From The Telluride Watch (Karen James):
…well over 200 people attended a public hearing held by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment in Nucla last Thursday evening, the majority in support of a radioactive materials license application presently under the agency’s consideration…
Colorado is among 37 “agreement states” to which federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission transfers authority to regulate and license uranium. As a result the CDPHE is in the process of conducting a 12 to14-month comprehensive technical review of the license application. The mill cannot be built without the license approval.
According to a presentation by Frank Filas, environmental manager for Energy Fuels, the mill would process 500 tons of ore daily (hopefully expanding to handle 1,000 tons of ore daily at a future point). At 500 tons per day capacity it would produce 770,000 pounds of uranium oxide annually – enough to produce 1,500 megawatts of electricity each year, he said. Additionally, it would produce 2.7 million pounds of vanadium oxide annually for use in steel production. The mill, sited in the Uravan Mineral Belt, would operate seven days a week, 350 days a year, for an operating life of 40 years. It would use 144 gallons of water per minute to process the ore.