uranium mines versus tar sands

If you think Uranium Mining is bad or Uranium Ore is severely limited, consider the following. I will take a good look at that by comparing the Tar Sands with Northern Saskatchewan Uranium Mining. Coincidentally North America’s two biggest Energy Resources are located in adjacent Canadian Provinces – Uranium in Northern Saskatchewan and the Tar Sands in Northern Alberta.

The Athabasca Tar Sands is the North American Petroleum Industry’s dream. When you see that lady in Oil Association Ads on prime time news claiming there is enough Oil in North America to supply are needs for the next 70 years – she is talking The Athabasca Tar Sands. The economically recoverable reserves from the Tar Sands are 75% of North America’s entire Oil Reserves and 97% of Canada’s Oil Reserves. The U.S.A. for example has 21 billion barrels of reserves vs the Tar Sands 173 billion barrels. All the press and hype is about the Athabasca Tar Sands. Very little is mentioned about Northern Saskatchewan’s Uranium production, which is about 25% of World Uranium Production.

456,250,000 barrels = Tar Sands Oil (Bitumen) production 2006

9465 Tonnes = Northern Saskatchewan Uranium production 2007

427 TWh = Thermal Energy Value of Tar Sands production 2006

1,007 TWh = Thermal Energy Value of N.Sask. Uranium prod. 2007, processed to 1392 Tonnes of 3.5% enriched Uranium and burned in standard LWR

2.4X = Amount Thermal Energy Value of the N.Sask. Uranium production 2007 is greater than the Tar Sands 2006 production value

63,000 million USgal/yr = Canadian Tar Sands approx water consumption

83 million Usgal per yr of water to produce the Tar Sands 2006 Crude Oil Energy production used in a 1% grade uranium ore mine - using thermal output of Uranium burnt in a LWR - no reprocessing

750X = more water needed to produce same amount of energy by Tar Sands than 1% grade Uranium (most N.Sask Grade is 21 % - some is 1.1%, 2.4% & 2.6%, thus uses approx 20X less water again, or about 3 million Usgal per yr)

Exploration expenditure in 2004 in all of Canada was C$ 44 million, mostly at established projects. However, the C$26 million of this on grassroots exploration in Saskatchewan - double the 2003 level - represented a major proportion of world uranium exploration. These are amounts that the Tar Sands Companies would call “Pocket Change” or “Coffee Money” or “Chicken Feed”.

If you went with various Deep Burn Reactor designs like the IFR, LIFTR, CANDU, Uranium Hydride or some HTPBR’s, or you did Fuel Reprocessing, you would get anywhere from 5 to 250 times more energy from the same amount of Uranium. Absolutely BLOWS AWAY the Tar Sands as an energy source.

Furthermore, go to Google Earth, and take a look at the area north of Fort McMurray, at a resolution of about 2 miles per inch, and check out the torn up Earth and Environmental Destruction. Now do the same to McArthur River in Northern Saskatchewan, which produces double the Energy of the Tar Sands, even burned in the exceedingly low efficiency, once through LWR, with no fuel reprocessing. And compare the environmental damage – at 2 miles per inch you will have a hard time seeing any sign of the Northern Saskatchewan Uranium mines. You will also see that there is lot’s of Water available vs the severely limited water availability in the Tar Sands region.