Stirring the Animas’ toxic pot

To the editor,

From 1942 to the 1960s, Vanadium Corporation of America ran a uranium mill on the banks of the Animas River, just upstream of Smelter Rapids. 

It was processing about 500 tons of ore/day. “In 1958 the mill effluents were discharged into Lightner Creek near its junction with the Animas and to the Animas a short distance below Lighnter Creek,” according to J.B. Anderson’s 1961 report Radioecology,  Effects of Mill Waste on Biological Fauna of the Animas River.

Among the wastes discharged were uranium, in particular uranium 238 which makes up 98 percent of natural uranium. It also includes isotopes of uranium, thorium, polonium, bismuth lead and radium. Only the uranium was extracted from the ore and all the remaining members of the series were discharged as waste into the Animas River. Because of the low permissible human consumption, radium 226 has been the radionuclide of most concern since it is a bone-seeking alpha emitter with a half-life of 1,620 years.”

“It is well to note also that most of the radium 226 is present in the wastes in undissolved form, about 98 percent remains undissolved through the milling process … These studies have shown, however, that if these ore solids are discharged to surface streams and accumulate on the river bottoms, they then create a reservoir from which radium reaches into the  flowing water in significant quantity. This path proved to be the primary means by which radium 226 became dissolved in the waters of the … Animas River,” Anderson states.

There is not much we can do about these

contaminates in the Animas River sediments except try our best not to disturb them, since any disturbance will risk mobilizing them into the fauna and flora of the river system.

But disturbing these sediments, and in precisely the riskiest location, is exactly what the City of Durango is proposing with its latest addition to the Whitewater Park.

Poor engineering in the construction of the park has led to the erosion of the entrance to Smelters Rapids and has left the City’s water intake high and dry. To fix this problem, which the City created and the Army Corps of Engineers permitting is supposed to prevent, the City wants to build at least four additional structures and permanently disturb 1/2 an acre of Animas River bed, as well as temporarily disturb 1 full acre of river bed. All without any testing of sediments for hazardous contaminates. Is the sediment contaminated? 

Who knows? But with a half-life of 1,600 years, that undissolved radium is certainly somewhere in the river bottom.

There is no promise that this new work will end the problems the City has created with its shoddy engineering. Predicting river dynamics is one of, if not the, toughest question in physics. A task the City was clearly not prepared for.

The City is like the carpenter cutting off a leg of a chair to balance it. Then, cutting off another leg when the first cut didn’t work. 

Until in the end, the legs are gone, or in our case the Animas River is cemented from one end of town to the other and all the sediment has been stirred up and moved downstream.

At stake are the health, safety and welfare of the Animas River, its biota and everyone using its water. But the fix seems to be in. The Corps of Engineers is fast-tracking the permit, limiting public input. 

The City appears to be going forward without any acknowledgement of the risk. Just business as usual for unaccountable bureaucrats.

– Michael Black, Taxpayers for the Animas River

S. Platte bill heads downstream

To the editor,

The unanimous passage of House Bill 2016-1256, South Platte River Water Storage Bill, shows that the Colorado Legislature can put politics aside, come together, and get behind an issue that is critical to every square inch and every person in Colorado. I don’t call HB 1256 my bill, it is our bill, all of Colorado. I am especially grateful to the majority leadership in the House and a few House Democrats who got behind the bill, early on, when it was first heard in the House Agriculture, Livestock and Natural Resources Committee.

The majority had first planned to send it to the “kill committee,” the House State Affairs Committee, and I am thankful that the leadership was willing to listen to me and send it instead to the Ag Committee. I am also appreciative of those in my own party, who rarely vote for anything that will cost money, but can see the need for water storage and its beneficial use which otherwise is wasting out of the state.

Also, I want to thank the “water community,” Colorado Water Congress, Colorado Water Conservation Board, State Engineer’s office, agriculture, environmentalists, towns, cities, counties, businesses, water districts, water roundtables and water utilities from every corner of the State of Colorado for their support.

Finally, I want to thank all of those who spent hours and hours putting together the Colorado Water Plan. One email I received said that HB 1256 “put life into the water plan.” I sincerely hope and pray that the bill will help us find the answer to our water needs of year 2050 and beyond.

Colorado is making history with the House passage of HB 1256. We have always depended on Washington D.C. for our water storage needs. It is plain to see that we can’t depend on the federal government to take care of us, nor should we.

Last year, almost 2 million acre feet of water wasted out of Colorado in the South Platte River, water that could have been stored and put to beneficial use in Colorado. This is water that can be used to stop the buying of water for municipal needs and drying of productive agriculture land. It will help to sustain agriculture, which is the second leading industry in the state, contributing $40.3 billion to our economy. It is water that can be used to satisfy the increasing need for water on the Front Range. And it is water that will curb the need for Western Slope transcontinental diversions and leave more water in the streams of the Colorado River Basin. The amount of water stored and banked in Lake Powell on the Colorado River and used to satisfy the entitlement and demands of California, Arizona and Nevada is at an all-time low.

– J. Paul Brown, Rep. R-Ignacio