want to Great Grandparent to things that look like ORKS?????

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:14 pm
When the Gov't created the Pine Ridge Saga it was for the extraction of uranium, and the taking away from the Native Americans their rights. Time people figured out the Bank of England and the illegal Federal Reserve own this country. And I bet you thought the British lost the war.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:19 pm
Nope Martin knew the British did not lose the war...seems we are all still under their thumb some way. Maybe we ought to go mining around stonehenge.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:21 pm
This really bites it, Robert. sad very sad.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:31 pm
they should not hurt the enviorment protect the animals

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:34 pm
What really gets me is that a vast number of people from all over the world go to National Parks for vacation with their family or friends. Just like the Great Smokey Mountains here in Tennessee, it has millions of vistors a year. In most of our Parks there's hiking, serenity, camping, untold majestic beauty, and ancient forests.

Now the Power's that be and the Corportacracy, are wanting to privatize, commercialize, drill, mountain top removal, clear cut, build roads and do everything in their power to plunder and destroy what so many people cherish. And the deadly uranium which could lead up to the extinction of all living life...nuclear bombs etc.

Like the illicit War with Iraq...that is all lies, and the people's love of nature, when are we goming to rebel? It is insane, and bu$hCo is still called Mr. President. Can you believe that???

Sunday March 16, 2008, 5:52 pm
I am sick and tired of our beautiful lands, forests, etc being put in jeopardy all because people want to make more money on a commodity! People sell their souls to the devil for MONEY! Why can't they appreciate all the beauty around us instead of putting it on the chopping block? Uranium (or any other 'thing') will NEVER replace the awesomeness of a mountain or a forest filled with wildlife!

Sunday March 16, 2008, 6:25 pm
ANOTHER SAD STORY...NOTED, RIV.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 6:34 pm
Another piece of beautb that will be destroyed because of greed. Why can they not leave some things alone in this worle do they have to destroy every thing? This shows me again our goverment does not care period. noted with sadness.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 6:39 pm
Thanks Boots..great story and very worthy/noted Duely...K

Sunday March 16, 2008, 8:33 pm
Commodity speculation is thought to have pushed up the price, which has risen from around $7 per pound in 2000, to more than $100 per pound today.

And when the element of money
is introduced, then it's okay
to say the environment be
damned!
The Bush mis-Administration
has been waging war on the
global environment every bit
as much as it has on Afghanistan
and Iraq. We absolutely cannot
allow John "McSame" to win in
November!!

Sunday March 16, 2008, 8:33 pm
Thanks, Boots.
noted.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 8:41 pm
Noted. Have been following this since the legal action has started. Thanx for the post

Sunday March 16, 2008, 9:33 pm
Thanks, BOOTS...Noted. I Sign For Preservation Of ALL Of the Wilderness-Lands that Still Make "America The Beautiful." Signed Up For Letter On Preserving Natural Resources Also.

Sunday March 16, 2008, 9:52 pm
Thanks Boots This is just madness. It's all money, we are losing so much.

Monday March 17, 2008, 1:52 am
Without doubt, this is the very worse administration the USA has ever had. I can't believe he is still in office.

Monday March 17, 2008, 4:57 am
thanks noted.

Monday March 17, 2008, 6:49 am
Received this email from a friend -- very provocative.

**********************

Happy to see so many are involved in this one. I got a message from a friend in London who said we should be checking to see who REALLY own this British company. As I have seen and now my friend reminds me, MANY of the companies coming in from over seas to mine are actually USA owned companies taking advantage of the overseas name and tax or whatever... they try to avoid their "local" responsibilities this way. Might be interesting if someone could find out this company was REALLY owned by a U.S. firm!
hugs and blessings,
Wahela

Monday March 17, 2008, 6:49 am
OMG!! Can't certain Humans just leave things alone!!!!!! Disgusting!!!!!

Monday March 17, 2008, 8:50 am
Thanks! I want to vomit everytime I read new ways they want to destroy everything that is precious and beautiful, for money and power of course. Mining for uranium anywhere is a BAD idea in itself..but near the Grand Canyon and the Colorado?! I'm not shocked by anything anymore. Sometimes it's just feels hopeless..The "Forest Circus", what a joke! We need a whole new system before everything is destroyed beyond repair. It's too much.

