Editorial: Yerington site should be on priority list

Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2004 | 9:10 a.m.

For years an abandoned copper mine just northeast of Yerington in Lyon County has been a danger for leaching contaminants into groundwater used by the area's 3,000 residents. The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection, in cooperation with Atlantic Richfield Co., a former owner of the 3,600-acre mine site, has supervised monitoring wells and pumping stations in an effort to prevent mercury, arsenic beryllium, lead and other toxins from migrating into drinking water supplies.

Four years ago the Bureau of Land Management and the Environmental Protection Agency entered the picture. The two federal agencies cooperated with the state environmental division and ARCO on a more intensive cleanup plan. In 2001, however, area residents expressed concern that even this joint oversight was inadequate and asked the state to seek assistance through the federal Superfund program. The state rejected that idea, reasoning that the mine site posed no immediate threat and that a Superfund designation carries a negative image that could harm the area's economy.

This reasoning is now outdated, given two recent events. In June 2003 a government contractor working with the BLM and EPA uncovered documents produced by the Anaconda Copper Co., original owner of the mine. The previously unknown documents revealed that tests in the 1970s and 1980s of unlined waste-collection ponds on the site had revealed enormous concentrations of radioactive uranium (naturally present at the site and disturbed by the copper extractions). So much uranium was detected that the company pondered selling it to the U.S. government for its nuclear weapons program. The discovery of these documents led to plans for additional tests at the site, specifically for uranium -- but none have yet occurred.

The second event took place just two months ago. A BLM worker took soil samples at the mine, and they tested well above normal for radiation. The state environmental division and ARCO are now irritated with the BLM because its tests were not part of agreed-upon "work plans." With indisputable evidence of uranium contamination, and with the responsible clean-up agencies now irked at each other, the state needs to drop its objection to the mine's designation as a Superfund site. The residents of Yerington deserve this level of priority.