Denison Mines celebrated the groundbreaking of Canada’s first in-situ uranium mine on Thursday.

Dubbed the ‘Wheeler River’ project, the mine will be located in the Athabasca Basin, about 600 kilometres north of Saskatoon.

The mine will operate through an in-situ recovery method. Denison President and CEO David Cates says this method involves leaching uranium directly from ore in the ground.

“ISR mining is done from surface on a small area…It means that we have this potential for a very small surface footprint and very minimal environmental interactions.”

He adds that this method doesn’t generate conventional tailings, either. There will also be nothing to crush or grind. Rather, the solution will be processed into a granular product called yellowcake.

He adds that developing a greenfield mine site is a challenging feat.

“You have to imagine that where we started was a property where we were not authorized to do any construction work util we received that final federal permit. So, one of the biggest challenges is getting it ready to have three to four hundred people on site.”

He also called the project ‘nation-building.’

“We’re building a new mine, but we have incredible Indigenous support. We’re using a mining method that achieves higher standards of sustainability. We’re doing the thing that the nation would like to do while also achieving economic activity that we need as a country to be able to afford the quality-of-life that we want. I don’t see a better way to define something that truly is nation-building.”

Cates says there is strong support for the project in the north, with over 30 Indigenous nations backing the project through the federal regulatory process.

However, last year, Peter Ballentyne Cree Nation announced it would be taking court action against the provincial government for a lack of consultation and accommodation regarding the project. Cates says they are working diligently to improve that relationship to resolve the judicial review.

Construction will ramp up to full scale in the coming weeks. The mine is expected to come online in two years.