Antinuclear

Nuclear waste dump idea is a political stinker: Liberal powerbroker Michael Kroger is worried

Malcolm goes nuclear, Switzer, 30 Oct 15  Sir Humphrey might have called it a “courageous” suggestion. Determined to show everything is indeed on the table, the Prime Minister this week floated the idea of Australia storing nuclear waste. Not merely waste from the Lucas Heights scientific reactor, or indeed waste from a hypothetical Australian nuclear power industry down the track. No, Malcolm Turnbull is suggesting Australia welcome and store the nuclear waste shipped to us from other countries

After announcing a well-known nuclear advocate, Dr Alan Finkel, as Australia’s next Chief Scientist on Monday, the Prime Minister visited the South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill to congratulate him on his Royal Commission into the nuclear fuel cycle. Turnbull says he is a “bit sceptical” about the chances of a nuclear power industry stacking up financially in Australia (especially while coal is so cheap). But he does see a business case for digging up uranium, processing it here, shipping it off for others to use and then taking back spent fuel rods.

He spelt out his thinking on Adelaide radio: “We have got the uranium, we mine it, why don’t we process it, turn it into the fuel rods, lease it to people overseas, when they are done we bring them back and we have got stable, very stable geology in remote locations and a stable political environment. That is a business that you could well imagine here.”………

as anyone even mildly involved in the nuclear debate over the last twenty years will know, there’s no escaping the politics. Liberal powerbroker Michael Kroger was typically blunt about the Prime Minister’s idea. “We look like everyone else’s rubbish bin, quite frankly, and Australians will see it that way…they will say ‘why is this stuff being dumped here?’” Kroger, the Victorian Liberal Party President, has a sharp nose for a political stinker………..

October 31, 2015 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, politics