Labor Member of Parliament joins Northern Territory protest against nuclear waste dump plan
March marks five years of nuclear waste push http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-05-25/tennant-creek-nucelar-waste-dum-protest-muckaty/4033982?section=ntBy Allyson Horn, May 25, 2012 A protest has marked the fifth anniversary of the proposal to build a nuclear waste facility at Muckaty Station. More than a hundred people have taken part in a protest against a
proposed nuclear waste facility in the Northern Territory.
Muckaty Station, about 130 kilometres north, of Tennant Creek is the site being considered for Australia’s first nuclear waste dump. Protesters marched along Tennant Creek’s main street, chanting “no dump at Muckaty, don’t waste the Territory”.
It has been five years since the site at Muckaty was first nominated for the facility but protesters say some of traditional owners of the land still have not been consulted about it.
Local MLA Gerry McCarthy stood alongside protesters and reaffirmed his commitment to fight against the dump. He says he would take part in a blockade to stop construction of the facility, if it comes to that.
Diane Numbin Stokes is a traditional owner from Tennant Creek and a custodian of the land area that includes Muckaty station. She says the land being set aside for the nuclear waste dump is an Aboriginal men’s site, but this does not mean the women can’t voice their concerns. “We don’t want the waste to come to that land,” she said.
A Federal Court challenge against the nomination of the site is yet to be settled.
Western Australian govt will not allow uranium to be shipped from W.A. ports
WA has no plans to change stance on uranium , Business Spectator, 25 May 12 The Liberal-Nationals government of West Australia has no plans to ship yellowcake uranium to overseas markets due to a lack of suitable ports, “because they are either surrounded by residential areas or do not have container facilities”, according to a report by Federal Labor MP Melissa Parke said that the WA government’s decision recognised “that the people of Western Australia are strongly against the mining and movement of uranium”………. http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/WA-has-no-plans-to-ship-yellowcake-pd20120525-UM2U9?OpenDocument&src=hp26,
Queensland govt axes solar farm project
Queensland Government Bails On Solar Farm Project
http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3224 by Energy Matters, 25 May 12 The Queensland Government has withdrawn funding for Cloncurry Solar arm as part of a cost cutting campaign that may see other solar elated casualties. Read more »
Renewable energy in Australia threatening the profits of fossil fuel industries
Electricity industry is in for a big shock by: Giles Parkinson The Australian May 25, 2012 Data from the European electricity market shows how 25GW of solar PV has changed the nature of the German electricity market. The data compares how the market looked in 2008, against how it looked on a sunny day on March 12 this year.
“……..It is just a snapshot, but it is being repeated often enough that generators in Germany, Italy and elsewhere in Europe are calling for the rollout of solar to be capped to protect their earnings.
Several gas-fired plants in Germany have either been closed or marked for closure, and the largest electricity companies, E.ON and RWE, have made it clear they cannot keep these plants open, and are refusing to build new ones, without further help. So the German government has come up with a new mechanism called “capacity factors”. The details are yet to be worked out, but essentially it represents a payment to ensure that the gas-fired plants are available to balance the growing number of solar PV and offshore and onshore wind plants in the German grid, and to provide capacity as nuclear and then coal-fired power stations are removed.
It would seem inevitable that Australia will have to follow the same path. The brown coal generators are already feeling the pinch from lower wholesale prices of electricity caused by moderating demand and by the large wind capacity in South Australia. They have succeeded once in persuading the Victorian government to reduce the ambitions of its state-based renewable energy target, and are now seeking to do so again at the federal level. Already, the federal government has provided two payment mechanisms for the closure for some of the most polluting plants, and compensation to ensure that others stay open despite the impact of the carbon price (which ostensibly is designed to force their closure).
The government also has an energy security mechanism that can provide emergency financing to any generators finding themselves in trouble. Capacity payments, incentives to ensure that “peaking” generators that are flexible enough to provide energy when a coal-fired generator is offline, renewables are not functioning, or in times of peak demand, may well become part of the landscape…..
