Navajo Nation tribal President Buu Nygren issued an executive order banning the transportation of uranium ore from the Pinyon Plain Mine through reservation property in Arizona.

This order follows an appeal sent to President Joe Biden in May asking him to prohibit ore hauling through the reservation, as well as a 2012 law passed by the tribal government opposing uranium transport other than the removal of mine waste accumulated at more than 500 abandoned uranium mines on the reservation since 1944.

Uranium mining on the Navajo Nation in Arizona has devastated the Navajo people for 80 years, killing and debilitating thousands over the decades. The Navajo people banned uranium mining nearly two decades ago. 

The Pinyon Plane Mine is on National Forest land south of the Grand Canyon Village, not on reservation land, and the operator, Lakewood-based Energy Fuels, transports its ore to its uranium mill in White Mesa, Utah, near Blanding for processing.

Curtis Moore, senior vice president of marketing & corporate development for Energy Fuels told The Denver Gazette that during full production, six-to-eight loads of ore will leave the mine per day in tightly covered trailers to prevent dust from escaping.

Moore said the company has been trucking hundreds of tons uranium ore from other mines near the Grand Canyon through parts of the Navajo Nation since 2007. The routes, on federal highways, were authorized by the company’s environmental impact statements in 1987. Moore said the route approvals were reconfirmed in 2012.

Moore also told The Denver Gazette that Energy Fuels has never had a truck accident while hauling uranium ore anywhere in the region. Energy Fuels President and CEO Mark Chalmers said the company has a 20-year track record of transporting uranium ore according to the regulations.

Aerial radiation surveys of highways through the reservation by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2018 reported “no significant deviations from background (radiation) was detected along the roadway” (U.S. 89, U.S. 160, and U.S. 161).

But Navajo authorities don’t trust uranium mining, given the terrible toll that it caused to the Navajo people from 1944 through the 1980s.

“Particularly with something as sensitive as uranium, where there is a long legacy of contamination and disproportionate impact to the Navajo people,” Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch said. “Anyone bringing those substances onto the Nation should undertake that activity with respect and sensitivity to the psychological impact to our people, as well as the trauma of uranium development that our community continues to live with every day.”

On July 30, the company hauled about 40 tons of ore in two semitrailers from the mine to Flagstaff and then north through the Navajo Nation to its mill at White Mesa, south of Blanding — a total of some 410 miles.

“The company’s failure to seek approval from the Navajo Nation for the transport of radioactive materials across its land disregards the Nation’s governmental authority and sovereignty,” President Nygren said in a statement.

“If you’re going to smuggle uranium into our borders and across our Nation and outside, that’s pretty much illegal,” Nygren said. “I’m very disappointed that this is happening in this day and age.”

Reacting to the controversy, Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs released a statement saying Energy Fuels has agreed to pause ore shipments and engage in “good faith negotiations” to try and resolve Navajo concerns.

“I have also instructed (the Arizona Department of Emergency and Military Affairs) to partner with tribal law enforcement and assist the Navajo Nation’s emergency management team in developing an emergency response plan in the event of a road incident,” she said.

Moore disputes the authority of the tribe to prevent the use of federal highways for ore transport, but said the company will suspend shipping in order to engage in productive dialog with the tribe.

“We respect, appreciate, and agree with President Nygren’s statements in Executive Order No. 05-2024 concerning the impacts of historic uranium mining practices, which unacceptably continue to impact many Navajo People today,” Chalmers said in a statement.

“We are also greatly encouraged that the Order appears to invite a constructive dialogue relating to the transport of materials across Navajo Nation lands, which we encourage and welcome,” Chalmers added.

“I recognize the fraught history of uranium mining and the devastating impacts it has historically had on tribal nations,” Hobbs said. “That’s why I have called on the federal government to remediate sites and invest in the cleanup of contaminated state and tribal lands.”