Antinuclear

Australian news, and some related international items

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No nuclear dump on agricultural land – Canada

Opposition gathering to nuclear fuel disposal vault in South Bruce, The Sun Times, 29 May 20 

The Nuclear Waste Management Organization is investigating the suitability of about 600 hectares of rural land it assembled to build a $23-billion buried storage vault for used fuel rods and a testing centre for technologies needed for the project.

NWMO’s other preferred site is also in Ontario, in the Ignace area, northwest of Lake Superior, and feasibility studies are underway for both sites.It would take 10 years to undertake the environmental regulatory approval process. Plans call for construction to begin in 2033 and take about 10 years, with operation starting in 2043, according to the NWMO.

South Bruce Mayor Bob Buckle said in January it seemed to him there was little opposition to the project, but that has changed. At an online South Bruce council meeting Tuesday, Teeswater-area beef and sheep farmer Michelle Stein spoke on behalf of a citizen’s group, Nuclear Tanks, No Thanks, which loosely formed in February.

Her farm is next to one purchased by NWMO for the project northwest of Teeswater, part of the parcel of land where metal-encased spent fuel rods could be buried for thousands of years.

She told council “there’s way too many risks involved with this project and they need to have a referendum to let the community decide. Like we have over 1,500 signatures that were collected before COVID,” before the virus stopped door-knocking, she said by phone Thursday.

“Council just it seemed turned to ignore us and do their own thing.” She noted Buckle was elected with 1,380 votes.

The group has an information website www.protectsouthbruce-nodgr.org, which includes an online petition with some 1,800 signatures, which prior to the pandemic was intended for people who aren’t local to sign…….

Becky Smith, a NWMO spokeswoman said “We’re a farming community. I don’t understand why they’d want to turn us into a mining community, and then bury the world’s most radioactive waste underneath our water table,”

A four-week comment period opened Wednesday and ends June 30 about whether a draft report accurately summarizes public concerns and wishes expressed during workshops held between December and February……..

n January, SON held a community vote which turned down a separate nuclear waste vault proposal, for lower- and mid-level nuclear waste, championed by Ontario Power Generation.

It was to be built in Bruce County too, near the Bruce Power nuclear plant close to Kincardine.

Saugeen First Nation Chief Lester Anoquot said Wednesday he has a letter from NWMO confirming the high-level nuclear waste vault requires First Nation consent.

“We’re continuing dialogue. It’s kind of difficult right now, working remotely,” given the COVID-19 pandemic, he said.

“It will probably go to a community vote again for acceptance or not. I think the process will mirror the one that was just conducted with the last DGR (deep geological repository) proposal.”

The site falls within Saugeen Ojibway Nation’s traditional territory and its support is required for the project to proceed, Belfadhel has said.https://www.owensoundsuntimes.com/news/local-news/opposition-gathering-to-nuclear-fuel-disposal-vault-in-south-bruce

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | General News | Leave a comment

Extreme heat, air pollution – climate dangers to health in South Asia

South Asia’s twin threat: extreme heat and foul air   https://climatenewsnetwork.net/south-asias-twin-threat-extreme-heat-and-foul-air/

May 29th, 2020, by Tim Radford  Climate change means many health risks. Any one of them raises the danger. What happens when extreme heat meets bad air?

LONDON, 29 May, 2020 – Extreme heat can kill. Air pollution can seriously shorten human lives. By 2050, extreme summer heat will threaten about 2 billion people on and around the Indian sub-continent for around 78 days every year. And the chances of unbearable heat waves and choking atmospheric chemistry at the same time will rise by 175%.

Climate scientists have been warning for decades that what were once rare events – for instance the 2003 heat wave that claimed tens of thousands of lives in Europe – will, as global average temperatures rise, become the new normal.

And they have repeatedly warned that in step with extreme summer temperatures, extreme humidity is also likely to increase in some regions, and to levels that could prove potentially fatal for outdoor workers and people in crowded cities.

The link between air pollution and ill health was established 60 or more years ago and has been confirmed again and again with mortality statistics.

Risk to megacities

Now a team from China and the US confirms once more in the journal  AGU Advances, published by the American Geophysical Union, that the danger is real, and that they can tell where it is becoming immediate: in seven nations that stretch from Afghanistan to Myanmar, and from Nepal to the tip of southern India.

Around 1.5bn people live there now, and they are already learning to live with around 45 days of extreme heat every year. By 2050, there will be 2bn people, most of them crammed into megacities in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan, and climate models confirm that the number of days of extreme heat could rise to 78 a year.