Sales of uranium to India not yet government policy? no date set for negotiations
Division delays sales of uranium to India by: David Crowe and Mark Dodd The Australian May 25, 2012 LABOR’S landmark policy change to allow uranium sales to India is yet to be put into effect amid divisions within the government over whether to proceed with a deal seen as crucial to the relationship between the two countries.
Talks on a bilateral deal are yet to begin despite assurances last year that negotiations would be under way by now and assumptions in India that talks had already begun.
Julia Gillard overcame objections from some of her cabinet colleagues to secure the policy shift at the ALP conference last December, drawing praise from India for strengthening the two nations’ strategic partnership.
But ministers are still considering whether to adopt the party platform as government policy and there is no date set for the formal negotiations to begin.
The delays come as Canberra also decides on Western Australia’s first uranium mine in the face of calls from the Greens for tougher safeguards on the Toro Energy project despite its approval by the state’s environmental regulator……
“Australia and India are not currently negotiating a civil nuclear co-operation (‘safeguards’) agreement,” a department official told The Australian. “Before exports could take place, a civil nuclear co-operation agreement would need to be concluded to cover supply of Australian uranium to India.”…..http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/foreign-affairs/division-delays-sales-of-uranium-to-india/story-fn59nm2j-1226366170546
Labor and Liberal Party leaders for Barkly, NT, both oppose Muckaty nuclear waste dump
Barkly candidates united against Muckaty, ABC Alice Springs By Emma Sleath (Cross Media Reporter), 24 May 12 They’re on opposite sides of the political divide but Member for Barkly, Gerry McCarthy and Country Liberal Party candidate Bec Healy stand united on Muckaty.
The CLP’s candidate for the Barkly, Bec Healy says she does not want to see the proposed nuclear waste facility at Muckaty Station go ahead. ”I know some of the traditional owners out at Muckaty…and you have to be sensitive with how people live, that’s their life and I’m willing to support them,” she says.
The Federal Government put forward the proposal to build a radioactive waste management facility at Muckaty Station in 2008. The station is located 120kms north of Tennant Creek and leased from Indigenous landholders.
Ms Healy stands united with current Labor Member for Barkly, Gerry McCarthy who maintains his strong opposition to the proposal.
“This is prime cattle country, this is important Indigenous land, this is a very important part of the Territory’s future, it doesn’t need to be contaminated with nuclear material,” he says.
Both candidates stand against their own parties federally on the issue……
Last week the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) announced their opposition to the Muckaty proposal, saying that they will actively support any trade unions ‘refusing to cooperate with the implementation of the policy.’…..
“Why put it over the top of our water table?” says local business owner Wayne Walsh
“I don’t think they realise that we’ve got so much water underneath up here…one mistake and the whole territory’s dead, all the water’s gone.”…….. http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2012/05/24/3510368.htm
Australia’s responsibility to face up to its radioactive wastes produced at Lucas Heights
Storing the reprocessed nuclear fuel that is to come back from France at Lucas Heights seems the best of a poor set of alternatives.
We are stuck with highly radioactive material for which we are responsible. Like all countries with nuclear reactors, we should not have produced it in the first place until safe storage technology existed.
Radioactive game of passing the parcel http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/opinion/politics/radioactive-game-of-passing-the-parcel-20120523-1z582.html#ixzz1vp20gX9X Richard Broinowski May 24, 2012 Reports indicate France is soon to return reprocessed nuclear waste generated at Lucas Heights to Australia. The federal nuclear agency says the waste is ”intermediate level”, small in volume, and to be stored temporarily at Lucas Heights.
These assurances are misleading in all three respects: the volume of the waste, its toxicity, and its future disposal. Read more »
Wiluna locals unhappy on uranium plans
Western Nuclear free Alliance ,24th May 2012 Wiluna locals have sent letters to both WA Environment Minister Bill Marmion and Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke inviting them both to Wiluna to discuss the proposed uranium mine by Toro Energy.Wiluna local and senior law man Glen Cooke has been very critical of the consultation process and is now seeking consultation from the Ministers, with the support of others in the community.
