Rum jungle uranium mine
| Rum jungle uranium mine | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| General information about the mine | |||
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| other names | Browns Oxide Project | ||
| Mining technology | Open pit | ||
| Information about the mining company | |||
| Operating company | Enterprises Pty Ltd | ||
| Start of operation | 1950 | ||
| End of operation | 1971 | ||
| Funded raw materials | |||
| Degradation of | Uranium ore | ||
| Geographical location | |||
| Coordinates | 12 ° 59 ′ 0 ″ S , 131 ° 1 ′ 0 ″ E | ||
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| Location | Batchelor | ||
| territory | Northern Territory | ||
| Country | Australia | ||
The Rum Jungle uranium deposit in the Northern Territory , Australia was discovered in 1949. It is located 65 kilometers south of Darwin on the East Finniss River .
The uranium mine , which began operations in 1953, was closed in 1971. Uranium mining was only used to supply uranium to the United States and Great Britain for the manufacture of nuclear weapons until 1963 .
The radioactive overburden on the mine site and the waste at Rum Jungle Creek South , Mt Burron and Mt Fitch have not been finally disposed of safely to this day. The disused open pit mine is one of the worst water polluters in all of Australia. Huge amounts of radioactive waste have been left behind in uranium mining. The Australian and Northern Territory governments have been pursuing redevelopment planning since 2009, which should not be completed until 2016.
Discovery story
Uranium mineralization was first discovered in the Rum Jungle area in 1869 by the expedition led by the explorer George Goyder . In 1913, two deep boreholes were driven into the local copper deposit to determine the size of the ore deposit for future exploitation. The copper mining was not started at that time.
In 1948 the Australian government advertised a price of £ 25,000 for a successful uranium search on their territory. At that time there was a great need for uranium for the construction of atomic bombs. On August 11, 1949, the prospector and local farmer John (Jack) Michael White discovered this uranium deposit. The area was freehold at the time . He secured the claim for £ 1000 in October 1950. He acquired additional property there in September 1952. He received the entire advertised price in several installments from the government. It cannot be ruled out that Aboriginal white stones with the yellow traces of uranium mineralization from the discovery area showed without recognizing the intrinsic value, which was quite common at the time.
In March 1952, representatives of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (USAEC) and the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) came to Australia - among other questions - to discuss the use of this uranium deposit with the Australian government. This led to the establishment of a Combined Development Agency (CDA). The CDA and the Australian government signed an exclusive supply agreement for uranium from the rum jungle mine. The uranium supplies from 1954 to January 1963 were used exclusively for the production of nuclear weapons.
Original uranium mine
In 1952 the Australian government financed the construction of a mine and the associated processing plant to make uranium oxide concentrate available for the CDA, a joint agency of the United States and Great Britain. The contract for the supply of uranium ran from 1953 to 1962. At the time, Rum Jungle was the largest industrial facility in the Northern Territory. The Australian government was responsible for the mine through the Australian Atomic Energy Commission (AAEC) . Operation of the mine, however, was transferred to Territory Enterprises Pty Ltd , a subsidiary of the Rio Tinto Group .
A city for the staff was established eight kilometers south in Batchelor .
Ecological damage
History of the redevelopment
When the mine closed in 1971, the AAEC - now known as the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organization (ANSTO) - decided that the mine site should not be rehabilitated. The mining company Conzinc , part of the Rio Tinto Group and operator of the Ranger uranium mine in Kakadu National Park , has repeatedly rejected any responsibility for the remediation. This resulted in the abandoned open pit becoming one of the worst water polluters in all of Australia. Due to the oxidation of sulfides by bacteria and the resulting release of acids and heavy metals into the East Finniss River . The considerable rainfall of 1,500 mm annually, together with pyritic mineralization, created ideal conditions for this process.
A first attempt to clean up the Rum Jungle was made in 1977. First a working group was set up to investigate the possibilities of sustainable renovation. An AUD $ 16.2 million program was started in 1983 to remove heavy metals and render tailings harmless.
One of the major problems with the rehabilitation of the Rum Jungle Creek South (RJCS) open pit mine was that the hole in the ground quickly filled with water after uranium mining stopped. This lake, the only body of water in the area that was not contaminated by crocodiles , quickly became a recreational area for both locals and residents of Darwin. Even after the mine was closed, increased gamma radiation , radioactive dust and significantly increased radon levels were measured in the air. But it wasn't until the late 1980s that something changed. The limit values for radioactive radiation had been adjusted again and again over the course of time, so that at that time the level of pollution was officially classified as unsafe and harmful for the first time. As a result, a $ 1.8 million program was started in 1990 to clean up the spoil heaps at Rum Jungle Creek South .