The number of days on which cities – already blighted by air pollution – reach health-threatening levels of high particulate matter will also rise. When heat and choking air chemistry become too much, lives will be at risk.

That extremes of summer heat are on the increase is now a given. That the intensity, duration and frequency of heat waves will go on rising has also been established. Extremes of heat are a threat to crops and a particular hazard in cities already much hotter than their surrounding landscapes.

One research group has identified 27 ways in which high temperatures can kill. Others have repeatedly warned of the dangerous mix of high temperatures and high humidity (climate scientists call it the “wet bulb” temperature), and one team of scientists has already argued that such conditions have already arrived, albeit so far for short periods and in limited locations.

The researchers chose the so-called wet-bulb temperature of 25°C as their threshold for an unhealthy extreme, and then worked out the number of days a year that such conditions happened in South Asia: between 1994 and 2006, these arrived at an average of between 40 and 50 days a year.

They then looked at the likely rise with forecast increases in average planetary temperature, depending on how vigorously or feebly the world’s nations tried to switch from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. The probability increased by 75%.

They then chose widely-agreed dangerous thresholds for air pollution with soot, and sulphate aerosols, usually from fossil fuel combustion, to find that extremes of pollution would happen by 2050 on around 132 days a year.

Tenfold risk increase

Then they tried to estimate the probabilities that extreme pollution and extreme heat would coincide. They judged that the frequency of these more than usually hazardous days would rise by 175%, and they would last an estimated 79% longer. The area of land exposed to this double assault on human health would by then have increased tenfold.

Scientific publications usually avoid emotional language, but the researchers call their own finding “alarming.”

South Asia is a hotspot for future climate change impacts,” said Yangyang Xu, of Texas A&M University, the first author.

“I think this study raises a lot of important concerns, and much research is needed over other parts of the world on these compounded extremes, the risks they pose, and their potential human health effects.” – Climate News Network

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | General News | Leave a comment

Today’s News Corp cuts represent an enormous threat to Australian democracy ⁠

Dark day for journalism as Murdoch’s global empire sells democracy down the river   
Today’s News Corp cuts represent an enormous threat to Australian democracy ⁠— and a grim reminder of the power of a single family.
ERIC BEECHER AND PETER FRAY, MAY 28, 2020

Australian news journalism has never seen a day as black as today — and not just because News Corp has closed 12 of its 17 regional daily newspapers, leaving Australia with just 20 remaining.

Today also demonstrates the grotesque power of
one company — and one family — to decimate a large slice of a country’s
news in a single media release.

A company worth $16.3 billion, run from New York, has wielded a knife through large swathes of Australian democracy….. (subscribers only) https://www.crikey.com.au/2020/05/28/rupert-murdochs-global-empire-sells-democracy-down-the-river/?utm_campaign=Weekender&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wkndr=VWI3bngzTjl0a0V6UEhQbEJJeTFxUT09

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, media | Leave a comment

USA conducted radiation experiments on its citizens

Nuclear Guinea Pigs: Radiation Experiments Performed on US Citizens  During the Cold War, the US conducted experiments with radioactive substances on its citizens.     https://interestingengineering.com/nuclear-guinea-pigs-radiation-experiments-performed-on-us-citizens  By  Marcia Wendorf, May 29, 2020 

In a dark corner of U.S. history lies the unfortunate fact that between 1944 and 1974, three U.S. agencies — the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), the Department of Defense, and the National Institutes of Health — conducted more than 4,000 secret radiation experiments on U.S. citizens, including children.

Between April 1945 and July 1947, in experiments performed at hospitals in Rochester, New York, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, Chicago, Illinois, and San Francisco, California, subjects were injected with various types of radioactive substances. Eighteen subjects were injected with plutonium, six with uranium, five with polonium, and at least one with americium.

In 1986, the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce released a report entitled, American Nuclear Guinea Pigs: Three Decades of Radiation Experiments on U.S. Citizens.

Then, in November 1993, journalist Eileen Welsome began a three-part story in the Albuquerque Tribune newspaper that described government experiments that were conducted on Americans during the Cold War. For her effort, Welsome received a Pulitzer Prize in 1994.

