[All] Fw: Wondering about the links of dust and uranium re: Alberta tar sands

[Louisette Lanteigne]

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From: Louisette Lanteigne <butterflybluelu at rogers.com>
To: "Elizabeth.May at parl.gc.ca" <Elizabeth.May at parl.gc.ca>; "info at forestethicssolutions.org" <info at forestethicssolutions.org>; "info at 350.org" <info at 350.org>; "mckibben.bill at gmail.com" <mckibben.bill at gmail.com>; "info at climateactionnetwork.ca" <info at climateactionnetwork.ca>; "info at coastforest.org" <info at coastforest.org>; "info at tarsandsaction.org" <info at tarsandsaction.org> 
Sent: Saturday, August 25, 2012 7:46:46 PM
Subject: Wondering about the links of dust and uranium re: Alberta tar sands
 

Hello everyone 

At the conference at UW on August 24,  there were reps from Fort Chipewyan Alberta.  They said the tar sands are set to run out of Natural Gas in 25 years, that operations will be replaced by planned nuclear power from 13 nuke plants. I asked the residents if there is Uranium in the soil up that way and they confirmed it. They said there is actually a massive quarry planned to extract Uranium 19km away from Fort Chipewyan to supply the proposed nuke plants. 
 
They also showed a photo taken by Ron Plain of an area whitefish caught during his visit up to Fort Chip. The fish had two jaws, the lower one with huge eyeteeth. Whitefish don't have eye teeth. Photo in the attachments.
 
They are removing enough sediment to fill the Skydome each and every day. I have no encountered any info regarding the impacts of the dust particulates associated with the sediment removal at all. Everyone's focused on the oil not the sediment but I have found online reports by the Alberta Government which speak of the prospects of Uranium Mining. Here is one example:  http://www.ags.gov.ab.ca/minerals/uranium/index.html
 
Like Ontario, the Alberta MNR has no regard at all for potential cumiliative impacts of environmental discharge or emissions. There is no centralized database on it. Generally discharge permits are kept by corporations in hand. Particulate concerns may or may not be part of the permit process but I'm not sure. Generally in Ontario, Aggregates are not required to have EA processes on the believe it's not releasing anything into the environment. There is no regard for what toxins they might actually be digging up or the impacts of the dust they stir up. 

Gravelwatch has information about how gravel dust can kill people at the following website: 
http://www.gravelwatch.org/dust.htm

Currently there is a high rate of kidney failure and diabetes among the aboriginal communities in Alberta and I'm wondering if it might be linked to toxicity of inhaling the uranium dust being dug up at the Tar Sands. The way to detect low dose radiation is to measure the urine and check the kidneys. We have a doctor at UW who measured the urine of Gulf War vets in Canada. 10 years after exposure they still had radiation in their urine. 
 
Uranium particulates and dust in general, contributes to high blood pressure and other ailments but of course it's a virtual chemical soup down that way so that complicates things a bit in terms of proving causes but the interesting thing about the concept of radioactive particulate is that it could travel down wind places like Edmonton and Calgary on the wind.  If a link like that could be proven, it might give leverage to the movement to reduce tarsands expansions.

Louisette Lanteigne
700 Star Flower Ave.
Waterloo ON
N2V 2L2
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