Uranium mining by country largest Canadian mines are located in the Athabasca Basin of northern Saskatchewan. Canada's first uranium discovery was in the Alona Bay area, south of Lake Superior Provincial Park in Ontario, by Dr. John Le Conte in 1847. The Canadian uranium industry, however, really began with the 1932 discovery of pitchblende at Port Radium, Northwest Territories. The deposit was mined from 1933 to 1940, for radium, silver, copper, and cobalt. The mine shut down in 1940, but was reopened in 1942 by Eldorado Mining and Refining Limited to supply uranium to the Manhattan Project. The Canadian government expropriated the Port Radium
Uranium ore Uranium is a highly soluble, as well as a radioactive, heavy metal. It can be easily dissolved, transported and precipitated within ground waters by subtle changes in oxidation conditions. Uranium also does not usually form very insoluble mineral species, which is a further factor in the wide variety of geological conditions and places in which uranium mineralization may accumulate. Uranium is an incompatible element within magmas, and as such it tends to become accumulated within highly fractionated and evolved granite melts, particularly alkaline examples. These melts tend to become highly enriched in uranium, thorium and potassium, and may in turn