Energy Fuels Announces C$7.1 Million Private Placement. TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - June 4, 2012) - Energy Fuels Inc. (TSX:EFR) ("Energy Fuels" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has entered into an agreement with Dundee Securities Ltd. as lead agent on behalf of a syndicate of agents including Haywood Securities Inc., Scotiabank and Versant Partners Inc. (the "Agents") under which the Agents have agreed to offer for sale, on a best efforts private placement basis, approximately 30,870,000 non-transferrable subscription receipts of the Company ("Subscription Receipts") at a price of C$0.23 per Subscription Receipt for total gross proceeds of approximately C$7,100,100 (the "Offering").
The Agents have been granted the option (the "Option") to sell up to an additional 15% of the Offering, exercisable in whole or in part at any time up to 48 hours before the closing of the Offering which is scheduled for on or about June 21, 2012 (the "Closing Date"). Environment: District court in Colorado nixes state license for proposed Pinon Ridge uranium mill. A district court in Colorado this week invalidated a state license for a controversial uranium mill in the southwestern corner of the state. Communities, conservation groups prevail in lawsuit against Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment By Bob Berwyn SUMMIT COUNTY — Communities and conservation groups in southwestern Colorado won a huge court victory this week, as a Denver District Court judge invalidated a state license for the proposed Piñon Ridge uranium mill. Judge John N. McMullen ruled June 13 that the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment erred by issuing the license to Energy Fuels without public hearings required under the regulatory process.
Pinon Ridge would be the first new rock-crushing uranium mill to be built in the U.S. in 25 years. “We asked for an opportunity to have meaningful public participation and we got it,” said attorney Richard Webster, who represented the towns of Telluride and Ophir in the lawsuit. Read the court ruling here. Nuclear Power Proposal in Utah Reignites a Century-Old Water War. Home Page Title: Utah Nuclear Plan Reignites Water War 'This is Utah's water to use as it sees fit,' says Utah nuclear executive. 'We're not taking water away from anyone.' By David Hasemyer, InsideClimate News For more than 100 years and maybe back to the days of outlaw Butch Cassidy, water from the Green River has nourished fields of sweet watermelons near the tiny town of Green River, Utah. But now a part of that water may be siphoned off for another use: cooling the twin reactors of a nuclear power plant that would tower above the town and its melons.
The nuclear facility is the concept of Blue Castle Holdings , a Utah-based and politically connected upstart nuclear development company that has been working on the project for more than three years. If the $16 billion facility is built, it would generate 3,000 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 3 million households. In an interview with InsideClimate News, Tilton acknowledged that "water is everything" in the West. Nuke Notes: Water rights granted for Utah's Blue Castle project. State engineer completes a two-year process to allocate water for twin nuclear reactors in Green River The State of Utah has granted water rights to the privately-held Blue Castle project which plans to build a nuclear power station that would generate between 2,200 to 3,000 MW of power at a site in Green River, Utah.
The decision allocates 53,600 acre feet of water a year. (Blue Castle press release) Blue Castle CEO Aaron Tilton told the Salt Lake Tribune the decision was expected and that without it the company would not have been able to proceed with its plans. The reactors are slated to be built on a 1,700 acre parcel in an industrial area of Emery County. Tilton told the newspaper the plants could cost $18 billion. Blue Castle officials said they are in the process of preparing an Early Site Permit (ESP) to be submitted to the U.S. Time line to revenue service It isn't clear from the projected power generation numbers whether the Blue Castle Project has settled on a reactor design. Citizens, Groups Condemn Approval of Green River Nuclear Reactor’s Water Rights, Pledge to Continue to Fight Proposal « Mother Earths Moments. Image by cm195902 via Flickr “Pretending there is enough water in the Green River for the power plant is a mistake,” says Bob Quist, the owner of Moki Mac River Expeditions, which leads rafting trips on the Green River.
“It’s bad for my business and bad for everyone that depends on this river.” Blue Castle has already begun the process of applying to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for an “early site permit” and then a “construction and operation license,” which would allow it to begin building its proposed 3,000-megawatt reactors on a site about five miles northwest of the town of Green River. Residents and business people in Green River also condemned the state engineer’s decision. More than 200 groups and individuals from across Utah and beyond filed official comments to the state engineer over the past few years urging him to reject Blue Castle’s bid to draw more than 53,000 acre-feet of water from the Green River.
“By no means are we done fighting this fight,” said Pacenza.
