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Uranium speculation skyrockets
Dolores County’s claims rise from 396 to 5,399 in one year
May 14, 2008
By Stephanie Paige Ogburn | Cortez Journal
More than 6,500 new uranium claims were filed on Dolores district
public lands last year as prospectors and corporations reacted to a
sharp increase in the mineral's prices.
The claims are located on U.S. Bureau of Land Management property
administered by the Dolores Public Lands office, primarily in northwest
Dolores and southwest San Miguel counties.
In Dolores County, uranium claims rose from 396 in 2006 to 5,399 in
2007, the latest year for which data is available. In San Miguel
County, claims were at 1,119 in 2006 and 2,633 in 2007.
Information for the number of claims filed in Montezuma County was not
available earlier this week, but Dolores Public Lands Manager Steve
Beverlin said he did not believe there were many.
As for La Plata County, the figures are much easier to obtain: There are no uranium claims.
"Where a mineral doesn't occur, you don't put a mine," said Bob Oswald,
environmental protection specialist for the Colorado Division of
Reclamation Mining and Safety in Durango. "The known trend of (uranium)
deposits in the state doesn't include La Plata County."
The price of uranium, which is tracked by private organizations because
there is no formal commodity exchange for the substance, has rapidly
increased over the last four years. From 1989 to 2004, uranium prices
ranged from about $7 to $15 per pound, according to the Ux Consulting
Co., the group that the industry relies on to track prices.
By the end of 2004, though, the price was up to almost $20 per pound,
and in early 2007, prices reached $130 per pound. The market has
stabilized a bit now, with uranium's price per pound at $63.
Most of the claims filed in 2007 are not active, Beverlin said. He knew
of only a couple of claims that were being actively mined, likely those
owned by Denison Mines Corp. Denison, the uranium mining company that
owns the White Mesa Uranium Mill in Blanding, Utah, opened three mines
in San Miguel County in 2007, said Ron Hochstein, president and chief
operating officer of the company.
"It's new activity," he said.
In late April of this year, Denison began shipping material from the
new mines, which are underground operations, to the White Mesa mill.
This is the first time since 1999 the mill has processed conventional
ore, Hochstein said.
The mill processes 2,000 tons of ore a day, and Hochstein expects it to
produce between 1.4 million and 1.7 million pounds of uranium in the
form of yellowcake, or U3O8, this year. Last year, the mill produced
about 100,000 pounds of uranium from sources known as alternate
feedstocks, which are substances like mill tailings from other
decommissioned mills and mining sites.
The total amount of uranium produced in the United States last year was
just more than 4 million pounds, Hochstein said. That uranium was
produced mostly by in-situ uranium mines, which remove uranium directly
from the ground, eliminating the ore-processing step that mills
traditionally perform.
The yellowcake that White Mesa mill produces makes up just the first
step in a long conversion process that eventually transforms the
uranium ore, mined out of the ground, into U235, which can be used in
nuclear reactors, Hochstein said.
Denison's mines are located in Big Gypsum Valley, and most of the
mining claims are on Bureau of Land Management property in that valley
and in the Lower Dolores River corridor around Slickrock, Beverlin said.
Beverlin said the jump in claims recently when the San Juan Public
Lands office put together a report on the number of leases for 2007.
"We knew it was coming just because of the prices (of uranium)," he said.
Global supply of uranium has dropped as old stocks are used up, while
demand has steadily increased, Hochstein said. Denison, which operates
the only operating uranium mill in the United States, sells its uranium
to utility companies in Asia and Europe.
Herald Staff Writer Ted Holteen contributed to this report.
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