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A Nevada company is looking to drill in a uranium-rich area west of Albuquerque in hopes of reviving the industry there.

Urex Energy Corp. of Reno plans to drill 21 exploratory holes on 2,700 acres of La Jara Mesa at the base of Mount Taylor.

Urex is one of seven companies that have mining claims in the Mount Taylor area near Grants. Laramide Ltd., a Canadian company, already has approval for exploratory drilling on the mesa, and Cibola National Forest officials expect more companies will apply for permits on forest land by the spring.

"There's a lot of interest, so there are new companies, for the most part, (that) went and bought old existing claims," said Rod Byers, minerals project manager for the Cibola forest.

"They already know from the previous stuff that there is uranium out there," Byers said. "They just need to confirm it."

In 1978, New Mexico had 55 bustling uranium mines - the most in the nation. But low prices forced the companies out of business. The state's last major operation, Chevron Resources Co.'s Mount Taylor Mine, closed in 1990.

Since then, prices have risen from below $10 a pound to more than $55 a pound.

Urex president Richard Bachman said the company believes uranium lies beneath the surface of its land. The stake is adjacent to a Laramide claim, where previous drilling showed 8 million pounds of uranium oxide, he said.

"The whole district potentially could produce again," Bachman said.

Bachman expects to begin drilling on La Jara Mesa in mid-November and possibly start mining in three years. The company would need a ground water discharge permit from the state Environment Department and approval from the state's Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department.

Should the permits be approved, it's unlikely the area would see a boom like that from the 1950s to the early Õ80s, said Bill Brancard, director of the state Mining and Minerals Division.

"While there are significant uranium deposits in the Grants uranium belt, new uranium mining faces a number of challenges that didn't exist back then," Brancard said.

He pointed to increased regulation, concerns of neighboring communities about exposure to radiation, mine safety, worldwide competition and environmental impacts.

Companies like Urex also could face opposition from American Indian tribes that consider Mount Taylor sacred.

Area tribes, including the Navajo Nation, use the mountain in healings and blessings and believe drilling would amount to desecration, said David Begay, a Navajo medicine man.

Mount Taylor, one of the Navajos' four sacred mountains, is at the southern boundary of what the tribe considers its ancestral land.

"The relationship with Mount Taylor is very significant, very personal," Begay said. "Not a day goes by without reference to Mount Taylor in most of the traditional prayers."

The mountain and La Jara Mesa are part of the forest's Mount Taylor Ranger District.

But Byers said the companies could argue that the mesa isn't part of Mount Taylor.

Bachman contends the two are separate and that "the footprint of our exploration is very minimal."

Past mine operators made similar claims of minimal impact. But Chris Shuey of the Southwest Research and Information Center, an environmental group that tracks claims, said that has not proven true.

"There's still a tremendous backlog of unfilled reclamation, restoration, surface impacts, ground water impacts from the previous boom area of mining," he said. "And there's not a lot to show for it."

The U.S. Forest Service is accepting written comments on the Urex proposal until Nov. 6, after which a permit would be issued.

While some groups are fighting uranium mining, the Cibola County Commission has passed a resolution in favor of exploration. The resolution says the county "is blessed with natural resources such as uranium and coal" and that the development of mining would "provide a significant tax base and additional jobs for Cibola County."