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Uranium Resources, Inc. (NASDAQ: URRE) (URI) announced today that it has terminated the agreement for the acquisition of certain assets in New Mexico from NZ Uranium, LLC because of the existence of title issues that were not resolved. The Company had previously announced that it had entered into an agreement to acquire the properties subject to the satisfaction of closing conditions, including a title review. The properties were believed to contain about 35 million pounds of uranium mineralized material. Paul K. Willmott, Chairman of the Board, commented, "It is unfortunate that this is the result, but we determined that it would be imprudent to proceed any further." About Uranium Resources, Inc. Uranium Resources Inc. explores for, develops and mines uranium. Since its incorporation in 1977, URI has produced over 8 million pounds of uranium by in-situ recovery (ISR) methods in the state of Texas where the Company currently has ISR mining projects. URI has 183,000 acres of uranium mineral holdings, 101.4 million pounds of in-place mineralized uranium material in New Mexico and an NRC license to produce up to 3 million pounds of uranium. The Company acquired these properties over the past 20 years along with an extensive information database of historic mining logs and analysis.

Mitchell Capitan points to a flock of sheep grazing in the shadow of a sandstone mesa. The sheep belong to Capitan's family, along with a few head of cattle and twelve quarter horses standing in a corral near his mother-in-law's house in Crownpoint, New Mexico. Shelley Smithson: Navajos say "No!" as the return of uranium mining threatens to despoil their lands and health. "All of this area," Capitan says, gesturing to the valley of sage and shrub brush below, "there's a lot of uranium underneath there. That's what they're after." Capitan and his Navajo neighbors are battling a license granted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to Hydro Resources Inc. (HRI)--a subsidiary of a Texas company, Uranium Resources--one of several firms that have laid claim to the minerals beneath thousands of acres on and around the lands of the Navajo Nation and three American Indian pueblos in northwestern New Mexico. A group called the Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining is suing the NRC to block mining in Crownpoint and another Navajo community. A panel of federal judges in Denver heard the case in May 2008 but has yet to issue a ruling.

U.S. Rep. Harry Teague, D-N.M., announced in a press release today that $172 million in stimulus money will be spent at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, known as WIPP, in southern New Mexico near Carlsbad. "The Recovery funding that will go to WIPP will create hundreds of jobs in southeastern New Mexico and help jumpstart the economy in a responsible way," said Teague. "The work that WIPP does to prepare and store nuclear waste is a unique and vital asset to our nation." WIPP is federal government's only nuclear waste repository, and it recently reached its 10-year anniversary.

Is it possible that the salt deposits around Carlsbad could become not only the home to WIPP, but to a far larger and more dangerous facility that would replace Yucca Mountain in Nevada as the nation's principal storage site for very hot nuclear waste? If Carlsbad Mayor Bob Forrest has anything to say about it, trucks and trains from around the country could be carrying used nuclear fuel rods, and other hot radioactive material, on New Mexico interstates and rail lines near major population centers to oil and gas and potash country in the southeast part of the state. Unlike Nevada and its congressional delegation, which has fought Yucca Mountain tooth and nail for years, many in New Mexico seem unperturbed by the thought of the state becoming the nation's nuclear waste dump.

"Hanford workers have resumed digging up temporarily buried transuranic waste in central Hanford with improved technology that should take some of the surprises out of the work. Retrieval of the transuranic waste -- typically debris contaminated with plutonium -- was stopped in February by CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. when it ran into problems. Since then the Department of Energy contractor has been working on improvements to its processes. In 1970 Congress ordered transuranic waste sent to a national repository. But until the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico opened, Hanford workers have been storing waste suspected of being transuranic, often by temporarily burying it. Much of the waste that Hanford workers have dug up so far to ship to New Mexico was buried in tidy rows and information about what's underground has been available. But within the last year CH2M Hill has been progressing to more difficult burial trenches, and that's contributed to problems."

"A New Mexico-based uranium producer plans to move forward with a mining operation in the western part of the state after that a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that its land is not part of Indian Country. The full 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver ruled in a 6-5 decision that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency erred when it determined that a parcel of land near the Navajo community of Church Rock was Indian land. The decision means that Hydro Resources Inc. can seek an underground injection control permit from the state of New Mexico rather than the EPA, which has permitting authority on tribal lands."

"At first glance, the agenda for last week's Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future looked pretty mundane. Who knew that former Sen. Pete Domenici - fresh from cataract surgery and sporting dark sunglasses - would bring the fireworks. The New Mexico Republican lobbed plenty of them at Ron Curry, New Mexico's secretary of environment, during a hearing to examine the Waste Isolation Pilot Project. First, a little background. The commission, appointed by President Obama earlier this year, met in Washington last Wednesday to consider best practices for disposing of high-level nuclear waste. Among those invited to testify were Curry; state Rep. John Heaton, a Carlsbad Democrat; and Don Hancock, director of the Albuquerque-based Southwest Research and Information Center. Domenici, a New Mexico Republican, is a member of the Blue Ribbon Commission."

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, voted 2-0 Tuesday to grant a double license for Waste Control Specialists to dispose of up to 28 million cubic feet of low-level radioactive waste from Texas, Vermont and the federal government in Andrews County. Commissioner Larry Soward abstained from the vote. The site is located in west Texas near the New Mexico border. The commission also denied the request by the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club on behalf of its Eunice, New Mexico members for a contested case hearing before an administrative law judge to decide the merits of the license.