Welsome’s reporting led to the creation of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments by President Bill Clinton. The committee published its results in 1995. The report described the following instances where Americans were dosed with radioactive substances without their express knowledge or full consent:

  • 57 normal adults were fed spheres containing radioactive uranium and manganese at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in the 1960s
  • 20 elderly adults were fed radium or thorium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology during the early 1960s

    • 18
       terminally ill patients were injected with plutonium in hospitals in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, Rochester, N.Y., Chicago and San Francisco
    • 6 emotionally disturbed or homeless patients with normal kidney function were injected with uranium salts at the University of Rochester from 1946 to 1947
    • 131 inmates at Oregon and Washington state prisons had their testicles irradiated between 1963 and 1971
    • 14 people in Richland, Washington were exposed to tritium during 1951 and 1952, either by breathing, eating, or bathing in it
      • 102 people were fed particles containing strontium, barium, or cesium between 1961 and 1963, at the University of Chicago and the Argonne National Laboratory
      • 54 patients in a hospital near the Oak Ridge Institute for Nuclear Studies, and who had normal intestinal tracts, were fed lanthanum-140 during the early 1960s
      • 12 terminally ill cancer patients at Columbia University and Montefiore Hospital in the late 1950s were injected with radioactive calcium and strontium
      • 14 people in 1967 were either injected with or drank radioactive promethium at the Hanford Environmental Health Foundation and Battelle Memorial Institute in Richland, Washington

        • 10
           people were either injected with radioactive phosphorus or else fed Columbia River fish which were contaminated with radioactive phosphorus in 1963
      • Experiments on infants and pregnant women

        In 1945, researchers at Vanderbilt University gave 829 pregnant women what were described as “vitamin drinks”, but which actually contained radioactive iron. The experiment was to see how fast the radioisotope passed into the women’s placentas.

        While the mothers experienced rashes, bruises, anemia, hair and tooth loss, and cancer, at least four of the children who were subsequently born to these women died from cancers, including leukemia.

        In 1953, at the University of Iowa, the Atomic Energy Commission began testing the effect of radioactive iodine on newborns and pregnant women. Researchers gave between 100 and 200 microcuries (3.7 to 7.4 MBq) of iodine-131 to pregnant women, to determine whether radioactive iodine crossed the placental barrier.

        Another study gave 25 babies who were less than 36-hours-old and who weighed between 5.5 and 8.5 pounds (2.5 to 3.9 kg) iodine-131, either by mouth or injection, then measured the amount of iodine in their thyroid glands.

        An AEC study at the University of Nebraska College of Medicine fed iodine-131 to 28 healthy infants through a gastric tube in order to gauge the amount of iodine in the infants’ thyroid glands.

        During 1946 and 1947, researchers at the University of Rochester injected uranium-234 and uranium-235 into six people to see how much uranium their kidneys could tolerate before becoming damaged.

        In 1949, near the Hanford site in south-central Washington state, the Atomic Energy Commission released iodine-131 and xenon-133 into the atmosphere. It contaminated a 500,000-acre (2,000 sq km) area, which included three small towns.

        In 1945, Albert Stevens received the diagnosis of stomach cancer at the U.C. San Francisco Medical Center. Without informing Stevens, a former Manhattan Project doctor, Joseph Gilbert, had Stevens injected with two isotopes of plutonium: Pu-238 and Pu-239.

        Prior to experimentation, scientists had assumed that 90% of injected plutonium would be excreted from the body, however, what they found was that 90% of the plutonium remained in patients’ bones for decades.

        Stevens, in fact, did not have cancer; however, his accumulated dose of Pu-238 was higher than anyone had received in history, at 64 Sv (6400 rem), despite the fact that he did not develop radiation sickness.

        Neither Stevens nor his relatives were told about the plutonium he had received, however, in 1975, when Stevens had died, his cremated remains were surreptitiously acquired by the Argonne National Laboratory Center for Human Radiobiology and the National Human Radiobiology Tissue Repository at Washington State University.

        A warm bowl of radiation

        In December 1995, a lawsuit was filed against the odd combination of the Quaker Oats company and renowned university, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

        In an almost unthinkable experiment, conducted during the 1940s and 1950s, MIT provided radioactive isotopes, which were added to the calcium and iron additives contained in Quaker Oats’ oatmeal cereal.

        The oatmeal was then served to 74 children who lived at the Fernald School, a state home for the mentally retarded located in Waltham, Massachusetts.

        The radioactive “tracers” allowed researchers to track the absorption of the calcium and iron into the children’s bodies.

        The entire purpose of the experiment was to give Quaker Oats a leg up in its rivalry with Cream of Wheat cereal. A lawyer representing the children, Michael Mattchen, was quoted in a 1995 Associated Press article as saying, “There was an utter failure to treat these kids with any human decency.”

