Cameco

Cameco is the world's largest single uranium producer, responsible for about 21% of world production. Based in Saskatchewan, Canada, the company virtually runs the uranium mining industry in Canada, and has extensive gold and uranium exploration and mining interests internationally. In Australia, the company is actively exploring in Arnhem Land (NT) and to the north of Kintyre at Rudall River (WA). The company has close alliances with the Japanese Government (PNC) and French nuclear agency (Cogema) in these areas.

History
Cameco was formed from a 1988 merger between the Canadian government-owned producer Eldorado Nuclear and the state-owned Saskatchewan Mining Development Corporation and subsequent privatisation. The Saskatchewan provincial government maintains a 10.3% stake in Cameco.

Eldorado Nuclear supplied the uranium which the US military used to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of the Second World War. The native Dene people who worked at the Port Radium site as miners and ore carriers have been decimated by cancers and other illnesses, while the Canadian and US governments denied any responsibility.1

Eldorado also operated the notorious 'Rabbit Lake' Mine, which is still being used by Cameco for processing ore from other mines. Tailings from this mine had been dumped into Wollaston Lake since 1975, and the local community, indigenous and non-native, had protested about the fact for ten years.2 As early as 1976, in response to concerns from the local people, the Federal Radiation Protection Bureau found 'unacceptably high' radiation in the area. Nothing was done, leading to a series of strikes and blockades in the 1970s and 1980s.

In November 1989, around two million litres of radioactive and heavy metal-bearing fluids burst into Collins creek, which flows into Wollaston Lake. The seepage occurred from a faulty valve on a pipeline carrying runoff and seepage from the Collins Bay mine. In the subsequent public furore, Saskatchewan MP for the Prince Albert-Churchill River region, Ray Funk called the incident a "total breakdown of the nuclear regulatory system."

In 1996, Cameco purchased Power Resources Inc, the largest uranium producer in the US, and in 1998 acquired the Canadian and US subsidiaries of Uranerz, increasing its reserves, resources and production levels by about 30%. In December 1999, production began at McArthur River, the largest high-grade deposit known.

Cameco had become the largest producer of uranium in the world. Coupled with its huge refineries at Blind River and Port Hope, this company is one of the most important players in the global nuclear industry.

Refining
Cameco also has refining and conversion plants in Ontario. At Blind River, it operates the world's largest refinery which produces high-purity uranium trioxide (UO3). At the Port Hope conversion plants, Cameco is a major producer of uranium hexafluoride (UF6), which, after enrichment, becomes the fuel used in most nuclear reactors. Cameco supplies about 20% of the western world market for UF6. Cameco is also the only commercial converter of natural uranium dioxide or UO2, the fuel used in the Canadian-built Candu reactors.

Canadian Uranium Holdings
McArthur River
the world's largest, high-grade uranium mine (milling at Key Lake)
Cigar Lake
The world's second largest, high-grade uranium deposit.
Key Lake
The world's largest high-grade milling operation.
Rabbit Lake
Saskatchewan's longest operating uranium milling facility.

Cameco also holds equity in 10 uranium mines in the USA, and two in Kazakhstan. 3

Australian Holdings
Cameco holds leases to the north of the Rudall River National Park in the shire of East Pilbara, and the Gascoyne Lease on the Gascoyne River. In Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, exploration is proceeding rapidly with joint venture partners including PNC and Cogema.

Cameco also holds 6.45% of Energy Resources of Australia Ltd., the proponent of Jabiluka and Ranger mines.

References

1. Echoes of the Atomic Age - Cancer kills fourteen aboriginal uranium workers - Andrew Nikiforuk Calgary Herald Saturday, March 14, 1998

2. Gulliver Files: Eldorado Dossier.

3. WISE Uranium Cameco Page

Cameco - Canadian Operations
2121 11th Street West, Saskatoon, SK S7M 1J3 Canada
Ph +1 306 956 6200
Fax +1 306 956 6201

Australian Operations
Manager James Marlatt
66 Winnellie Rd, Darwin, NT 0820
P.O. Box 35,921 Darwin, NT 0820
Ph (08) 8947 3477
Fax (08) 8947 3488 cameco@ozemail.com.au

Websites

• Cameco Home
• WISE Cameco page
• SEA-US Cameco Page
• Gulliver File Eldorado/Cameco Brief