The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Radiation Protection Division works to address hazards posed by technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive materials (TENORM). As one part of EPA’s efforts to characterize risk from TENORM sources and to identify where TENORM problems may exist, we have been investigating the potential environmental hazards of wastes from abandoned uranium mines in the western United States. Between the 1940s and 1990s, thousands of uranium mines operated in the United States, mostly in the western continental U.S., leaving a legacy of potential radiological and chemical hazards.
In order to help us identify where potential problems may occur, we have compiled mine location information from federal, state, and Tribal agency partners to develop a database that can be used with geographic information system (GIS) software. Most mines producing uranium as a primary commodity are, or were located, in Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico and Arizona, and are typically on federal and Tribal lands. The current number of locations associated with uranium, as identified in the EPA database, is around 15,000. Of these uranium locations, over 4,000 are mines
having documented production.
Uranium mines, particularly conventional type operations, have the potential to become health hazards if they are not appropriately closed. Three uranium mines presently are on the National Priorities List (Superfund), while others are in the EPA Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Information System (CERCLIS) hazardous waste database. The database does not reflect the current reclamation status of the approximately 15,000 uranium locations.
The focus of this Uranium Location Database (ULD) compilation is the western United States. Because most uranium mining occurred in the western United States, and this Agency effort coincided with a Colorado Plateau initiative in the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Region 8 office in Denver, Colorado, the initial database compilation efforts were focused there. Working cooperatively with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Forest Service (FS), EPA regional offices, Navajo Nation, and state agency offices, multiple western state databases have been incorporated into the master database. The U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Minerals Availability System/Minerals Industry Location System (MAS/MILS) and Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) (McFaul et al. 2000) databases are also included (uranium locations identified in the eastern U.S. and Alaska are solely based on these two databases).
Even though these national data sets are presented, it is the different state and more local federal databases that make the data in this effort more comprehensive than the previously released national data sets. Efforts were made to eliminate redundant records, and steps were taken to determine the accuracy of the data and their reliability. A master database is included that represents the result of these efforts. However, the individual databases are included separately as well. The database was included as part of the peer review of two other technical reports by EPA (U.S. EPA 2006a, 2006b) discussed briefly below.
In this document, we provide some background on uranium mining, list the contents of the master database and the component databases, present some maps (see figures at the end of the document) for comparing the extent of the databases, and include a limited discussion on the data. Separate documents provide additional information on the database, including the metadata for the database. Some of this information, e.g., the metadata, is taken from documentation of the compact disc (CD) and has been edited and provided in this document for ease of use and readability.
Introduction
This technical report was developed as part of a larger effort to examine the potential hazards of wastes generated during the mining and processing of uranium, and particularly those wastes known as Technologically Enhanced Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (TENORM). Information collected and analyzed in that effort will be presented in two additional reports. The first of those volumes, entitled Technologically Enhanced Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (TENORM) from Uranium Mining: Volume I: Mining and Reclamation Background (U.S. EPA 2006a) will provide background information on the occurrence, mining, and reclamation of uranium mines and mills. The second volume entitled Technologically Enhanced Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (TENORM) from Uranium Mining: Volume II: Investigation of Potential Health, Geographic, and Environmental Issues of Abandoned Uranium Mines (2006b), will evaluate, in a general way, potential radiogenic cancer and environmental risks posed by abandoned uranium
mines.
In these technical reports, Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORM) is defined as: Materials which may contain any of the primordial radionuclides or radioactive elements as they occur in nature, such as radium, uranium, thorium, potassium, and their radioactive decay products, that are undisturbed as a result of human activities. Radiation levels presented by NORM are generally referred to as a component of “natural background radiation”. The term Technologically Enhanced Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (TENORM) is defined as: Naturally occurring radioactive materials that have been concentrated or exposed to the accessible environment as a result of human activities such as manufacturing, mineral extraction, or water processing.
“Technologically enhanced” means that the radiological, physical, and chemical properties of the radioactive material have been altered through having been processed (or beneficiated) or disturbed in a way that increases the potential for human and/or environmental exposures. The definition of TENORM used in EPA’s reports does not include Atomic Energy Act materials.
Under the Atomic Energy Act, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) regulates operations which produce and concentrate uranium and thorium. In accordance with terminology of the Act, the NRC has defined in 10 CFR 40.4 “source materials” as 1) uranium or thorium, or any combination thereof, in any physical or chemical form or (2) ores which contain by weight one-twentieth of one percent (0.05%) or more of: (i) uranium, (ii) thorium or (iii) any combination thereof.
Source material does not include special nuclear material. It also defines the “byproduct materials” (wastes) of those operations as tailings or wastes produced by the extraction or concentration of uranium or thorium from any ore processed primarily for its source material content, including discrete surface wastes resulting from uranium solution extraction processes. Underground ore bodies depleted by such solution extraction operations do not constitute “byproduct material” within this definition. Byproduct materials are also regulated by the NRC. However, certain types of waste from conventional mining of uranium (surface and underground mining) are not subject to NRC regulation, and are considered to be TENORM. Thus, while these reports include information about uranium extraction, processing methods and wastes, only the wastes from conventional mining are considered to be TENORM, and subject to EPA and state agency oversight.
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