LIMOUSIN

BELLEZANE -- shut down

Purpose: production of uranium
Type: surface and underground mine and dump with residues
Location: Bessines-sur-Gartempe and Bersac-sur-Rivalier (Haute-Vienne)
Operator: Cogéma
Raw material: uranium ore
Period of operation: approximately 1975-1993; the surface operation was finished before underground mining began
Actual production: 900-1500 t/d of ore

SOLID WASTES

In the old surface mine as of February 1999 were 1,514,000 t of tailings from the Simo plant and 42,000 t of tailings from the Simo heap leaching installation [Andra 99]. Residues from Simo were transported to Bellezane from 1987 until about 1993. 

Andra estimates that the radioactivity of the radium 226 in the tailings is 49 Tbq. The Crii-Rad evaluates "the radioactivity equivalent group 1" (essentially radium 226 and thorium 230) on the site at 296 Tbq (8000 Ci). Even according to the figures of Andra, the site, classed as an ICPE, should be an INB [InfoU iii-iv.92].

Crii-Rad sampled in the galleries, directly underneath the storage areas, sludges "from the decantation of water that had drained from the piles of tailings on the surface" and learned of "the existence of a series of connections between the [surface mine] and the galleries beneath." The surface mine, it seems, is not tight. "The sludges have an activity in radium 226 greater than 90,000 Bq/kg . . . . The total mass activity is more than 1,000,000 Bq/kg."

LIQUID EFFLUENTS

"In the Bellezane brook, the liquid releases have caused major contamination of the sediments and aquatic plants . . . . There are more than 25,000 Bq/kg of radium in the sediments" [Crii-Rad 94b].

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