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Bill Would Stop Uranium Mining Near Grand Canyon National Park

Bill Would Stop Uranium Mining Near Grand Canyon National Park
FLAGSTAFF, Arizona, January 26, 2009 (ENS) – Congressman Raul Grijalva, an Arizona Democrat, has reintroduced legislation prohibiting new uranium claims, exploration, and mining across one million acres of public lands watersheds surrounding Grand Canyon National Park.

The lands covered by the bill are the last remaining public lands not protected from new uranium development around the park, which extends for 277 miles along the Colorado River in Arizona and receives some five million visitors a year.

The bill protects the Tusayan Ranger District of the Kaibab National Forest south of the canyon, the Kanab Creek watershed north of the park, and House Rock Valley, between Grand Canyon National Park and Vermilion Cliffs National Monument.

………………….”Uranium mining poses one of the greatest risks to Grand Canyon National Park in decades,” said Roger Clark of the Grand Canyon Trust. “It threatens to contaminate park waters with radioactive waste, poses public-health problems for local residents and downstream communities dependent upon the Colorado River, and endangers the park’s unique ecosystems.”

Bill Would Stop Uranium Mining Near Grand Canyon National Park

January 26, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics | antinuclear, nuclear, radioactive, uranium