Monday March 17, 2008, 8:56 am
The article states that The U.S. Forestry Service gave permission in December (last year?). WHO and WHAT is the U.S. Forestry Service? With whom does it confer - is this a single bureaucrat making this decision because it pertains to uranium? You can be sure there were considerations of some kind but what are they? There needs to be full public disclosure. I wish the Environmentalist Group well - they may get some interesting documents brought to public light.

Monday March 17, 2008, 9:13 am
Robert, I am extremely upset with our government even considering allowing private, for profit, anti-environment companies "developing" national parks!!! They were aside to never be developed!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday March 17, 2008, 9:26 am
Ominous words from the mining company: "The Vane spokeswoman said it had gone through all the correct procedures. At any site where uranium was mined, the area would be restored to its original states, she said." We've heard it too many times before. Thanks Robert.

Monday March 17, 2008, 11:33 am
Thanks Boots, that's an angle I hadn't thought of. If it is a "British Company",then one thinks it must BE British! This is so typical of this vile government.

Monday March 17, 2008, 11:41 am
Perhaps we should also investigate who owns BRITISH PETROEUM BP Co. ... now drilling in Alaska and wanting to drill in ANWR.

Monday March 17, 2008, 12:09 pm

I don't think we control US Natural Parks anymore. They've all been handed over to the United Nations. Small signs where no one looks when entering these areas, have been going up. Care of U.N............

Monday March 17, 2008, 12:30 pm
Just an extension of this Amazingly Destructive mining 'technique"
called Mountaintop Removal -- Unbelievable -- but it's true

Check out this site:

http://www.appvoices.org/index.php?/site/mtr_overview/

This is the equivalent of Mass Murder-- for generations into the future also

I would have no problem with the chief executives of these companies being locked up for life -- hard labor; let them break big rocks into small rocls with sledge hammers fot the rest of their lives. Oh -- and the next four or five generations of their families too.

They are robbing the very planet out from under us.

Monday March 17, 2008, 4:19 pm
Typical of people to destroy what nature has taken millions of years to perfect.

Monday March 17, 2008, 4:47 pm
I'am sorry but who asked the British company to do this I think you will find it was your own Government through and another American company That did this I would look into it further before you start blaming us Brits.
I have stood by you American people in all that you have asked from me to give you support but now I think I will have other thoughts Please check out all the details of this all jobs are put out to tender and and if the British company won it its was your Government that gave them this.
Please also don't forget that the British armed forces are fighting in Iraq in an Illegal war that it was the American Government started The United Nations did not sanction this war.
an angry Jim W

Monday March 17, 2008, 5:08 pm
I might have been to hastie in my reply but as Robert put it in an E-Mail from the UK in might be an American company trading in Brittian. But I hope you looking into it further.
I 'am sorry for the people that I have upset with my comment.
I like to see all places of natural Beauty preserved I don't like to see anywhere desacrated for the sake of it Why do they want Uraniam?? thats what i would like to know.
A Sorry Jim W

Monday March 17, 2008, 6:05 pm
This makes me sick. I want the Brits out, now! And I want whoever let them in out too!

Monday March 17, 2008, 7:21 pm

Robert thanks for bringing to our attention. Unfortunately this story is only the tip of the 'ice berg' so to speak.

Fuller story found at...
http://www.ewg.org/reports/grandcanyon

In an ominous move, the Forest Service has approved

drilling for uranium at as many as 39 sites near the Grand Canyon’s south rim, marking what may be the beginning of a rush to mine the radioactive mineral near the iconic National Park.

The approvals were granted to VANE Minerals, a British firm, and highlight the vulnerability of even our most sacred places to global demand for minerals under the antiquated Mining Law of 1872. To make matters worse, the Forest Service specifically excluded these projects from public and environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act.

Without changes to the current law or other federal intervention, public land managers have virtually no power to stop metal mining activities – the nation’s leading source of toxic pollution – even when national parks and other treasured places are at risk.

