Antinuclear

Trust – hmmm How can anyone trust a process that began with the charade of the Nuclear Fuel Chain Royal Commission South Australia?

For a start – what a strange topic for a Royal Commission (RC) . RCs are called when there is an urgent problem, ?scandal to address.- child abuse, Aboriginal deaths in custody, detention of juveniles. I know of no other RC called to study a commercial enterprise. RCs are up until now, chaired by persons of legal knowledge and a legal background, generally retired judges. They are not chaired by military men. In this case, the Royal Commissioner Kevin Scarce is a person of defence industry background and clearly a previous promoter of the nuclear industry – clearly biased choice for a clearly unsuitable topic for a Royal Commission.

The Weatherill government then set up a State wide blanket of promotion, (despite the law prohibiting such spending taxpayers money on such a nuclear promnotion. Then set up the Citizens’ Jury process – designed to delay decision, and get some sort of claim to community support. The Citizens’ juries were given loaded questions, designed to prevent any verdict, and to produce a veneer of support. Some of the witnesses were poorly informed and biased, especially in the First Jury sessions, on the subject of ionising radiation and health.

At the very worst, the Juries are expected to produce a report that says “Further discussion is needed” and certainly, by the wording of their questions – not able to produce a “NO to Nuclear Dumping” answer.

The surprising factor in all this, is – as far as I can see, the Weatherill government, the nuclear lobby, and the shonky Nuclear RC have underestimated the intelligence of the jury members. The took it seriously, and asked inconvenient questions.

The only way that I can imagine consent ever being given for this is if that happens – and the minority is outvoted. Or perhaps the Aboriginal people can be expected to accept massive financial bribes? We all know damn well that if it’s to put not exactly on Aboriginal land, it will be put next door to Aboriginal land – with all the risks to land, groundwater, sacred sites involved in the transport of wastes etc. Well, bribing the Aborigines has been tried for over 20 years, for radioactive trash dumping on their land. It has never worked, and won’t work this time.

While, for me, the risks of irretrievable environmental disaster are paramount, the purported ‘economics’ are also relevant.
Firstly the RC Report states: “There is no existing market to ascertain the price a customer may be willing to pay for the permanent disposal of used fuel.” (p.93)

It goes on, “the baseline scenario assumes that 50 per cent
 of the accessible quantities of used fuel and intermediate level waste will be stored and disposed of in South Australian facilities” (p.292 – see also p.98 and p.298)

To assume that a start-up venture for what is made out to be a highly profitable, low-risk undertaking will be able to capture a 50% market share seems most unlikely noting that the report itself acknowledges; “(i)t should be underscored that there is significant potential for other countries to develop a domestic solution …” (p.97)

The RC Report states: “The modelling assumed the establishment of a reserve fund to provide for the costs of decommissioning, remediation of surface facilities, closure, back fill of underground facilities and the ongoing, post-closure monitoring phase.” (p.301) The report also acknowledges that; “(t)he consequences of human error and ‘normal’ accidents must be anticipated, expected and planned for in system design and operation.” (p.91) It appears that the costing for these eventualities (noting the life of the dump is “at least 10 000 years and up to a million years” (p.85) has not been taking into account.
It seems to me that at very best the figures are ‘rubbery’.

And again I would ask the basic test question, ‘if importing high level waste is so straightforward, safe and so very, very profitable why are no other countries (or Australian States or Territories) doing so already?’ Noting that ‘other countries’ that could consider such a project are entrepreneurial, technically advanced, and, most importantly, experienced in handling nuclear waste (unlike SA). Such countries include, China, USA, Russia and the Scandinavian and EU countries.

It’s a pity that this radioactive trash import plan has not been knocked out on grounds of risks to health, damage to environment, disrespect of Aboriginal people, and importantly – on its real purpose – to save and promote the global nuclear industry.

At least the Nuclear Fuel Chain Royal Commission South Australia had to admit that there is no argument for nuclear waste importing actually benefiting the Nation’ or the State’s health, environment, or indigenous people.

The Nuclear Fuel Chain Royal Commission had only one argument for the plan – that it would be an economic bonanza for South Australia. I could list the economic analysts who have destroyed that argument. But the well known Blind Freddie could see the economic flaws. South Australia is supposed to set up “interim” waste storage before the famous underground dump is built, – sort of using the money that will be paid for the dump to finance it – or some plan like that. South Australia has to spend $millions on the plan, for years before it gets any revenue. The planned revenue is entirely speculative, as there is no market for nuclear waste importing. If it goes ahead – any financial benefit will be decades away, yet South Australia needs economic development now, not decades later. If it were to go ahead, it could grind to a halt at any time – with changes in governments overseas, collapse of nuclear companies or untoward events, such as a disaster in the transport of the wastes. South Australia could well be left with expensive, dangerous, and useless Stranded Radioactive Trash.

Meanwhile, other clean, and quicker alternatives – in renewable energy, energy efficient design for example, have been neglected while South Australia pursues this toxic dream – which has the very real potential to bankrupt the state.