Nunavut MLAs pressed for public inquiry on uranium mining

Sandra Inutiq of Nunavummiut Makitagunarningit speaks during a public meeting about uranium mining in Iqaluit Nov. 28. The group wants Nunavut MLAs to hold a public inquiry on uranium mining. (PHOTO BY CHRIS WINDEYER)

A new lobby group that wants Nunavut’s MLAs to order a public inquiry on uranium mining held its first public meeting this past weekend.

Nunavummiut Makitagunarningit (“Nunavummiut can rise up”) wants to spark debate on Nunavut’s budding uranium mining sector and is circulating a petition calling on MLAs to hold public hearings on the industry.

Group spokeswoman Sandra Inutiq told a crowd of about 40 people that Nunavummiut need to decide if the benefits of mining the radioactive mineral outweigh the environmental risks.

Inutiq added people shouldn’t assume the Nunavut land claims agreement will protect water and wildlife from the impact of mining.

“We can’t take it for granted that these discussions will take place,” she said.

In 2007, Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. reversed its longstanding opposition to uranium mining with a new policy that supports uranium mining that is socially and environmentally responsible.

And Inutiq asked whether Nunavummiut want to be associated with a substance that, in addition to fuelling nuclear power plants, may also be used in nuclear weapons.

“There’s no way of controlling, once you take [uranium] out of the ground, where it goes.”

Jamie Kneen, communications coordinator with the lobby group Mining Watch Canada, said Canada’s uranium industry is haphazard in following industry regulations.

That means the costs of allowing mining in Nunavut may end up outweighing the benefits, he said.

Kneen denounced the uranium industry’s safety record in northern Saskatchewan. And he accused the mining industry of making up environmental protection practices on the fly, resulting in spills and contamination of wildlife habitat.

“It’s just one disaster after another,” Kneen said. “There is no such thing as responsible uranium mining.”

While the uranium industry asserts that nuclear power is a green alternative to burning fossil fuels, Kneen mocked the notion.

Nuclear reactors might not produce greenhouse gases, but mining uranium does.

“The overall carbon footprint of nuclear energy… is far from zero,” he said.

NTI president Paul Kaludjak attended the meeting and said Inuit impact and benefit agreements, which must be signed before any mining projects take place in the territory, are enough to protect Nunavummiut from the downsides of mining.

And Nunavut’s numerous regulatory agencies will prevent the reckless mining practices of days gone by.

“It’s not like the 1960s, 1970s anymore,” Kaludjak said.