        In October 1995, then-president Bill Clinton apologized to the Fernald School, and the president of MIT also apologized on behalf of the school.

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | General News | Leave a comment

Australia must not forget – the plutonium abuse of an Australian child, by Argonne National Laboratory

Paul Langley,  https://www.facebook.com/paul.langley.9822/posts/10213752429593121CAL-2, 14 Aug 17, 5 yr-old Simon Shaw and his mum. Simon was flown from Australia to the US on the pretext of medical treatment for his bone cancer. Instead, he was secretly injected with plutonium to see what would happen. His urine was measured, and he was flown back to Australia.

Though his bodily fluids remained radioactive, Australian medical staff were not informed. No benefit was imparted to Simon by this alleged “medical treatment” and he died of his disease after suffering a trip across the world and back at the behest of the USA despite his painful condition. The USA merely wanted a plutonium test subject. They called him CAL-2. And did their deed under the cover of phony medicine.

“Congress of the United States, House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515-2107, Edward J. Markey, 7th District, Massachusetts Committees, [word deleted] and Commerce, Chairman Subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance, Natural Resources, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe] MEMORANDUM To: Congressman Edward J. Markey From: Staff Subject: The Plutonium Papers Date: 4/20/94

Staff Memo on Plutonium Papers

The medical file for Cal-2 also contains correspondence seeking follow-up from Argonne National Laboratory in the 1980s. Cal-2 was an Australian boy, not quite five years old, who was flown to the U.S. in 1946 for treatment of bone cancer. During his hospitalization in San Francisco, he was chosen as a subject for plutonium injection. He returned to Australia, where he died less than one year later.

Document 700474 is a letter from Dr. Stebbings to an official at the Institute of Public Health in Sydney, Australia, in an attempt to reach the family of Cal-2. This letter reports that the child was “injected with a long-lived alpha-emitting radionuclide.” Document 700471 is a letter from Dr. Stebbings to New South Wales, Australia (names and town deleted), inquiring about recollections of the boy’s hospitalization in 1946. The letter notes that, “those events have become rather important in some official circles here,” but provides few details to the family.

A hand-written note on the letter reports no response through October 8, 1987. Considering the history on the lack of informed consent with these experiments, it is surprising that the letters to Australia failed to mention the word “plutonium.”

The Australian news media has since identified Cal-2 as Simeon Shaw, the son of a wool buyer in New South Wales, and information on the injection created an international incident. The information in the medical file does indicate that at a time when Secretary Herrington told you that no follow-up would be conducted on living subjects, the Department of Energy was desperately interested in conducting follow-up on a deceased Australian patient.

In an effort to determine the full extent of follow-up by the Department after 1986, your staff has requested, through the Department’s office of congressional affairs, the opportunity to speak with Dr. Stebbings, Dr. Robertson, and any other officials who may have been involved in the follow-up. So far, that request has been unsuccessful. It remains an open question as to what was the full extent of follow-up performed in the 1980s, and whether the efforts then would facilitate any further follow-up on subjects now. It seems appropriate for the Interagency Working Group to address these questions as its efforts continue.”

Source: National Security Archives, George Washington University, http://www.gwu.edu/…/…/mstreet/commeet/meet1/brief1/br1n.txt

See also ACHRE Final Report.

NO MORE DUAL USE ABUSE OF AUSTRALIANS MR PRESIDENT. STOP FUNDING SYKES AND FLINDERS UNIVERSITY IN THE DOE QUEST FOR CHEAP CLEANUP OF URANIUM CONTAMINATED SITES.

Mr. President, you are wrong if you think you can do the same again re hormesis funding in Australia as the USA did with CAL-2. We have not forgotten and do not trust you or your paid agents in Australian universities such as Flinders.

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, health, history, reference, secrets and lies | 1 Comment

May 29 Energy News — geoharvey

 

Opinion: ¶ “Just How Good An Investment Is Renewable Energy? New Study Reveals All” • Renewable energy investments deliver massively better returns than fossil fuels in the US, the UK and Europe, according to analysis. Despite this, the total volume of investment is still nowhere near what will be required to mitigate climate change. [Forbes] […]

via May 29 Energy News — geoharvey

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Ausgrid seeks thousands of NSW homes to join expanded virtual power plant — RenewEconomy

After a successful phase one, Ausgrid launches second phase of household battery-based virtual power plant, with two new “aggregator” partners – ShineHub and Evergen. The post Ausgrid seeks thousands of NSW homes to join expanded virtual power plant appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Ausgrid seeks thousands of NSW homes to join expanded virtual power plant — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Angus Taylor says higher emissions targets ‘not necessarily good policy’ — RenewEconomy

