Relief for Flinders Ranges as Minister Matt Canavan scraps nuclear waste plans for Wallerberdina
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Nuclear waste plans for Wallerberdina Station in Flinders Ranges scrapped after community ballot, ABC North and West SA
By Gary-Jon Lysaght , Angela Smallacombe and Shannon Corvo 13 Dec 19, The Flinders Ranges will no longer be considered a potential site for a nuclear waste facility.
Key points:
The Federal Government was considering Wallerberdina Station, near Hawker, for a facility that would permanently store low-level nuclear waste and temporarily store intermediate-level waste. Hawker, along with other Flinders Ranges communities were given the opportunity to vote on whether they supported the facility. That ballot showed 454 votes opposing the facility and 408 supporting it. That represented a 52-48 split. “While the community ballot was just one of many measures I am considering, I have said that achieving at least a majority level of support was a necessary condition to achieving broad community support,” Resources Minister Matt Canavan said.
“I especially want to thank the communities of Hawker and Quorn for their patience and resilience through this process. They are a fantastic community that I have had the privilege to know better through this process.” ‘The result we were hoping for’ Greg Bannon lives at Quorn and has been a vocal opponent of the facility for the past four years. He said it was a “huge relief” the facility would not go ahead near Hawker. “It puts an end to four years of argument and debate and trying to make the case to preserve the Flinders Ranges,” he said. “It’s been a long process but in the end, we got the result we were hoping to.
“We’ve always said that the process was wrong, that it’s not fair to do this, to make one small community make the decision for the whole of Australia’s nuclear waste.”……. Kimba votes in favour The Flinders Ranges was only one of two sites being considered for the facility.The other one was Kimba, on the Eyre Peninsula. That town had a similar ballot, which found more than 60 per cent of voters were in favour of the facility going ahead. Mr Canavan said a final decision on where the facility would go would be made in 2020.
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