Imagine powering your home with a mini nuclear plant. Imagine that's it's not just a pipe dream. Scientists at Los Alamos in New Mexico say the plants will be on sale within five years. Hyperion Power Generation, based in New Mexico, said it's already taking orders and will start mass production of its Hyperion Power Module within the same time frame.

Bidding farewell to 36-year New Mexico Senator Pete Domenici, Alamogordo's Committee of 50 had some kind words and gifts for the senator as he moves into retirement. During a luncheon event Friday, multiple community members stepped up to thank Domenici for the work he has done on behalf of Alamogordo and New Mexico.

VIENNA, May 22 (UPI) -- The International Atomic Energy Agency announced plans to hold a simulated nuclear emergency in Mexico to test international and national response capabilities. The two-day mock radiation emergency exercise will take place at the Laguna Verde nuclear power plant in Alta Lucero, Mexico, on July 9 and 10. The exercise is an effort to test the ability of emergency authorities from 60 participating countries and 10 international organizations to handle a radiological emergency, the IAEA reported.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A uranium mining company contends a U.S Environmental Protection Agency ruling is stalling its plans to begin operations in northwest New Mexico. The EPA ruled last year that a 160-acre parcel near Church Rock is part of a dependent Indian community, therefore requiring that Hydro Resources Inc. obtain an underground injection control permit with the EPA, not the state of New Mexico.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A uranium mining company contends a U.S Environmental Protection Agency ruling is stalling its plans to begin operations in northwest New Mexico. The EPA ruled last year that a 160-acre parcel near Church Rock is part of a dependent Indian community, therefore requiring that Hydro Resources Inc. obtain an underground injection control permit with the EPA, not the state of New Mexico.

Documents indicate there could be nearly 700 truck shipments of remote-handled transuranic waste - the hottest radioactive waste in the Oak Ridge inventory - going to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico over the next few years. However, an Oak Ridge official said Wednesday that figure is too high, and that the actual number will probably be about half of that.

Opposition mounted this week against a federal court ruling that limits the power of a regional waste compact to restrict radioactive waste going to disposal facilities like the one operated in Tooele County by EnergySolutions Inc. Nothing short of states' rights are at stake in a federal court ruling on the government authority over radioactive waste headed to EnergySolutions Inc.'s Utah disposal site. In filing a friend-of-the-court brief Thursday in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, New Mexico joined a growing line of opponents to a May ruling by U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart. It basically said EnergySolutions no longer has to answer to the Northwest Interstate Compact on low-level radioactive waste. Utah, the Northwest Compact and the Rocky Mountain Compact, which share a low-level waste disposal site in Hanford, Wash., are appealing Stewart's ruling, and they filed papers in the case last week. Six regional compacts, joined by New Mexico and the Council of State Governments, weighed in Thursday. And, with all the papers filed Thursday, eight of the nation's ten congressionally established compacts have weighed in the effort to overturn Stewart's ruling. Compacts represent all but six states. The two remaining compacts, which manage waste within eight states, have through Tuesday to join the fray.

The state of New Mexico has filed a court brief backing a uranium company's request for a federal appeals court review of an April decision. The decision says a proposed uranium mine site in western New Mexico is on American Indian land. The attorney general's office and the governor's chief counsel filed the friend of the court brief Monday before the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver.

EnergySolutions, Inc. (NYSE: ES) announced today it has been awarded waste remediation contracts for the management of transuarnic waste from the U.S. Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The contracts are valued at $16 million and will involve retrieval, packaging, and disposition of transuranic waste. "EnergySolutions has worked closely with Los Alamos on many projects and appreciates the confidence the DOE has in EnergySolutions to manage this waste for final disposition," said Steve Creamer, CEO and Chairman of EnergySolutions. Since 2005 EnergySolutions has been working with LANL to repackage transuranic legacy waste to meet the requirements for disposal at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant located in Carlsbad, New Mexico. Under the newly awarded contracts, EnergySolutions will continue its operations in existing facilities as well as develop and operate two new transuranic debris processing lines through 2010.

Uranium Resources on Monday said it plans to ask a US appeals court to reconsider its ruling that a proposed uranium recovery site in northwestern Mexico is on Indian land and subject to permitting requirements under the US Environmental Protection Agency's Safe Drinking Water Act. The Lewisville, Texas-based company said that it plans to file a petition Monday asking for an "en banc" review in which all judges in the appellate court would rehear the case, instead of the three-judge panel that issued the original ruling. The 10th US Circuit Court of Appeals on April 17 said it agreed with EPA's 2007 finding that Section 8 of the property in Churchrock, New Mexico, falls under federal, not state, jurisdiction.

Los Alamos National Laboratory has sent its first shipment of remote-handled radioactive waste to the federal government's underground repository in southern New Mexico. The shipment left the northern New Mexico lab on Tuesday. It's the first of 16 canisters of such waste that are scheduled to be sent to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant this year. The shipments cleared their final regulatory hurdle in April when the state Environment Department approved a report detailing the contents of the canisters and where the material was used.

The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver has upheld a 2007 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of the Interior decision that Hydro Resources Inc.'s Churchrock Section 8 mine site is located in "Indian Country." HRI challenged the decision last May before the Court of Appeals. The decision means that HRI will have to obtain an underground injection control permit from EPA rather than the New Mexico Environment Department before it can move forward with its plans for in-situ leach uranium mining in Section 8. Navajo Nation Department of Justice, Churchrock Chapter, New Mexico Environmental Law Center, Southwest Research Information Center and Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining all participated in the matter, filing comments on the proposed determination in 2006.