Taylor criticises other countries for setting ambitious emissions targets, while Australia bets on unspecified technology improvements to meet its own targets. The post Angus Taylor says higher emissions targets ‘not necessarily good policy’ appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Angus Taylor says higher emissions targets ‘not necessarily good policy’ — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Suntech’s 9.4MW Robinvale solar farm completed in Victoria — RenewEconomy

Suntech’s 9.47MW Robinvale solar farm – one of a growing number of ‘small but smart’ projects pitched at under 10MW – has been completed in Victoria’s north west. The post Suntech’s 9.4MW Robinvale solar farm completed in Victoria appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Suntech’s 9.4MW Robinvale solar farm completed in Victoria — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Wind, solar and drought drive down emissions, but Australia still lags on targets — RenewEconomy

Latest quarterly emissions update shows emissions down thanks to renewables and drought, but increases from the gas sector are hindering faster progress. The post Wind, solar and drought drive down emissions, but Australia still lags on targets appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Wind, solar and drought drive down emissions, but Australia still lags on targets — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Networks can now replace costly poles and wires with solar and storage micro-grids — RenewEconomy

AEMC sets new rules to open up the option of stand alone power systems to remote and fringe-of-grid communities as network alternative. The post Networks can now replace costly poles and wires with solar and storage micro-grids appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Networks can now replace costly poles and wires with solar and storage micro-grids — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Sun Cable’s solar and battery mega-project may be first of many — RenewEconomy

Sun Cable says the $20 billion solar and storage project planned for the Northern Territory likely to be just the first of many. The post Sun Cable’s solar and battery mega-project may be first of many appeared first on RenewEconomy.

via Sun Cable’s solar and battery mega-project may be first of many — RenewEconomy

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Friends of the Earth condemns shameful Radioactive Waste Management Bill, offers positive alternatives

Friends of the Earth,. to Senate Committee on National Radioactive Waste Management Amendment (Site Specification, Community Fund and Other Measures) Bill 2020 [Provisions] Submission 54 

The National Radioactive Waste Management (NRWM) Amendment Bill is deeply flawed and should be rejected. Further, the existing Act is deeply flawed and should be repealed.

The proposal to proceed with the nuclear waste facility despite the unanimous opposition of the Barngarla Traditional Owners is unconscionable and must not be allowed to stand. Shamefully, the federal government excluded Barngarla Traditional Owners from a ‘community ballot’ held in 2019. Therefore the Barngarla Determination Aboriginal Corporation initiated a separate, confidential postal survey of Traditional Owners, conducted by Australian Election Company. This resulted in 100% of respondents voting ‘no’ to the proposed nuclear facility. If the results of the two ballots are combined, the overall level of support falls to just 43.8% of eligible voters (452/824 for the government-initiated
ballot, and 0/209 for the Barngarla ballot) ‒ well short of the government’s benchmark of 65% for ‘broad community support’.

