LETTERS TO THE EDITOR — Mining’s contribution often

I read with interest your article on Cameco getting the green light for production of its Eagle Point and Collins A and D zones (“Rabbit Lake gets federal OK,” T.N.M., April 4/94).

Sometimes our industry doesn’t make enough of its contribution to the economy of our country, and this calm announcement leaves a few things unsaid. When production is complete on these zones, they, along with the original Rabbit Lake deposit and the Collins Bay B zone, will have produced in the neighborhood of 200 million lb. U3O8 for a total worth of . . . well, you figure it out. If the average price is $20 per lb., it is $4 billion; if the average price turns out to be $10 per lb., it will be $2 billion. In any event, the new wealth created in Canada by this operation alone puts it in a special category, especially inasmuch as these are mostly export dollars earned.

As you mention, we should emphasize the 400 direct and indirect jobs created (during a 40-year period) and the taxes they generate, as well as the federal and provincial taxes and royalties paid and to be paid.

Nothing is made of the contribution of the men and women who produce this wealth, in what many would call the adverse conditions of a remote area. Nor, finally, is anything said of that remarkable group of geologists, geophysicists, geochemists, prospectors and all the rest through whose skill, foresight and hard work, all of these deposits were discovered during the short period 1968-82. At that time, it was a Gulf Minerals Canada operation and the finding cost was about 50 cents per lb. U3O8. I give them all a tip of my hat as I congratulate them on their success.

Fred Perry

Mississauga, Ont.