Mr Cooke said “Toro Energy they only talk to a few people, always the same people. It’s not right, the people from Bondini’s (the community closest to the proposed mine) sometimes they don’t know about meetings, or they’re not invited to meetings or they can’t get to meetings. This is not right.”
“Marmion and Burke they will be making a big decision that will affect our community our dreaming and our health. Before they make a decision on what happens in our community, before signing away our country from many thousands of kilometers away they should come and look us in the eyes.”
Kado Muir, Chairperson of the West Australia Nuclear Free Alliance and Ngalia man said “The decision by EPA to approve the mining and transport of uranium has sent a shiver of fear through Aboriginal communities in the Goldfields. Our families in Wiluna face the prospect of having their country and environment poisoned by the Toro mine, while those of us living in Leonora and Kalgoorlie can only live in fear and hope that the road trains driving through our town does not have an unfortunate accident.
“The trucking of uranium down the Goldfields highway, sneaking around the back of Kalgoorlie and scurrying out of the State to South Australia along the Eyre highway is a striking commentary on the ‘not in my backyard syndrome’. Lead exports through Esperance and Fremantle demonstrated that industry and Government owned ports can’t cope with Lead, how will they ever transport uranium safely, it’s like playing Russian roulette with a loaded gun.
“This is an irresponsible politically motivated decision by the EPA to pander to Barnetts ‘development at all costs’ agenda for Western Australia. “The EPA needs to redeem its legitimacy and hold a full public enquiry as provided for under their Act into the wider environmental and public health consequences of uranium mining in WA” Mr Muir concluded.
(the signatures on this letter are only a few of the many many people in Wiluna who are concerned about the uranium mine at Wiluna- due to bad timing and meetings). http://nuclearfree.wordpress.com/media/
Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) a winning strategy for superannuation investment
After decades of failed renewable energy support programs, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) will prudently apply public funds to support private investors in bringing forward a more diverse, cheaper, cleaner energy supply. This is the winning strategy for mums and dads with their money in super and the investors who oversee it. The CEFC will build the foundations of the future our nation is demanding.
We can all invest in clean energy, SMH, Simon O’Connor May 24, 2012 “…….With the CEFC, the last pillar of the Clean Energy Future package is soon to become law. This makes it a good time to look at why the rest of the world is embracing this method of accelerating renewable energy investment, in a time of intense global spending pressures. Renewables are one of the few global industries that registered continued growth throughout the GFC. Clean energy investment is up 500 per cent since 2004.
Couple this with longer-term energy forecasts and most governments can see the importance of getting behind clean energy. Investing now in diverse sources is critical for the holy trinity of power: energy security, insurance against price shocks and lower energy prices.
Despite our coal and gas resources, Australia is in no way immune to potential price shocks. Most energy analysts believe it is only a matter of time before our cheap fossil fuels inflate to international prices, Read more »
Australia-based Barefoot Power provides small scale solar power to 10 million impoverished homes
The Australia-based social enterprise Barefoot Power aims to expand access to its high-quality, energy efficient, affordable light-emitting diode (LED) lamps, home lighting systems and phone chargers, to more off-grid communities with expansion in Ghana, Senegal, Nigeria and India as a focus by 2015. The company has already captured the majority market share in East Africa.
Solar energy enterprise to provide 10 million with access to renewable energy , PR Wire 24 May 12 The BCtA is a global initiative that encourages private sector efforts to fight poverty, supported by several international organizations including the UN Development Programme (UNDP).
Ten million low-income people living in rural communities in Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America
and the Caribbean, will gain access to low-cost solar energy by 2015, in part due to a commitment made by solar energy provider Barefoot Power to the Business Call to Action (BCtA).
The BCtA is a global initiative that encourages private sector efforts to fight poverty, supported by several international organizations including the UN Development Programme (UNDP). Read more »
Close dirty coal-fired power stations – we want renewable energy, say Port Augusta residents
The State Government says above average lung cancer levels in the city are caused by smoking.