There is no consent from Barngarla Traditional Owners let alone free, prior and informed consent. The National Radioactive Waste Management Amendment Act systematically disempowers and dispossesses Traditional Owners, and the Amendment Bill worsens the situation and strips Traditional Owners of their legal review rights. Legal advice in a Feb. 2020 report by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights notes that the Bill “would enable native title to be extinguished, without the consent of the traditional owners”, and it raises further concerns about the Bill’s intention to permit the acquisition of land for an access route without any Parliamentary oversight or right of appeal.
The Act, the Bill, and the proposed nuclear waste facility are all inconsistent with the United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD Committee) has said that Australia’s historically “racially discriminatory land practices have endured as an acute impairment of the rights of Australia’s indigenous communities”. Imposing a nuclear waste facility on Barngarla Country will clearly exacerbate the problems identified by the CERD Committee
In 2017, the CERD Committee expressed concern “about information that extractive and development projects are carried out on lands owned or traditionally owned by Indigenous Peoples without seeking their prior, free and informed consent” and recommended that Australia “ensure that the principle of free, prior and informed consent is incorporated into the Native Title Act 1993 and in other legislation as appropriate, and fully implemented in practice”.
The Senate Committee should recommend rejection of the NRWM Amendment Bill, and rejection of the proposed nuclear waste facility, in light of the clear opposition of the Barngarla Traditional Owners. The Senate Committee should also recommend that the government follow the advice of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to “ensure that the principle of free, prior and informed consent is incorporated into the Native Title Act 1993 and in other legislation as appropriate, and fully implemented in practice”.
It should be noted that the willingness to override the rights and interests of the Barngarla Traditional Owners is opposed by the SA Labor Party. The SA Labor Party argues that Traditional Owners ought to have a right of veto over nuclear projects given the sad and sorry history of the nuclear industry in SA, stretching back to the British atomic bomb tests. That position dates from 2017, if not earlier. In 2017, then Premier Jay Weatherill wrote to then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull recommending that the federal government adopt the policy of allowing a right of veto by affected Traditional Owners in relation to the planned national nuclear waste facility.
Deputy Leader of the Opposition Susan Close says that SA Labor is “utterly opposed” to the “appalling” process which led to the announcement regarding the Kimba site.1 The SA ALP State Conference on 13 October 2018 endorsed a resolution which pledged to support Traditional Owners in the Kimba region in their struggle to prevent a national nuclear waste facility being constructed on their country. The 2018 State Conference resolution further
committed the SA Labor Party to “support communities opposing the nomination of their lands or region for a dump site, and any workers who refuse to facilitate the construction and operation or transport and handling of radioactive waste material destined for any contested facility or sites including South Australian Port communities.”
The federal government’s willingness to override the rights and interests of Traditional Owners, and to strip them of further rights (including legal appeal rights) through the NRWM Amendment Bill, makes for a sad contrast with the situation in Canada. Earlier this year, the Saugeen Ojibway Nation voted against plans for a nuclear waste repository near Lake Huron after a lengthy consultation period. The Canadian government then announced that it will respect the decision and will no longer target the site.2
Deputy Leader of the Opposition Susan Close says that SA Labor is “utterly opposed” to the “appalling” process which led to the announcement regarding the Kimba site.1 The SA ALP State Conference on 13 October 2018 endorsed a resolution which pledged to support Traditional Owners in the Kimba region in their struggle to prevent a national nuclear waste facility being constructed on their country. The 2018 State Conference resolution further
committed the SA Labor Party to “support communities opposing the nomination of their lands or region for a dump site, and any workers who refuse to facilitate the construction and operation or transport and handling of radioactive waste material destined for any contested facility or sites including South Australian Port communities.”

Illegal under SA law: The proposed nuclear waste facility is illegal under South Australia’s
Nuclear Waste Facility (Prohibition) Act, introduced by the SA Liberal Government in the
year 2000 and strengthened by the SA Labor Government in 2002. The federal government is expected to take the draconian and unacceptable step of using regulations to specifically override the SA Nuclear Waste Facility (Prohibition) Act. South Australians are opposed to the proposed nuclear waste facility: a 2015 survey found just 15.7% support for a nuclear waste dump, and a 2018 survey found that those who strongly agreed with stopping the dump outnumbered those who strongly disagreed by a factor of three (41:14).

1 https://www.transcontinental.com.au/story/6454080/state-labor-party-weighs-in-on-nucleardebate/?
cs=1538
2 https://phys.org/news/2020-02-tribal-vote-nixes-radioactive-storage.html

Breaching NH and MRC siting guidelines: Only 4.5% of South Australia is arable land. It is of deep concern that a radioactive waste could be allowed to jeopardise the Eyre Peninsula’s agricultural industries. Indeed the government’s proposal is a clear breach of the National Health and Medical Research Council’s ‘Code of Practice for Near-Surface Disposal of Radioactive Waste in Australia’ which states that “the site for the facility should be located
in a region which has no known significant natural resources, including potentially valuable mineral deposits, and which has little or no potential for agriculture or outdoor recreational use”.

1 https://www.transcontinental.com.au/story/6454080/state-labor-party-weighs-in-on-nucleardebate/?

cs=1538
2 https://phys.org/news/2020-02-tribal-vote-nixes-radioactive-storage.html

Long-lived intermediate-level waste: Measured by radioactivity, long-lived intermediate level
waste currently stored at ANSTO’s Lucas Heights site in NSW accounts for an overwhelming majority (>90%) of the waste destined for the nuclear waste facility in SA. There is no logic behind the proposal to move intermediate-level waste from interim abovegroundstorage at Lucas Heights to interim above-ground storage at the Kimba site. The proposed double-handling is illogical, it exposes communities to unnecessary risk, and ARPANSA’s Nuclear Safety Committee has indicated that it is not consistent with international best practice.
 
