Trump Could Revive Utah's Uranium Mines but Activists Worry about Industry's Legacy

摘要

A decision expected from the Trump White House in coming weeks could have far-reaching consequences for Utah's uranium mining industry, which has been largely dormant in the face of competition from overseas producers. U.S. nuclear power plants get the vast majority of their uranium fuel from foreign sources — such as Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and China — even though there are ample reserves of the radioactive mineral at home in the Colorado Plateau. President Donald Trump could change that with a stroke of the executive pen should he sign an order requiring — in the name of national security — power generators to receive 25 percent of the uranium they use from domestic sources. Such a measure could breathe new life into an extractive industry that has a storied past in Utah, along with a troubling environmental legacy and public health history whose impacts still sting decades after Cold War-era uranium mines and mills closed.