Radiation report needs ‘significant work’

THE uranium mining sector has agreed to ‘engage positively’ with Earthlife Namibia and the France-based Commission for Independent Research and Information about Radiation (CRIIRAD) to get to the bottom of the watchdog’s report on radiation, especially near Rössing.

CRIIRAD, Earthlife Namibia and senior representatives of the uranium mines in the Erongo region met last week to discuss the report. CRIIRAD recently voiced its concern over radiation levels it detected near Rössing, saying ‘indications are there might be a problem’.Mark Dawe, president of the Chamber of Mines of Namibia, on Friday said all the parties agreed that the CRIIRAD document is a preliminary report and that the ‘verification and interpretation of the results will require significant additional work’.When announcing the preliminary results at a press conference in Windhoek recently, CRIIRAD nuclear physics engineer Bruno Chareyron highlighted concerns about radiation dose rates in Rössing’s parking lot, the mine’s waste rock dumps and high uranium concentration in underground water collected downstream of Rössing in the Khan River and Swakop River alluvium.However, Chareyron also said ‘one has to be extremely cautious not to say this is Rössing’s fault and not to say it isn’t’.Dawe said in a statement on Friday that ‘discussions were held in a cooperative manner, on the understanding that the findings would be responsibility managed, without attempts from either party to sensationalise them’.Mike Leech, chairman of the Uranium Stewardship Committee of the Chamber of Mines, said the mines ‘have committed to engage positively’ with CRIIRAD and Earthlife Namibia to ‘ensure that the final report is objective and factual’. Leech said Namibia’s uranium industry has one of the best combined health and safety records in the world. It subscribes to the World Nuclear Association’s principles which embody best practice and ethical conduct to ensure that uranium and its by-products are managed in a safe, environmentally responsible, economical and socially acceptable manner, he said.’The uranium industry has at it heart a simple but enduring principle, namely that those who create risk are best placed to control that risk, whether they are employers, contractors or managers,’ Leech said.