Nuclear power, uranium mining, continue to be unpopular in Australia
After Fukushima: Nuclear less popular than ever, Green Left Weekly, April 10, 2011,By Jim Green A poll by Roy Morgan Research several days into the Fukushima nuclear crisis found that 61% of Australians oppose the development of nuclear power in Australia, nearly double the 34% who support it. Continue reading
Darwin hears Aboriginals, scientists, call to close Ranger uranium mine
Monash University engineering academic Dr Gavin Mudd said that Ranger was one of the most heavily monitored uranium mines in the world, but this was still insufficient to deal with the problems.
The Ranger mine has been closed for several weeks because the extreme wet season has threatened to overflow a dam site used to hold radioactive tailings.
‘Call to close Ranger uranium mine’ | Green Left Weekly April 10, 2011 By Peter Robson, Darwin One hundred and thirty people packed out a room in the Crowne Plaza hotel to hear traditional owners and nuclear experts call for the closure of the Ranger uranium mine in the world heritage-listed Kakadu national park.
No real safeguards in Australia’s uranium to Russia
Fukushima sets faithful to spin mode James Norman The Australian April 11, 2011“………Given Julia Gillard ratified the nuclear co-operation agreement with Russia last November to supply Australian uranium, the apparent opportunism and the lack of transparency of the Russian nuclear industry is very much Australia’s business.The agreement struck with Russia contains no requirement for nuclear safeguards inspections, despite the rhetoric from the government and industry that “strict” safeguards will “ensure” peaceful use of Australian uranium in Russia.
Aside from the often stated reality that there is still no long-term safe way to dispose of nuclear waste, one of the most critical but frequently overlooked issues is the nuclear industry’s repeatedly proven connection to the proliferation of nuclear weapons. For those who remain sceptical of this connection, Iran, Pakistan and North Korea provide compelling examples….Fukushima sets faithful to spin mode | The Australian
Inadequacy of health study into Australian nuclear veterans
Letter to Governor General from Major Alan Batchelor Paul Langley’s Nuclear History Blog, 11 April 11, Quote:
29 March 2011 “…….requests a review and cancellation of the currently accepted study of the health of Australian nuclear veterans contained in Australian Participants in British Nuclear Tests in Australia by Dr Gun et al. Both the hazardous environments and resulting detriments to the health of many nuclear veterans have been incorrectly assessed in this document, leading to many false exposure and compensation assumptions that also need revision and remedial action…….
The basis on which the Cancer and Mortality Study was constructed omits several important areas of consideration and makes no effort to explain the effect of these omissions.
• It confined the study to the carcinogenic effects of ionising radiation, ignoring:
o Non-carcinogenic effects following exposure to internal radioactive emitters with long biological half-lifes resulting in;
• Loss of immune competence,
• Short and long term sterility, miscarriages, stillbirths, etc,
• Heredity defects in subsequent generations,…….
The above background discussion provides a number of conditions that reduce the viability of the Cancer and Mortality Study and should have, as a minimum, been taken into account in the findings. In addition, Royal Commission Conclusion 201 (15.6.13) goes even further and questions the feasibility of attempting such a study:
“Because of the deficiencies in the available data, there is now little prospect of carrying out any worthwhile epidemiological study of those involved in the tests nor of others who might have been directly affected by them.” Letter to Governor General from Major Alan Batchelor « Paul Langley’s Nuclear History Blog
Martin Ferguson speaks with forked tongue at IRENA
Ferguson ….. spoke of Australia’s commitment to clean energy….But if you wanted to know what he really thinks about clean energy and resources, and what he thought his audience wanted to hear, you needed to read his speech to a business breakfast the following day. No prizes for guessing that the focus was on coal, LNG and uranium,
Clean out of time , Business Spectator, Giles Patkinson. 8 Apr 2011 Sometimes politicians travel so much and speak to so many different audiences that it must be easy to forget what they should be saying, and to whom. Particularly if your responsibilities straddle multiple portfolios, such as those of Martin Ferguson, the Federal Minister for Resources, Energy (both brown and green), and Tourism. Continue reading
Radioactive water risk keeps Ranger uranium mine closed
a threat of contaminated water leaking from Ranger into nearby waterways could keep the mine closed for the rest of this year….there’s no way the company will be able to safely treat the contaminated water stored at Ranger by the time the mining lease expires in 10 years….
AUDIO AM – Traditional Aboriginal land owners pressure uranium miner to shut up shop 08/04/2011 ABC Radio National. 08/04/2011 TONY EASTLEY: The Australian company that produces 10 per cent of the world’s uranium is under increasing pressure by Aboriginal 
traditional owners to shut up shop.The Mirarr people own the section of the world heritage listed Kakadu National Park that includes the Ranger uranium mine operated by Energy Resources of Australia. Continue reading
Courageous Aboriginal owners value their land above money
In a letter to the United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, this week, Ms Margarula said it was “with great sadness” the Mirarr people learnt of the suffering of the Japanese people following the earthquake and tsunami.
Ms Margarula told Mr Ban her people had been blocked from opposing the export of uranium from their land to Japan…..
Jeffery Lee, the sole member of the Djok clan, offered Koongarra to the 
government, shunning the chance to become a billionaire, saying he is happy to work as a ranger protecting the land….