Locals lobby for renewable power http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-05-22/port-augusta-locals-renewable-power/4025622?section=sa May 22, 2012 Port Augusta residents want the town’s coal fired power stations replaced with renewable alternatives . Residents at Port Augusta in South Australia’s north have launched a campaign to replace the city’s two ageing coal-fired power stations. A community group has been set up to encourage a switch to renewable energy.
Read more »
Australia’s uranium companies put on a bold face, but their prospects are not good
The uranium price tanked after the Fukushima disaster and so far there is no sign of a bounce. Current prices are too low to allow the smaller uranium wannabes to proceed with any confidence.
Uranium flashpoint in the wild West, The Drum, Jim Green, 22 May 12, Interesting times in the uranium sector. The mining companies have had a few wins in the 14 months since the Fukushima disaster, but they’ve had more losses.
Bill Repard, organiser of the Paydirt Uranium Conference held in Adelaide in February, put on a brave face with this claim: The sector’s hiccups in the wake of Fukushima are now over with, the global development of new nuclear power stations continues unabated, and the Australian sector has literally commenced a U-turn in every sense.
Yet for all the hype, uranium accounts for a lousy 0.03 per cent of Australian export revenue and a negligible 0.02 per cent of Australian jobs. The industry’s future depends on the nuclear power ‘renaissance’, but global nuclear power capacity has been stagnant for the past 20 years, and if there is any growth at all in the next 20 years, it will be modest. Read more »
BHP reluctant to develop its Western Australian Yeelirrie uranium mining project
Procrastinating BHP pressured over uranium deposit, Rania Spooner May 23, 2012 BHP Billiton has been challenged to develop or sell a West Australian uranium deposit, amid growing speculation it may offload the deposit later this year.
Despite a pro-uranium WA government, BHP Billiton delayed submission of the draft environmental review and management program for its Yeelirrie uranium project in June, citing a failure to meet internal standards and flagging a delay of at least six months. Almost a year later,.. speculation grows that a sell-down of the asset is imminent Read more »
Toro Energy’s plan to track radioactive material through Western Australia and Northern Territory
The Australian, 23 May 12 WEST Australian yellowcake will be carted thousands of kilometres across state borders and shipped out of Adelaide or Darwin in a bold plan that limits political fallout in the west and puts the blowtorch on federal Labor to increase uranium exports.
South Australian company Toro Energy yesterday received approval from the WA Environmental Protection Authority to mine 1200 tonnes of uranium ore from its Wiluna operations, 520km north of Kalgoorlie, and to truck it in 200-litre drums across the Nullarbor. Once it crosses state lines, it will go direct to Adelaide and be shipped out or put on rail to Darwin.
The plan means the yellowcake will not have to be shipped through the port at Fremantle, near Perth, where the local council’s policy declares that “no uranium, nuclear waste nor other material connected with the nuclear power industry may be stored or transported in or through the municipality”.
Conservation Council opposes Wiliuna uranium mine, Kalgoorlie mayor not enthusiastic, either
The Kalgoorlie-Boulder mayor Ron Yuryevich says he is not opposed to the project as long as the uranium is not transported through residential areas of Kalgoorlie-Boulder.
Council to challenge Toro’s uranium approval, ABC News May 22, 2012 The Conservation Council is to challenge the approval of Toro Energy’s proposed uranium mine in Western Australia’s northern Goldfields. Yesterday, the Environmental Protection Authority gave the go-ahead for the company’s proposal to develop the mine 30 kilometres from Wiluna. Read more »
This month
For international news, go to nuclear-news ion for Western Australia’s energy future
http://ifyoulovethisplanet.org/?p=5755 Mary Olson on how women are more vulnerable to atomic radiation
- Muckaty Gathering 25 May 2012
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1J9q-OeEO4 - NuclearKop http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpMhhzkeYjk
Anti nuclear action below: - more info at Action Australia « Antinuclear and at Event details « Antinuclear
- http://www.communityrun.org/petitions/put-the-brakes-on-toxic-trucks-no-nuclear-waste-at-muckaty
- Online Petition - against the proposed national radioactive waste dump at Muckaty Station in the Northern Territory http://www.gopetition.com.au/petitions/no-nuclear-waste-dump-at-muckaty.htmlUranium Free WA Sign the online charter saying no to uranium mining in Western Australia http://ccwa.org.au/takeaction/uraniumnotforsaleSIGN THE PETITION TO STOP LYNAS RARE EARTH EXPORTS TO MALAYSIA http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/ban-rare-earth-exports/
EVENTS
- May 29 – Melbourne - Amnesty International panel on weapons and war .