Salt Lake City News - Cover Story: Nuclear Utah Page 1. Posted // October 7,2009 - Mike McCandless grew up playing in the uranium mines of Utah’s Emery County. At 41, he still does, hiking and exploring, wheeling around in his Dodge truck, showing off this unique piece of real estate to recreationists and business people alike. In the Temple Mountain area, the silent, sandstone beauty of the San Rafael Swell is punctuated by tumbleweeds, wind-carved hills and the man-made caves we call mines. McCandless remembers shining a flashlight whose beam never reached the ceiling of one such mine.
It’s just an exciting part of the local history, and McCandless, as the head of Emery County’s planning and zoning, economic development and the travel bureau, wants to share the wealth. Literally and figuratively. Emery County—Green River, specifically—is the chosen site for a future nuclear power plant touted by former Rep. Aaron Tilton, R-Springville, whose holding company, Blue Castle (BlueCastleProject.com), owns and wants to develop the site. New Natural Gas Drilling OK'd in Utah. SALT LAKE CITY (AP via USA Today) -- U.S.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar on Tuesday announced the approval of a major natural gas drilling project in Utah that the Obama administration says will support more than 4,000 jobs during its development while safeguarding critical wildlife habitat and air quality. During an appearance outside Salt Lake City, Salazar said Texas-based Anadarko Petroleum (APC) would be allowed to develop up to 3,675 new gas wells over the next decade in eastern Utah. "It will help power the American economy," Salazar said. The move comes at a time when the Obama administration is under fire from critics who say his energy plan falls short and is hurting job growth and the economy with undue opposition to new drilling. The administration says the attacks are political rhetoric. Natural gas production in the U.S. grew by more than 7 percent in 2011, according to the U.S.
Salazar and U.S. "Anadarko is one of those companies that get it," Abbey said. While Sen. First Nations Development Institute Receives $50,000 Grant | firstnations.org. First Nations Development Institute Receives $50,000 Grant {*style:<b>First Nations Development Institute Receives $50,000 Grant from The Christensen Fund to Help Strengthen Native Food Systems for Tribes of the Colorado Plateau </b>*} LONGMONT, Colorado (May 14, 2012) – First Nations Development Institute ( ) today announced it has received a $50,000 grant from that will be used to strengthen control of local food systems in Native communities located on the Colorado Plateau. The Colorado Plateau is a large geographic area in the “Four Corners” region of the United States, covering parts of Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico.
First Nations’ efforts will focus on building the capacity and management expertise of Native organizations that are working toward locally controlled and sustainable food systems. “This is a continued extension of First Nations’ work under our Native Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative,” said Michael E. Roberts, president of First Nations.
Earth Notes: Osprey | KNAU Arizona Public Radio. They’re sometimes called fish eagles, for good reason: their diet is almost all live fish. They’re big raptors, hard to miss soaring above the scattered rivers and lakes of the Southwest’s high country. They’re ospreys, birds that belong to the summer skies of the Colorado Plateau. With a six-foot-wingspan, snow-white belly, and dark wrist on crooked wings, ospreys are hard to miss. They return to the Southwest each spring from wintering grounds in Mexico and Central America. Upon arrival they go right to work building, or remodeling, bulky nests of twigs high in old ponderosas—or on top of power poles. Birder Elaine Morrall has kept track of osprey nests in northern Arizona for twenty-five years.
The female bird lays two or three eggs, and will incubate them for about a month. It’s mesmerizing to watch osprey fish. Land Lines-The East Kaibab Monocline | KNAU Arizona Public Radio. The cool pine-scented air of the Kaibab Plateau at 8,000 feet is a respite on a hot day. You might want to stop at Jacob Lake Lodge for one of the best chocolate milkshakes this side of Grand Canyon. Stretch your legs, take a last slurp of that ‘shake, then pedal on down the hill on Highway 89A.
The road’s fairly level at first, but heading east it plunges downhill past yellow-belly ponderosas, through pinyon and juniper, toward sagebrush below, dropping three thousand feet in a hurry. The reason for this impressive hill--the East Kaibab Monocline. The monocline is a gigantic wrinkle that bends the surface of the Colorado Plateau. It looks for all the world like a humpbacked ocean wave rushing to the east.
