A resource developer wants to prospect for uranium on the Little Missouri National Grasslands in Slope and Billings counties in western North Dakota.

Formation Resources Inc., the same company already coring for uranium on private land in those same counties now wants to look on public land to see if it can detect the heavy metals there.

Formation is the U.S. subsidiary of Pacmag Metals, of Australia. This application and the active coring on private land, is part of its North Dakota Sentinel Project.

The company has said because of geology it would mine in open pits for uranium, rather than inject water.

Formation wants to prospect on 18,000 grasslands' acres - most in Slope County - by walking through the area with a radium detector and taking a grid of soil samples under peeled and replaced sod.

It will look for uranium used in the nuclear industry and molybdenum, a heavy metal used to harden steel.

Uranium was mined decades ago in Bowman, Slope, Billings and Stark counties, but the industry was abandoned in the late '70s.

The Forest Service will take public comments for 30 days and hold a public meeting before taking any action on the application.

Forest Service project manager Mark Sexton said depending on the comments and any other considerations, the company could start prospecting late this summer.

Formation Resources will detect for uranium and molybdenum along stream bottoms and other low areas on the grasslands. Its prospectors could not take vehicles into the areas, which are a mix of management areas, special interest areas and inventoried roadless areas.

If the prospecting is positive, the company would have to return to the Forest Service for permits to drill and core for uranium.

That permitting would require a detailed environmental analysis. For some parts of the grasslands, the grasslands management plan would have to be amended because removal of minerals and ground disturbance are prohibited there. It would take four to five years before any mining could be approved, Sexton said.

Sexton said Formation should get good information from the coring it's already doing on nearby private acres.

"They may find out with the private acres that it's not even doable," he said.

Starting last month, the company has drilled hundreds of samples on the private land and those were positive for both uranium and molybdenum.

The public meeting on Formation's prospecting application will be held at 6:30 p.m. July 15 at the Memorial Hall in Belfield.

(Reach reporter Lauren Donovan at 888-303-5511 or lauren@;westriv.com.)