ISL? Where will the water come from?
Dear editor, When considering “insitu leaching” methods, citizens must be aware of the millions of gallons of water that will be used and contaminated during this “non-mining” process. ISL will use water contaminated in historical mining processes, AND fresh water from our deepest aquifers, essentially our “future” water. How many millions of gallons will be used in the “clean-up”?
In a quick assessment, Nat Chakeres, general counsel in the NM state engineer’s office, outlines “increased water stress” in the next 50 years. There is now less snowpack, violent rainstorms at lower elevations that increases stress on forests, and rising temperatures that increases evaporation of surface waters.
The state water plan predicts a 25 percent decreased flow in rivers and aquifers in the next 50 years, way below levels to meet needs. The 50-year “water security” plan includes clean-up of contaminated groundwater sites and controlling pollution through discharge permitting.
One of the action steps aimed at contaminated groundwater, counts “15 Superfund sites, hundreds of legacy uranium milling sites, federal facilities (Los Alamos National Lab, military institutions), hundreds of petroleum storage tank releases, and up to 200 other pollutant plumes scattered across rural and urban communities where groundwater fails to meet State water quality standards.”
Locally, in four years of mining and milling (1977-1981) the L-Bar disposal site near Seboyeta in Cibola County, 2.1 million tons of ore was processed; 2.1 million tons of radioactive tailings in a 100-acre disposal cell was left at the site. US Department of Energy legacy management report indicates, “seepage of tailings fluid contaminated the First Tres Hermanos aquifer immediately below the disposal cell. The contaminants of concern in groundwater are chloride, nitrate, selenium, sulfate, anduranium. Detection of contaminants and monitoring included extraction of 65 million gallons of groundwater at the site. One million gallons is 3.07-acre feet.
Cibola County citizens can testify to the growing number of 95-degree days, the unpredictability of monsoons, the increased number of dust-storms. Wildfire season is seamless. Lakes across the state cannot “recover”. When the Paguate-Jackpile mine (now a Superfund site) started in the 1950s, the natural springs in the area were the first to disappear. In the last 75 years, the entire West has grown drier. Water aquifers--a crucial part of the groundwater systemcannot be replenished.
Indeed, where will the water come from?
Christine Lowery Chair of the Cibola County Commission Paguate Village