Antinuclear

Nuclear waste dump for South Australia: an unacceptably bad option

The endeavours of our scientists and engineers are needed in dealing with the many facets of climate challenge, including the transition to renewable energy, and they should be focused on this.

Nuclear waste dump just another bad option — what about renewable energy? http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/nuclear-waste-dump-just-another-bad-option–what-about-renewable-energy/news-story/92f494cdde1dcae41481a45e5ac4f4ac  February 18, 2016  John Willoughby The Advertiser SOUTH Australia’s Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission, in its tentative findings, has recommended avoiding some bad options: no nuclear power generation and no reprocessing or fuel leasing in the foreseeable future.

However, a bad option it found acceptable is allowing a proportion of the world’s most dangerous high-level nuclear waste to be transported to SA for long-term disposal.

The royal commission is not proposing to import this material in its hottest, radioactive state — the initial cooling of the waste will take place overseas.

From the health point of view, the risks are largely borne by those who work in the nuclear industry and, perhaps because the risks are not high, the report does not adequately address them. Employees involved in the processing would have to accept increased health risks.

The impact on life and health from a major release of radioactivity from nuclear accidents is severe and immediate. Safety problems cannot be excluded: in existing repositories overseas (Germany and US), water ingress occurred in one, and failure in cooling systems caused an explosion in another. Both required expensive remediation.

Radiation toxicity is the primary reason so much care is required in dealing with nuclear material and why safe disposal of radioactive waste is critical. As the royal commission report says, “Used fuel requires isolation from the environment for many hundreds of thousands of years”.

The commission’s view is that this difficulty would be overcome by the placement of the material in ancient rock formations in SA and surrounding it with physical barriers. The commission’s views seem reasonable, but humans have previously been wrong about many certainties.

What is especially disappointing about the nuclear fuel chain discussion is that it detracts from another important discussion: the challenge of finding a sustainable way to live without adding carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases to our atmosphere.

Nuclear reactors are hugely complex, take decades to construct, are very expensive, have short life-spans (20-60 years) and cannot be ‘‘recycled’’. They are utterly unsustainable.

In contrast, the costs of renewable sources of energy (solar, wind) are very low. Solar and wind plants can be built quickly and relatively cheaply, can be maintained or deconstructed easily, and have no ongoing population risks.

The endeavours of our scientists and engineers are needed in dealing with the many facets of climate challenge, including the transition to renewable energy, and they should be focused on this.

John Willoughby is Professor Emeritus, Flinders University, and a member of Doctors for the Environment Australia

February 19, 2016 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | NUCLEAR ROYAL COMMISSION 2016, South Australia, wastes