Fifteen miles from Jacob Lake, pull into the overlook above House Rock Valley for a textbook view of the fold. Kaibab Limestone dominates this panorama, a cream-colored fossil-ridden rock capping the fold and continuing out across House Rock Valley. John Wesley Powell: Soldier, Explorer, Scientist. The thirty-three founders of the National Geographic Society were an adventurous and accomplished group. They included scientists, explorers, a journalist and a superintendent of the National Zoo. In recognition of the National Geographic Society’s upcoming 125th anniversary this series takes a look at their stories.
By Mark Collins Jenkins John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) was once described as “a somewhat rough and striking figure, with tumultuous hair and beard.” His own sister considered him the homeliest man she had ever seen. Others were reminded of Socrates, save for the tobacco stains in the beard. He was 5’6″ and only had one arm, his empty right sleeve a testimony to bravery in the Civil War. Powell’s career as a champion of exploration and science began more than two decades before he and his fellow National Geographic founders would form a society that would increase and diffuse geographic knowledge. They nearly ran out of rations, and a deep foreboding set in among them. Diverse Coalition: Green River Nuclear Power Plant Plant Protest at Green River. Alarmed by plans for nuclear reactors and long-term storage of highly radioactive fuel rods just four miles from the majestic Green River, more than a dozen organizations and Indian tribes will assemble in Green River, Utah, on Saturday, May 19, at 6 p.m. to protest the plan and launch a national campaign to save the Green and Colorado Rivers from nuclear contamination.
Protestors will assemble near the proposed reactor site at Green River’s west end, along Highway 6 just north of I-70 exit 157, at 6:00 p.m. for a march to “Celebrate and Protect the Green and Colorado Rivers and the Colorado Plateau.” The parade will be set against the backdrop of the Book Cliffs and the proposed construction site for the reactors. For more information please visit www.nogreenrivernuke.org.
Uranium Watch - Home. Environmental groups, tribes join to protest nuclear power plant. GREEN RIVER, Emery County — Environmental groups and Native American tribes gathered Saturday at the site of a proposed nuclear power plant to protest its location and plans to divert water from the Green River. "I don't want to see a nuclear reactor in Green River," Moab resident Joan Gough said. "I want to see the water still going down the Green River. " Blue Castle Holdings is proposing to take 53,000 acre-feet of water per year from the Green River for use in the cooling process at the proposed plant, which would be located near the city Green River and generate 3,000 megawatts of electricity.
Saturday's demonstration was organized by groups hoping to save Green River water from that fate. "This is a land of national parks," said John Weisheit, conservation director of Moab-based Living Rivers. "We have Arches National Parks. We have Canyonlands National Park. Their main concern, though, is water. Email:jpage@ksl.com. Colorado Plateau | The Arizona Experience - landscapes, people, culture and events. The Colorado Plateau of Northern Arizona is a vibrant mix of high deserts and forests over a mile above sea level. Climate, geology, and vegetation draw visitors for water activities, hiking, canyoneering, and skiing. Roughly centered on the Four Corners Region of Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico, its windswept mesas and sandstone formations create an unforgettable geographic experience.
A living sculpture formed over millions of years by the cutting action of water, wind, and even ice slicing through layers of sedimentary rocks, the landscape is a montage of spires, canyons, and buttes in a rainbow of hues. Lands governed by the Navajo and Hopi tribes feature breathtaking geology. The Grand Canyon is the Colorado Plateau’s most famous place, and one of the world’s seven Natural Wonders. The Grand Canyon’s geology is remarkable. Fort Valley Experimental Forest Webcam Like all of the Colorado Plateau, the Grand Canyon features extremes in climate as well as geology. Court arguments focus on process behind Roan leasing. By Dennis Webb Wednesday, May 23, 2012 DENVER—A federal judge Tuesday drilled down into some core legal questions surrounding the Bureau of Land Management’s 2008 leasing of 55,000 acres on the Roan Plateau for oil and gas development. Judge Marcia Krieger of the U.S. District Court of Colorado grilled attorneys for the government, conservation groups and industry during nearly two hours of oral arguments in Denver over a lawsuit challenging the leasing and the planning that led up to it.
Krieger then said she’ll be taking the matter under advisement. “We’ll have an opinion out as soon as possible,” she said. Krieger said it’s not her role to judge the wisdom of the BLM’s Roan plan itself. Ten conservation groups sued in 2008, initially in hopes of stopping the leasing from even going forward. However, it’s also thought to lie above rich natural gas reserves. “The impacts are going to take place over the life of the project. The lead defendant is Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. Judge reviewing BLM Roan Plateau decision.