Permits to drill for uranium just outside Grand Canyon National Park are a direct result of surging global metals prices and a related explosion in mining claims across the West since 2003. According to Bureau of Land Management records, claims within five miles of Grand Canyon National Park have increased from 815 last July to 1,130 this January, a jump of nearly 40 percent. Most, if not all, of these claims are for uranium. As of January 2003, there were only 10 claims within five miles of the Park. Overall the number of claims West-wide increased 80 percent between 2003 and 2007 from about 200,000 to more than 375,000.

Under current law this explosion of mining claims presents a real threat to national parks and all public places across the West. The December 20, 2007 Forest Service approval documents [PDF], obtained by the Grand Canyon Trust, describe the situation in stark terms:

"The 1872 Mining Law specifically authorizes the taking of valuable mineral commodities from Public Domain Lands. A ‘No Action’ alternative is not an option that can be considered."


These comments echo the recent testimony of former Forest Service Chief and former director of the Bureau of Land Management, Michael Dombeck, who told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in January that "once claimed, it is nearly impossible to prohibit mining under the current framework of the 1872 Mining Law, no matter how serious the impacts might be."

The House of Representatives passed a metal mining reform bill last fall that would empower the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to prevent mining near places such as the Grand Canyon. The bill’s prospects in the Senate are uncertain even as full-scale uranium mining near the Canyon appears imminent and other National Parks including California’s Death Valley are threatened by a global land rush for minerals.

If the Senate and President Bush fail to act, taxpayers and federal land managers may face the same situation they did in 1996 when the federal government paid $65 million to buy out patented claims just three miles from Yellowstone National Park that would have been the site of a major gold mine. The mine would have been located at the headwaters of three streams that flow into the park.
More Mining Activity Near Grand Canyon Likely

VANE’s uranium drilling approvals may be just the beginning of mining activity near the Grand Canyon. VANE issued a news release about the approval of drilling sites near the Canyon suggesting that it will seek more approvals soon.

"The Company is very encouraged with these approvals and believes it has established a process whereby approvals can be obtained for projects on Forest lands on a timely basis moving forward," the release said. VANE added that it "is presently looking to contract a second rig suitable for breccia pipe drilling in order to accelerate the pipe exploration program." Beccia pipes are a type of uranium deposit found near the Grand Canyon.

The Arizona Game and Fish Department (AGFD) reported last May that approximately 25 companies are staking claims on the Arizona Strip, an area of public land immediately north of Grand Canyon National Park, and six of the 25 have presented formal proposals to the BLM for mining activity.

One of these companies, Quaterra Resources, a Canadian firm, last year proposed to drill exploratory holes for uranium on claims just north of the Canyon. The operation would include a helicopter pad to carry supplies in and out in an area already crisscrossed by dozens of tourist flyovers a day.

Driving the boom is surging global demand that has increased prices for copper, gold, uranium and other metals. Uranium prices have jumped from about $10 a pound in 2004 to approximately $80 a pound today, caused by renewed interest in nuclear power.
Uranium Mining Linked to Contamination of Water, Air

The AGFD reported that it did not know what type of techniques mining companies would use to extract uranium near the Canyon but all of the methods have the potential for radioactive pollution. One possibility is called in situ leach mining in which companies inject chemicals into underground deposits to leach out the uranium. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) found in a recent report that while in situ leaching "in general" is less harmful than traditional uranium mining and milling, "the use of leaching fluids to mine uranium contaminates the groundwater aquifer in and around the region from which the uranium is extracted." The agencies added that "groundwater restoration represents a substantial portion of the cost of decommissioning at a uranium leach mining facility."

The other potential types of uranium mining include open-pit mining and removal of ore from underground mines. Each type of uranium mining has been associated with contamination of ground or surface water the AGFD reported. Such contamination could be an even greater cause for concern because the Colorado River flows through the Grand Canyon and provides drinking water for millions of residents downstream including those in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
Other Parks at Risk

The Board of Supervisors of Coconino County, the county that encompasses much of the land in and around Grand Canyon National Park, unanimously passed a resolution on February 5th opposing uranium development in the vicinity of Grand Canyon National Park and calling for Congress to place federal land near the Canyon off-limits to new mining activity. The County acted at the urging of local citizens and the Grand Canyon Trust which is also supporting broader reform of the mining law.

Even if Coconino County were successful in persuading Congress to withdraw land from new mining activity near the Grand Canyon, federal officials would have to contend with the possibility of mining on valid existing claims near the park and would have to address mining threats to other national parks.

