Most uranium in the U.S., including all of it from Wyoming, is mined by pumping a solution of water and chemicals into uranium-bearing deposits underground. The water is then pumped to the surface and ore is extracted.

One of the richest known reserves of uranium ore spans parts of northwestern New Mexico. Previous booms in what was once known as the uranium capital of the world occurred during the 1950s and again in the 1970s. Environmentalists have been fighting to prevent future mining in the region and in Arizona around the Grand Canyon.

Amber Reimondo of the Flagstaff, Arizona-based Grand Canyon Trust says she fears moves to boost domestic uranium mining could end protections put in place during the administration of President Barack Obama for uranium-bearing lands outside Grand Canyon National Park.

Uranium mining in the Southwest during the atomic age left a legacy of death and disease, Reimondo said. Hundreds of uranium mines that dot the Navajo Nation, for example, have not been cleaned up. The tribe, whose reservation extends into New Mexico, Utah and Arizona, banned uranium mining and transport on its lands in 2005.

“When people talk about past uranium mining, they talk about it as if the problem is in the past, as if people aren’t still living with the consequences of uranium contamination and that uranium contamination can be segregated in some bubble when it just inherently lasts for longer than any of us can fathom,” she said. “We shouldn’t be meddling in that.”

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