Washington, D.C. — Today, an advisory group established by the Trump administration released a set of recommendations to expand uranium mining in the United States, including by further enabling foreign companies to extract royalty-free uranium on public lands in the American West. The Nuclear Fuel Working Group, which was created by a July 2019 presidential memorandum, declined to propose any changes to existing mining law to better protect taxpayers or local communities from the costs and impacts of uranium mining. A recent analysis from the Center for American Progress found that 100 percent of companies producing uranium in the United States are foreign-owned and that these companies don’t pay a dime to taxpayers for the minerals they take from U.S. public lands.
In response, Nicole Gentile, deputy director of Public Lands at CAP, issued the following statement:
These recommendations are a giveaway to foreign-owned mining companies at the expense of taxpayers and public health. Two-thirds of America’s public lands are already open to mining, and the United States has more than enough access to uranium to meet current needs. We need to update the laws that govern mining on public lands, not double down on handouts to foreign mining companies.
For more information or to talk to an expert, please contact Sam Hananel at [email protected] or 202-478-6327.