"We are very concerned," Death Valley National Park Supt. James T. Reynolds told the Los Angeles Times in October about the surge in claims near that Park. "I hope the public understands the destruction that will occur. Development will have far-reaching impacts that our grandchildren will have to address."

"Unfortunately, we don't have the authority to stop" any of the claims, Reynolds said, echoing the Forest Service decision to allow drilling for uranium near the Grand Canyon.

Other national parks and monuments with claims staked within five miles include Arches and Canyonlands in Utah, Death Valley and Yosemite in California and Mt. Saint Helens in Washington. While these nearby claims may be the most worrisome for the parks, claims even farther away could also pose problems. Utah’s Bingham Canyon mine, for example, has created a plume of contaminated groundwater that covers 72 square miles according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Death Valley’s Reynolds noted that the biggest threat to Death Valley is the depletion of groundwater, which is affected by mining, farming and nearby residential development. "If too much water is pumped from the aquifer, then the seeps in the springs in Death Valley will no longer flow," he said. "Plants will die, animals will die and they would even have to truck in water to the valley's private resort."

Reynolds told the Los Angeles Times that he is in negotiations with two borite mining companies to convince them to donate their land to the park. Reynolds has strongly opposed the reopening of the Briggs mine, an open-pit cyanide heap leach operation in the Panamint Range on the park's western border. Cyanide heap leaching is a method in which companies place the huge quantities of rock and earth on a plastic-lined heap leach pad and then spray or drip cyanide over the pile. As the cyanide trickles through the heap, it binds to the precious metal. The mining company then collects the metal from the cyanide solution in liquid-filled pits at the base of the rock pile. Canyon Resources, the company that owns the Briggs Mine, has a history of pollution in Montana. Its Kendall Mine was permitted in 1989 and has exceeded water quality standards according to the EPA. Canyon Resources led an unsuccessful attempt in 2004 to overturn a Montana state law, passed by voters in 1998, that bans open-pit cyanide heap leach gold mining. Previously, the company sued the state of Montana for "taking" its potential profits due to passage of the law.

Canyon Resources says on its website that "re-starting the Briggs Mine in light of today's gold market is Canyon's top priority."

Monday March 17, 2008, 7:57 pm

David K....thank you

Monday March 17, 2008, 8:09 pm
I fear that Uranium will be the new "oil" of the future.

Monday March 17, 2008, 8:10 pm
Why do the have to spoil nature ? who need gold etc. when there is nature to enjoy .

Monday March 17, 2008, 9:08 pm
In pursuit of the almighty dollar, nothing is sacred.

Monday March 17, 2008, 9:11 pm
nothing surprises me anymore. i am just glad i'm old & will not see the whole distruction of the world

Monday March 17, 2008, 10:14 pm
Do you want to manipulate the power of electric…
Click on the URL: http://www.heroesmindreader.com/?um=52

Tuesday March 18, 2008, 5:53 am
noted.

Tuesday March 18, 2008, 7:41 am
NOTED THIS IS A PLACE I WENT TO REFLECT LIFE DEATH PLEASE DON'T KILL THE WONDERFUL LAND

Tuesday March 18, 2008, 11:00 am
Thaks to all of you for the great comments, and I was just thinking as red neck as I am, I believe we are witnessing the genesis of the biggest downfall of life on this planet, more than any other time in recorded history.

Tuesday March 18, 2008, 1:35 pm
Very disturbing, as is all the methodical destruction of OUR planet taking place. Noted and thx Robert!

Tuesday March 18, 2008, 9:58 pm

I don't understand why it can not be stopped. I don't get it. Why is it other countries staking these claims.
I am Hot!
And have just enough life left (ha) to get to the bottom of this.
Thank you Al Goreon, for upping the demands for Nuclear Power Plants.

Friday March 21, 2008, 11:30 am
noted

Saturday March 22, 2008, 8:57 pm
They probably want to drill to secure a place inside the canyons in event of a nuclear bomb or maybe WWIII. Bush and all the corruptors know something is about to go down. Ever seen Terminator 3.

Wednesday July 30, 2008, 1:15 pm
Greed greed and more greed