It beggars belief that double-handling ‒ and the movement of long-lived intermediate-level waste from a site with greater safety and security provisions to a site with lesser provisions ‒ is even being contemplated. This absurd situation demonstrates the incompetent handling of this matter by successive ministers and departmental officials over many years. The Senate Committee should recommend that portfolio responsibility for this matter is shifted
from Industry, Innovation and Science to another minister and department (e.g. health) who might do a better job.
The existing 2012 Act is flawed
Friends of the Earth Australia wishes to emphasise that not only is the NRWM Amendment Bill deploy flawed, the existing National Radioactive Waste Management Act 2012 (NRWMA) is undemocratic in many respects. The Act should either be repealed or radically amended to remove clauses which disempower Australians and in particular First Nations.The current Bill does the exact opposite..
A 2017 report released by Friends of the Earth Australia points to serious problems with the NRWMA.

Monash University fifth-year law student Amanda Ngo ‒ is posted at www.nuclear.foe.org.au/nrwma

The NRWMA gives the federal government the power to extinguish rights and interests in land targeted for a radioactive waste facility. In so doing the relevant Minister must “take into account any relevant comments by persons with a right or interest in the land” but there is no requirement to secure consent from Traditional Owners.

Aboriginal Traditional Owners, local communities, pastoralists, business owners, local councils and State/Territory Governments are all disadvantaged and disempowered by the NRWMA.
The NRWMA goes to particular lengths to disempower Traditional Owners. The nomination of a site for a radioactive waste facility is valid even if Aboriginal owners were not consulted and did not give consent. More precisely, the NRWMA states that consultation should be conducted with Traditional Owners and consent should be secured ‒ but that the nomination of a site for a radioactive waste facility is valid even in the absence of consultation or consent.
The NRWMA has sections which nullify State or Territory laws that protect the archaeological or heritage values of land or objects, including those which relate to Indigenous traditions. The Act curtails the application of Commonwealth laws including the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act 1984 and the Native Title Act 1993 in the important site-selection stage. The Native Title Act 1993 is expressly overridden in relation to land acquisition for a radioactive waste facility. The NRWMA has been criticised in both Senate Inquiries and a Federal Court challenge to an earlier federal government attempt to impose a national radioactive waste facility at
Muckaty in the Northern Territory.
The NRWMA also puts the federal government’s radioactive waste agenda above environmental protection as it seeks to curtail the application of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. A senior government official told a public meeting in Hawker in 2016 that the NRWMA is based on ‘world’s best practice’. In fact, the legislation systematically disempowers local communities and Traditional Owners and weakens environmental protections. It needs to be radically amended or replaced with legislation that protects the environment and gives local communities and Traditional Owners the right to say ‘no’ to radioactive waste facilities.
Some positive proposals
Previous, failed attempts to establish a Commonwealth radioactive waste facility (repository and store) assumed the need for off-site, centralised facilities. This assumption continues  with the current project configuration. However, a closer examination indicates both that this assumption may not be warranted and that there are major information gaps that need to be addressed before informed decisions can be made.
An important, preliminary task is to establish an accurate and up-to-date inventory of Australia’s radioactive waste stockpiles. That must include consideration of the nature and adequacy/inadequacy of current storage conditions, and the nature and adequacy/inadequacy of institutional control. Serious consideration of those issues is necessary if informed decisions about future waste management options are to be made, yet successive Governments have largely ignored these issues and information on waste inventories is superficial and unhelpful. The government should adopt a more nuanced approach which may allow it to make progress in a contested public policy area where previous governments have failed. This approach would involve:
(i) Differentiating waste that needs to be moved vs. waste that does not need to be moved, consistent with the net-benefit clause in the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Act – the ARPANS Act. This in turn would require a more detailed inventory than has been compiled to date and consideration of issues (detailed in a 2014 briefing paper3 co-authored by Friends of the Earth) such as the number of legacy waste sites and
the adequacy/inadequacy of existing storage sites. The failure to actively address these basic issues has worked against progression to the resolution of this contentious public issue in recent decades.
(ii) Differentiating waste arising from the operations of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) from non-ANSTO waste. ANSTO is quite capable of managing its own waste, at least in the medium term. Permanent disposal of ANSTO waste should be explored and addressed in subsequent decades, keeping in mind
that ANSTO is likely to be operating at its current site for many decades to come.
Importantly, the current national facility proposal at Kimba explicitly does not seek to dispose of ANSTO’s most problematic radioactive wastes.
(iii) Differentiating low level radioactive wastes from long-lived intermediate-level waste. Plans to move intermediate-level waste from Lucas Heights (and elsewhere) to an above-ground store co-located with the low-level waste repository, and then to an unspecified site at an unspecified later date, make no sense from a policy perspective and
they significantly raise public-acceptance obstacles. The current co-location proposal would mean double handling i.e. transport to the interim national store then future transport to a currently non-determined disposal site. Such an approach would be likely fail the net benefit test that ARPANSA would need to apply in response to any license application
With a detailed inventory completed, thorough consideration of all waste management options is required. That work should be carried out by a dedicated National Commission or comparable public inquiry mechanism. A detailed discussion on how that Commission might be constituted and the issues it might address is contained in the 2014 briefing paper.4 For ANSTO waste, ongoing storage at Lucas Heights needs consideration. Relevant government agencies (and others) have acknowledged that ongoing radioactive waste storage at Lucas Heights is a viable option:
• Andrew Humpherson, ANSTO: “Lucas Heights is a 70-hectare campus with something like 80 buildings. It’s a large area. We’ve got quite a number of buildings there which  house radioactive materials. They’re all stored safely and securely and all surrounded by  a high-security perimeter fence with Federal Police guarding. It is the most secure facility we have got in Australia.”6
• Dr Clarence Hardy, Australian Nuclear Association: “It would be entirely feasible to keep storing it [radioactive waste] at Lucas Heights …”7
• Then ARPANSA CEO John Loy: “Should it come about that the national approach to a waste repository not proceed, it will be necessary for the Commonwealth to devise an approach to final disposal of LLW from Lucas Heights, including LLW generated by operation of the RRR [Replacement Research Reactor]. In the meantime, this waste will
have to be continued to be handled properly on the Lucas Heights site. I am satisfied, on the basis of my assessment of the present waste management plan, including the license and conditions applying to the waste operations on site, that it can be.”8
• Department of Education, Science and Tourism: “A significant factor is that ANSTO has the capacity to safety store considerable volumes of waste at Lucas Heights and is unlikely to seek the holding of frequent campaigns to disposal of waste holdings generated after the initial campaign.”9
• Dr Ron Cameron, ANSTO, when asked if ANSTO could continue to manage its own waste:
“ANSTO is capable of handling and storing wastes for long periods of time. There is no difficulty with that. I think we’ve been doing it for many years. We have the capability  and technology to do so.”5
3 Friends of the Earth, Beyond Nuclear Initiative, Australian Conservation Foundation, November

