Uranium's everywhere in Virginia

Virginia Uranium isn’t the only entity in our state that owns land containing uranium. Uranium is found in many, many places around Virginia — and the world, for that matter.

But the 119 million pounds of uranium under Coles Hill has been studied and verified. Geologists are certain of how much of the ore is there and how much it’s worth.

"We have more uranium than anybody else in the United States," Virginia Uranium’s project manager, Patrick Wales, told The Associated Press. "We’ve got our hands full with that right now."

As Virginia continues to struggle with the question of whether to allow uranium mining and the milling that turns the raw ore into the more valuable yellowcake, opponents have raised the specter that VUI or other companies could set up mines and even mills in other parts of the Dan River Region — and around the commonwealth. They even point to the old leases that Marline had in the early 1980s as proof that there’s a lot more uranium available for mining.

Ironically, it’s the moratorium on uranium mining that has kept some of those questions from being answered. With the moratorium in place, it makes no financial sense for a mining company to expend the kind of money, time and effort to find the next Coles Hill in Virginia.

If the moratorium were lifted, that would certainly encourage VUI or other mining companies to look for more uranium deposits. But it’s one thing to find uranium, and quite another to find enough of it of sufficient quality and quantity to make a new mining project economically feasible.

"Having the correct geology that could host a uranium deposit is one thing, but actually having the uranium deposit there is very different," Robert Bodnar, a Virginia Tech geologist, told the AP. "Until you start to actually dig a hole in the ground, you don’t really know what you have."

Coles Hill has actually been studied twice, the first time by Marline during the late 1970s and early ’80s. But it’s highly unlikely that the thousands of feet of core samples would have been taken from the ground if Marline had known Virginia would eventually place a moratorium on uranium mining.

Now the question for Virginia is whether this industry can be trusted with the health and safety of the people, animals, land and water beyond the borders of its own property — a case that hasn’t been made yet.

But let’s not pretend that the debate over uranium mining and milling is only a debate about Virginia Uranium’s project at Coles Hill. If there is demand for uranium and Virginia allows VUI to move forward with its project, the entire uranium mining industry will be taking a good, long look at other parts of the Dan River Region — and the state.