Hundreds of long-abandoned uranium mines dotting western states and dug in the early days of World War II have, and continue to, cost mining operators, and their successors billions in litigation-fueled cleanup costs.
Some environmental groups are also suing to stop new uranium drilling near three national parks. They predict similar toxic legacies, resulting in massive remediation costs and, like at the war-time sites, health risks posed by toxic tailings of radon, radium and thorium.
“These are high-exposure cases—we’re talking about uranium here,” Superfund litigator William Ruskin, of the William Ruskin Law Office in Rye Brook, N.Y., said of abandoned war-era mines.
But whether the new drilling proposed near Grand Canyon National Park, Bears Ears National Monument, and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument really poses similar risks depends on who you ask...