One of the biggest environmental problems with uranium mining is the huge amounts of radioactive waste (tailing) that is left on the mine site. The largest proportion of radioactive elements is uranium-238, an isotope with a half-life of 4.46 billion years. In 2003, the government investigated the remedial measures taken in 1990, with covers on the tailings to prevent the dangerous material from entering washed out by rain and released into the environment. However, it turned out that these measures, actually intended for 100 years, had already failed after less than 20 years. Since then, the Northern Territory and the Australian government have been arguing about who has to pay for the financing of the remedial measures of the polluted East Finniss River. The pollution of the groundwater has not yet been discussed.
Current renovation planning
On October 7, 2009, the Australian and Northern Territory governments signed a partnership called the National Partnership Agreement . A concept for the implementation of the environmental remediation of the consequences of the rum jungle mine operation should be developed within four years. It should include studies of successful remediation taking into account environmental, cultural, financial and technical aspects. The costs of the study amounted to 7,048,000 AUD . The project, known as Stage 1, was completed on May 30, 2013.
On August 19, 2013, a so-called Project Agreement of the Council of Australian Governments was signed by the two above-mentioned governments in a second stage . It is the Project Agreement for the Management of the former Rum Jungle Mine Site (Stage 2) . The project includes developing a plan to remediate the environment around the mine’s ruins and remove waste from the area at Rum Jungle Creek South , Mt Burron and Mt Fitch . The project objective is the decision for an effective technical renovation and the determination of the resulting renovation costs. The traditional landowners, the Kungarakan and Warai Aborigines , are also continuously involved in this partnership . The project agreement should be completed on June 30, 2016. The planning costs are A $ 12.4 million.
Brown's Oxide Project
In December 2001, Compass Resources applied for - under the EPBC Act of Environment Australia (now the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities ) - for a large-scale open pit mine, the Browns Polymetallic Project , which will run over a period of 15 years Should mine lead , cobalt , copper , nickel and silver near the old Rum Jungle Mine . In the 2001 proposal, Compass also suggested that the Browns Polymetallic Project be a nuclear project under the EPBC Act , on the basis that the project could include the rehabilitation of the facility from a previous uranium mine.
Compass Resources , however, stopped efforts to apply for the project when, in 2002, low raw material prices caused a Compass donor to withdraw.
In 2005 Compass Resources submitted a new application, this time for a significantly smaller mining project, which was limited to the extraction of cobalt, nickel and copper. Due to the significantly lower financial framework of the Browns Oxide Project , Compass was able to carry out the project itself without a partner.
The Northern Territory government has passed a ruling on the application and has determined that the Browns Oxide Project can be carried out without unacceptable environmental impact.
The project is scheduled to start in early 2007, subject to the approval of the Australian federal government. Since 2008, Compass Resources has received Northern Territory government approval to mine copper, cobalt, nickel, lead and zinc and has begun construction of the processing facilities. Open pit and underground mining of ore in the existing mine has been approved for approximately 20 years. There is no permit for uranium mining.
Web links
- Adrienne Francis: Renewed activity around Rum Jungle . In: ABC Rural: Northern Territory , Australian Broadcasting Corporation , February 22, 2006. Retrieved February 11, 2011.
- Adrienne Francis: Minerals Council defends uranium industry . In: ABC Rural: Northern Territory , Australian Broadcasting Corporation, February 28, 2006. Retrieved February 11, 2011.
- ACF's Submission on the Browns Oxide Project (NT) . Australian Conservation Foundation . 2005. Retrieved March 16, 2006.
- NTNe.ws . In: collection of news articles and media releases about rum jungle . 2007. Retrieved February 11, 2011.
- Rum Jungle data on Mindat.org
- Rum Jungle mine site, Department of Resources at Government of the Northern Territory
Individual evidence
- ↑ Rum Jungle Mine History - Discovery and Exploration ( Memento of the original from November 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English), accessed November 8, 2014
- ↑ Rum Jungle , accessed on November 8, 2014
- ↑ Taylor, G. Spain, A. Nefiodovas, A. Timms, G. Kuznetsov, V. Bennett, J .: Determination of the reasons for deterioration of the Rum Jungle waste rock cover (PDF; 2.2 MB) In: Australian Center for Mining Environmental Research . 2003. Archived from the original on February 19, 2011. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved February 11, 2011.
- ^ Department of Infrastructure, Planning and Environment: Rum Jungle Monitoring Report 1993-1998 . In: Technical Report 2002/1 . Pp. 176-9. 2002. Archived from the original on March 13, 2011. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved February 11, 2011.
- ↑ The continuing Rum Jungle dilemma: accounting for ground-surface water interactions in AMD polluted systems ( Memento of the original from December 20, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ index.cfm? Header = Rum% 20Jungle% 20Home Overview of the former Rum Jungle mine site ( Memento of the original from November 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English), at nt.gov.au, accessed November 8
- ↑ Project Agreement for the Management of the former Rum Jungle Mine Site (Stage 2) on nt.gov.au. ( Memento of the original from November 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English), accessed November 8, 2014
- ↑ Brown's Oxide - Natural Resources, Environment and the Arts ( Memento of the original of September 6, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Browns Sulphide Project on nt.gov.au pp. 1 and 6 ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English), accessed November 7, 2015