2014, ‘Responsible Radioactive Waste Management in Australia: The Case For An Independent
Commission Of Inquiry’, https://nuclear.foe.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Responsible-Radioactive-
4 Ibid. proposing double handling. With a detailed inventory completed,
5 ARPANSA forum, Adelaide, 26 February 2004,
http://web.archive.org/web/20040610143043/http://www.arpansa.gov.au/reposit/nrwr.htm#for
um
6 September 2008, www.abc.net.au/news/2008-09-22/new-nuclear-waste-site-for-sydney/517372
7 ARPANSA forum, Adelaide, 26 February 2004,
http://web.archive.org/web/20040610143043/http://www.arpansa.gov.au/reposit/nrwr.htm#for

6 September 2008,
7 ARPANSA forum, Adelaide, 26 February 2004,

8 April 2002, Decision by the CEO of ARPANSA on Application to construct the Replacement Research
Reactor at Lucas Heights. Reasons for Decision”, p.30.
9 Application to ARPANSA, 2003, Vol.iii Ch.9 Waste – Transfer and Documentation p.5.

May 29, 2020 Posted by Christina Macpherson | aboriginal issues, AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, Federal nuclear waste dump, politics | Leave a comment

   

1.This month.

The Road to War brings a sharp focus to why it is not in Australia’s best interest to be dragged into a war with China which will almost inevitably go nuclear very quickly. The filmmaker has interviewed some of Australia’s senior foreign policy analysts who have vast experience behind them in analysing what really is going on here as the United States rattles its sabres with China. And sets us up to be its proxy, like the poor Ukranians have been fed into the Meatgrinder. So America can remain the Top Dog. The Road to War reveals how the United States through its spy base at Pine Gap and by stationing six nuclear capable B52 bombers in the Top End (without permission from the traditional owners) is making Australia a prime nuclear target if the current war of words suddenly melts down into full scale war.

The Road to War shows the implicit connection between Carbon emissions (the US military uses a whopping 70% of America’s annual petroleum to move its armies and vast War Machine around the globe to its 800+ military bases..but under a loophole wangled at Kyoto, the US military does not have to report its C02 annual emissions). The Road to War starts screening at selected cities and regional centres in March. See the trailer end for details.

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