Cleanup a struggle at old Sask. uranium mill, 50 years later

[Oscar]

Cleanup a struggle at old Sask. uranium mill, 50 years later

[ http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/cleanup-a- ... -1.1984848 ]

Published Sunday, August 31, 2014 10:38AM EDT

The closed Lorado uranium mill is shown at the red marker on this Google Maps image of northern Saskatchewan.

Rob Drinkwater, The Canadian Press

EDMONTON -- More than 50 years after a Saskatchewan uranium mill that is a key part of Canada's nuclear history closed, heavy machinery is once again rumbling across the remote northern corner of the province.

But this time workers at the former Lorado mill are cleaning up a massive pile of radioactive, acidic tailings that has poisoned a lake and threatened the health of wildlife and hunters for decades.

"I think we're a lot more environmentally aware than we were 40 or 50 years ago," said Ian Wilson with the Saskatchewan Research Council, which is the Crown-owned company that's carrying out the cleanup.

The Lorado mill is near Uranium City, less than 50 kilometres from the Northwest Territories boundary. It's where uranium mining once supported a community of up to 5,000 people.

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission says the town was one of several in Canada to rise following the Second World War and during a boom in uranium demand that was driven by military needs.

Lorado only operated from 1957 to 1961, but during that time it produced about 227,000 cubic metres of tailings that were dumped beside Nero Lake. The tailings are acidic, according to the environmental impact statement for the cleanup project, and water has run from them into the lake and killed just about everything in it.

Windblown dust from the top of the tailings, the assessment says, also presents "a gamma radiation and radon concern."

Wilson's job is to lead a two-year project in which workers will cover the tailings with a layer of specially engineered sand to prevent water from running over them and into the lake. As well, a lime mixture is to be added to the lake to counteract the acidity.

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The project is controversial.

The Prince Albert Grand Council, which represents a dozen First Nations in central and northern Saskatchewan, said in a written submission for the Lorado and Gunnar projects that many residents favour removal of the tailings rather than covering them up.

The Saskatchewan Environmental Society says more investigation should have been done on the feasibility removing the tailings. It questions how the covering will stand up as climate change delivers more severe weather, and whether government will continue to monitor the sites.

"We always get anxious about safety programs that require monitoring and maintenance over an indefinite period of time," the society wrote in its response to the environmental assessment.

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