India’s Biggest Uranium Mine in Andhra Pradesh

HYDERABAD: India’s biggest uranium mine will come up in Kadapa district of Andhra Pradesh where 6,000 tonnes of uranium will be produced every day.
With an investment of up to Rs 6,000 crore, the mine at Kanampalli will beat the nearby Tummalapalli mines and the Turamdih mine of Uranium Corporation of India Limited (UCIL) in Jharkhand, which produce 3,000 tonnes each.
UCIL CMD C K Asnani told TOI that the process of mining lease boundary fixation has begun and the corporation would soon approach the ministry of forests and environment for terms of reference and AP pollution control board for public hearing.
The Department of Atomic Energy’s Atomic Minerals Directorate will complete the initial work and hand over the mine area to UCIL.
“UCIL will also go for a public hearing in February or March 2020 for expansion of Tummalapalli mine from 3,000 tonnes to 4,500 tonnes. Kanampalli will be the biggest uranium mine in India. It will take six months to get terms of reference from MoEF, and for full-scale production, it will take seven years as it’s a time taking process,” Asnani said.
The ore body of Kanampalli and Tummalapalli mining block in Kadapa is spread over a length of 21 kilometres.
“Around 51 per cent uranium ore is in this block, holding 3.17 lakh tonnes of uranium. We had a record production of uranium in the past two months at UCIL. The percentage of purity of extracted uranium at Tummalapalli is 70,” he said.
UCIL working on mining lease boundaries at Chitrial project
Unlike in Tummalapalli, UCIL will acquire land where mine and mill will be constructed in Kanampalli and dig the uranium ore underneath. In Tummalapalli, the mine lease areas are 2,405 acres and the area of tailing ponds is 148 acres.
UCIL will be investing all together Rs 10,500 crore in 13 projects across the country in which majority of funds will come into Kanampalli block. Chitrial project in Nalgonda district in Telangana is estimated to have an outlay of about Rs 1,500 to Rs 2,000 crore.
UCIL is working on mining lease boundaries for another project at Chitrial, officials said.

Source: TOI

Image Courtesy: Irocks