Coconino Co. Supervisors, Greens Slam Uranium Mining Report For Grand Canyon Region

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The Coconino County Board of Supervisors, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, Grand Canyon Wildlands Council and Grand Canyon Trust are all questioning estimates that mining in northern Arizona could employ hundreds directly and thousands indirectly -- saying those figures appear greatly inflated.

These groups all support putting federal land bordering the Grand Canyon off-limits to new uranium mines for 20 years. It's a scenario that would allow perhaps 11 existing mines to open instead of 30 and end new exploration rather than permitting more than 700 sites to be explored.

These questions have growing significance this summer because a 2-year-old moratorium on new uranium mining issued by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar expires in mid-July, opening the door for mining exploration to resume across about 1 million acres. An Interior spokeswoman said she did not know when Salazar might make a decision on the issue.

"The problem with this area is that there are more unknowns than knowns -- especially north of the canyon, there is a huge area where the science has not been done to determine how groundwater is moving," said Alicyn Gitlin, of the Sierra Club.

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http://www.azdailysun.com/news/local/article_4a7626d9-536e-5a00-8a9f-1dee5a15bfcf.html