Environmental Front Explores Uranium and Thorium Presence at Amulsar

The Armenian Environmental Front has addressed the information regarding uranium reserves at the Amulsar mine. In a statement released by the organization, it is noted: “The presence of radioactive elements in Amulsar has been discussed for a long time. According to an article by G. P. Aloyan published in the Russian scientific journal 'Gorny Zhurnal' in 2007, the average uranium content at Amulsar varies widely from several thousandths to 0.5%. Approximately 76 tons of uranium has been estimated in the five areas of uranium occurrence at Amulsar. Considering the presence of uranium in thorium areas, the total reserves may be estimated at 100 tons.”

It should be noted that the leaders of 'Geotim' (currently 'Lydian Armenia'), including scientist Hayk Aloyan's son, completely deny the scientific value of G. P. Aloyan's mentioned article (see this article from 2011).

The Environmental Front possesses a comprehensive 126-page report (in Russian) from the 'Amulsar Exploration Group', detailing the uranium-thorium occurrence evaluation works conducted between 1952-1954, which includes clear facts about uranium and thorium mineralizations in the Amulsar area. Meanwhile, in a conclusion dated August 10, 2018, senior researcher and candidate of geological sciences Dmitri Arakelyan from the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia noted that the planned waste rock storage area partially overlaps with the area studied between 1952-1954, which has not been fully evaluated in Lydian’s reports.

Particularly, Dmitri Arakelyan's conclusion about the proposed waste rock storage area states: “1) The data presented by 'Geotim' on the locations and quantities of boreholes and exploratory pits do not provide sufficient justification for the storage of the waste rock. In particular, the five drilled boreholes (GRE-B8, GRE-B6, GRE-B10, GRE-W1, GRE-B6A) cannot provide a complete picture of the engineering-geological conditions over the specified area (approximately 2-2.5 km²) according to engineering-geological conditions of 1:500m, 1:1000m, 1:2000m (see Fig. 1). 2) There are no longitudinal and transverse geotechnical cross-sections based on data regarding the physical-mechanical properties of the soils obtained from the boreholes, which are necessary to present the geotechnical elements, groundwater levels, and other parameters according to required regulations. The drilled boreholes (TP-774, TP-775, DDAG-392, BH-606, DDAG-387, etc.) and the works executed mainly cover and justify the construction and operation of rock crushing, vehicle parking, and other mining infrastructure areas.

From all these considerations, one can conclude that the geotechnical studies carried out in the area of the planned waste rock storage have been conducted incompletely and do not provide the necessary information for assessing the current situation. The reports presented by the company superficially depict the works done in previous years. In one of those reports, the history of the exploration starts from Kotlyar and immediately transitions to the 1955 report. Only the works and reports of the 'Golden’ experts from 2008-2016 are presented, while there were uranium-thorium occurrence evaluation works conducted in the area of the planned waste rock storage by the 'Amulsar Exploration Group in 1955.'”