Forget the billions, return Jabiluka site to Kakadu, say traditional owners, Sydney Morning Herald, Lindsay Murdoch Jabiru April 7, 2011 ABORIGINAL traditional owners have declared they want the multibillion-dollar Jabiluka uranium deposit to remain undeveloped and be incorporated into Kakadu National Park. Continue reading
BHP’s Olympic Dam uranium mine the reason for desalination plant
Olympic Dam, South Australia BHP Billiton, the world’s largest mining company The most ambitious mining-water supply project, which includes the expansion of the associated mine—it will become the world’s largest uranium producer…But the expansion depends on a coastal desalination plant— —at Point Lowly on southern Australia’s Spencer Gulf. Four pumping stations will move water through the 320-kilometer (200-mile) pipeline, providing nearly 90 percent of the 83 million cubic meters (22 billion gallons) of water the mine will use each year for ore processing and dust suppression,
Australia Builds Desalination Plants and Pipelines to Bring Water to Mines, Circle of Blue WaterNews, 05 April 2011 To feed water-hungry mining industries, similar plans are in the works to supply drought-ridden regions of Australia and China. Continue reading
Radioactive danger to Australia of Indonesian nuclear plants
impacts on northern Australia of even a small release could potentially be devastating to agricultural production and tourism.”
VIDEO Top End warning over nuclear reactor fallout | News | NT News | Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia | ntnews.com.au NT News | Darwin, 5 April 11, THE Top End is in danger of being devastated by a nuclear fallout cloud should Indonesian reactors melt down, computer modelling shows.The Australian National University’s Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies working paper shows there is “substantial risk” for the whole of northern Australia – particularly during the monsoon months. Continue reading
No finance for impossibly costly nuclear power in Western Australia
why is it that no investor wants to put their own money into building a nuclear power station in Western Australia?….It’s not the environmental movement that is preventing nuclear power becoming available in Western Australia, it is merchant bankers!
The myth of Nuclear Energy for WA, Wangle April 4th, 2011 By Bill Johnston MLA The current situation in Japan has given pause to the calls from some people that nuclear energy will fix Western Australia’s energy problems. However, it will not be long before we see those comments beginning again.
This is accompanied by the implication that it is somehow the environmental movement that is holding back this nuclear energy nirvana. Continue reading
How Australia’s carbon tax could be used for the public good
Let’s give the money into the greening of the economy, the jobs creation, which in Germany they had legislation like this because of the Greens a decade ago and they’ve created 350,000 jobs….put it into local business, put it into the renewable energy business – that includes in rural and regional Australia, create the jobs in this country and keep the profits in this country. And at the same time clean up our economy. Now – so it can compete with the rest of the world
Bob Brown joins Lateline, ABC, Ali Moore, 04/04/2011..……..the Greens’ position is that the compensation should go to householders, not to the polluters as Tony Abbott would do. And let me just make this important observation here: his policy would rip $10 billion out of the taxpayers’ money pool and give it across to the big polluters for a voluntary scheme. You know, it’s not going to work. Continue reading
Western Australia: Black and White Unite Against Uranium Mining
“Uranium mining is not like any other mining, it poisons water, land and life through radiation. The mining industry and the government are trying to make people believe uranium mining is inevitable but we say No.”
“We Can’t Close the Gap by Digging a Deeper Hole” 4 April 11The Western Australia Nuclear Free Alliance (WANFA), made up of Aboriginal Traditional Land Owners from the Pilbara, the Kimberley, the Goldfields, the Great Victoria Desert, the Central Desert, the Gascoyne, and the South West and their allies, met from 2 – 4 April 2011 on Whadjuk Boodjak (Noongar Land) near Perth.
The meeting was the first gathering of Western Australian traditional owners since the continuing nuclear emergency at Fukushima in Japan and comes against a backdrop of increasing contest over plans for uranium mining in WA. Continue reading
Australia’s trade hit by Japan’s nuclear crisis
“Japan’s nuclear situation and power shortages continue to weigh on international financial markets and may prolong the impact of this crisis on the global economy.”……
Japan disaster to cost Australia $2b, ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), 4 April 11, “…..Japan is Australia’s second largest trading partner, but its economy has been hit hard by the deadly tsunami and ongoing nuclear crisis… Continue reading
Australia’s seizure of Aboriginal land for uranium mining
……..mining has a lot to do with the Northern Territory Intervention. Australia has 23% of the world’s known uranium deposits……Since the Intervention, the Territory’s government has allocated AU$14.4 million to expanding its mining industry....
…communities have been offered homes in exchange for 40 year leases. Thus, the Intervention, has wrested indigenous land from its owners by force and bribed indigenous communities to barter their rights for basic amenities…
the seizures of their land, the bribes to get them to hand over control of more land, and the attempts to shift them from outstations are not about protecting children or building new homes. They are about getting access to mineral wealth and sweeping indigenous people out of the way in order to do so..
Aboriginal Peoples Lose Rights and Mineral Rich Land in Northern Territory Intervention. The Women’s International Perspective , Sarah Irving, 1 April 11, “……..indigenous voices heard in Our Generation, an important new film documenting the impact of the ‘Northern Territory Emergency Response.’ Continue reading
Fukushima, not the NT govt, is killing the uranium industry
The uranium mining industry is out of step with public opinion, and with the realities of the collapsing uranium market.
The Northern Territory is the heart of Australia’s tourist industry. The last thing it needs is to have a dirty, uneconomic market flop of a uranium mine – damaging its natural environment, and killing the tourist industry.
It’s not the Northern Territory govt that is stopping investment in uranium mining – it’s the unfolding Fukushima nuclear disaster. – Christina Macpherson
Uranium mine resistance ‘sends bad message’ ABC The Minerals Council of Australia says the Northern Territory Government’s decision to oppose a mine near Alice Springs will deter the industry from investing……. “It send a very bad message to the industry and paints the NT in a very poor light.”…
Uranium mine resistance ‘sends bad message’ – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
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