- May 29 – 30 Melbourne - Wind Farms conference
- May 30 Darwin - expert Panel on Nuclear Waste Dump plan for Muckaty
- June 2 - Nuclear Abolition Day
- June 13 - Melbourne -Lizards Revenge -Shut Roxby Down
- June 14 Melbourne Beyond Zero Emissions ZCA 2020 plan.
- June 19 - Melbourne Public meeting US FORCES IN AUSTRALIA: SECURITY OR THREAT? USforcesflyer-2.pdf
The Nuclear/uranium industry and WOMEN - theme for May 2012
Deceptive information given to women about breast cancer. Women are repeatedly told about “genetic causes”, about “risks of obesity:. about “diet factors”, about “not having babies”, or “having a baby at a later age” even about “stress” – as causes of breast cancer. The not so subtle message is that it is THEIR FAULT – a problem caused by the individual woman, so – the only preventive actions must be those made by individual women.
The facts are otherwise. The single most proven cause of breast cancer is ionising radiation. After that, other environmental causes exist, amongst the wash of chemicals, and synthetic hormones, that pervade our environment. After that – probably some hereditary susceptability, amongst some women.
Why is this so? One could conclude that breast cancer is a growth industry. There’s money at every point in this sorry cycle – from the radiation from nuclear fuel through to the medical radiation used to detect and treat breast cancer. There is no money clearly involved in shutting down a toxic industry, and preventing millions of breast cancers.
How does ionising radiation cause breast cancer? Ionising radiation comes in several forms. for example, Gamma rays, x-rays, and some sub-atomic particles such as alpha particles and protons In ionising radiation, a tiny electron is released from an atom, and enters a body cell, hitting the DNA in the cell’s nucleus, and damaging it. The damaged DNA sends out ‘wrong’ messages telling the cell to divide in an uncontrolled manner – cancer develops.
“...the time between radiation exposure and breast cancer development is longest in young women and shortest for older women; young children do not show a detectable elevation in breast cancer occurrence for some 35 to 40 years after exposure. Radiation-induced breast cancers appear to occur later in life during the same ages when breast cancer rates, in general, begin to increase. It appears that a single exposure of sufficient dose during early life can increase breast cancer risk even 50 years later...
the relationship between radiation dose and breast cancer risk can be described by a straight line which implies that no matter how low the dose, there is some small risk associated with the exposure.…
The risk of subsequent breast cancer from very high doses is lower than that which might be expected from the effects of lower doses. This is because radiation at high doses is an effective killer of cells and dead cells are not able to develop into cancer…..
Young girls are at highest risk …when a young girl is exposed to radiation, she will have menstrual cycles for several decades that might enhance the development of any underlying damage caused by the radiation. There is evidence to suggest that exposure to the immature breast during early development, and around the age of beginning menstruation, carries a higher risk than at other times of a woman’s life.
It is unclear how radiation exposure of the breast during pregnancy affects a woman’s breast cancer risk. However, a recent study of women treated for Hodgkin’s disease concluded that pregnancy might be a time of increased sensitivity of breast tissue to the cancercausing effects of radiation……”
.” John D Boyce, Jr, DSc, Scientific Director,Program on Breast Cancer and Environmental Risk Factors in New York State.. Ionizing Radiation and Breast Cancer Risk
