Kentucky Fish and Wildlife swaps land to boost prospective nuclear fuel enrichment project
Republished from Kentucky Lantern
Kentucky wildlife management officials are swapping land in West Kentucky to benefit a prospective nuclear fuel enrichment company looking to establish itself in McCracken County.
Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources (KDFWR) leaders in a release say the department is turning over 665 acres of its 6,425-acre West Kentucky Wildlife Management Area to Global Laser Enrichment (GLE), an Australian company that seeks to use lasers to enrich uranium left over from hundreds of thousands of depleted uranium tails at the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant.
In exchange, the KDFWR is receiving 1,043 acres near the Mississippi River in Fulton County to expand its existing 4,258-acre Obion Creek Wildlife Management Area. That land was purchased by the Paducah-McCracken County Industrial Development Authority and funded by GLE.
Rich Storm, the KDFWR commissioner, said in a statement the land swap was “a creative and carefully constructed exchange” that will benefit both wildlife and nearby communities.
“The additional acreage on Obion Creek WMA will provide much needed public hunting access, hiking, wildlife viewing and other wildlife related opportunities in an area where these are not readily available,” Storm said.
The department said the expanded wildlife management land in Fulton County should be open to hunting and fishing by next spring, and the land being given to GLE in McCracken County would remain open for public use through Feb. 28, 2025.
The former gaseous diffusion plant created uranium waste when enriching uranium for nuclear weapons in the 20th century and eventually for commercial nuclear power plants until closing in 2013. WKMS, the public radio station in Murray, reported GLE hopes to enrich and reuse the leftover tails as fuel for nuclear power in what would be a potentially $1 billion facility creating hundreds of jobs and be the first commercial operation in the world using laser-enrichment technology.
The public radio station reported GLE had struck a deal earlier this year giving the Australian company the option of acquiring land owned by the KDFWR. WKMS also reported GLE hopes to test their laser-enrichment technology by the end of the year.
The 665 acres that GLE is receiving is adjacent to the former gaseous diffusion plant.
“We greatly appreciate the collaborative efforts of our community and state partners in Kentucky that have been instrumental in finalizing this land acquisition,” said GLE CEO Stephen Long in a statement. “We are excited to continue our partnership with the commonwealth as we work towards a commercialization decision and maintaining our deployment target date of no later than 2030.”
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