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AREVA’s uranium enrichment plant a danger to Idaho’s groundwater

Areva uranium enrichment plant in Idaho would threaten aquifer, Beyond Nuclear, 28 May 2010, The $2 billion in federal loan guarantees just awarded to Areva by the U.S. Department of Energy for a new uranium enrichment plant in Idaho, will produce depleted uranium (half-life of 4.5 billion years) and will threaten the Snake River Aquifer, say leaders of the Snake River Alliance.

Areva plans to build a new uranium enrichment plant “on the upstream end of the Snake River Aquifer a few miles east of the Idaho National Laboratory,” stated the Alliance in a press release. “INL’s nuclear activities have already contaminated the aquifer and have left substantial radioactive waste behind. Addressing these environmental challenges has already cost billions of taxpayer dollars and will continue for decades”.

Depleted uranium, a by-product of enrichment, is used in weaponry and leaves toxicity on the battlefield that is dangerous for longer than geological time. Devastating – but often disputed – health effects have been found in communities in Bosnia, Kuwait and Iraq where DU weapons have been used. To move ahead with the enrichment plant, Areva will first need to get a combined construction and operating license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, an agency with a perfect record in rubber-stamping such permits.

May 29, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, water | antinuclear, AREVA, depleted, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear secrecy, nuclear technology, nuclear wastes, radiation, radioactive, uranium