Time that Australia looks beyond uranium mining, and towards rehabilitation of the environment
K-A, Nuclear Free Community Campaigner, 11 Mar 21, On the 10th anniversary of the Australian uranium-fuelled Fukushima nuclear disaster, it is time for a rethink on uranium Australia wide and for WA to look beyond mining towards rehabilitation.
WA’s four proposed uranium mines and the 85 exploration sites have been unable to develop into and all pose serious environmental, economic and public health risks. Some of the companies involved no longer exist, others are hanging on by a thread.
With a stagnant uranium price and a global nuclear power industry that is struggling to maintain the status quo, we should be looking to clean up Barnett’s failed attempt to establish uranium mines in WA and close that chapter in our history book.
Fukushima, ten years after the devastating Tsunami and subsequent multiple reactor meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is still one of the most radioactive places on earth. It remains a profound human, economic and environmental tragedy that was fuelled by Australian uranium.
In Parliament in 2012 Dr Robert Floyd, Director General, Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation confirmed that Australian uranium was in each of the reactors at the time of the meltdown. Following the disaster, the UN Secretary-General urged every uranium-producing country to hold “an in-depth assessment of the net cost impact of the impacts of mining fissionable material on local communities and ecosystems.”
MP Josh Wilson’s excellent submission Senate, about nuclear wastes
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another well written submission – presented as a speech this time in Parliament in 2020
 Josh Wilson MP, Federal Labor Member, Shadow Assistant Minister for Environment, June 2020 “There is no question that Australia needs to make progress when it comes to the proper long-term storage of nuclear waste. It is just that this bill doesn’t help take us towards that end. It’s taken us 40 years and it’s cost $55 million to get us to this point. There’s no question that we benefit significantly from nuclear medicine, from the use of radiopharmaceuticals, especially as a diagnostic tool. We benefit here in Australia and we provide those benefits to other parts of the world. We have the nuclear facility, the OPAL reactor, that’s operated by the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, ANSTO, at Lucas Heights. It creates the relevant material for nuclear medicine and it creates the need to carefully and safely deal with the waste. It’s not an easy task to do that, but this bill doesn’t help.Effectively this bill seeks to rush and force the issue of community acceptance, which is a mistake. The minister has the power to make the decision in question. You can only guess that the reason for this legislation is to lock in an outcome, when the minister and the government accept that there are some concerns with the community acceptance process that has occurred so far. The bill effectively also wants to ignore, avoid and further neglect the key issue of a permanent disposal site for intermediate-level waste. There are two kinds of waste that this bill proposes to send to a site in South Australia—low-level waste and intermediate-level waste—and they are very different. A lot of what has been said, including what the minister said in introducing this bill, glides over that difference in a way that is wrong and is certainly not helpful in terms of getting to where we need to get to with a permanent disposal site for low-level waste and a permanent site for intermediate-level waste.
If we know anything about nuclear technology, we know that it relies upon toxic radioactive material and it generates toxic radioactive waste. That’s why there are serious engineering challenges in relation to waste and that’s why there are quite legitimately very serious issues in relation to social licence around nuclear technology. People are wary of it, especially of nuclear waste, and they should be. We have to get towards a long-term disposal solution, and yet this bill raises two serious questions about how the government wants to take us there. There’s concern over the site selection process, which goes to the question of consultation, engagement and community agreement, and there are concerns about the purpose and function of the facility. I want to talk mostly about the latter, but, in relation to the former, in relation to community decision-making, I support the fundamental proposition that the people of South Australia, or any state or territory where a waste disposal site is proposed, should decide, and the agreement about a site should be a meaningful agreement without the serious question marks that remain in this case. Really, for the government to take us to that end, it would do better to work on achieving that meaningful agreement rather than steamrolling over the top in the way that this bill seeks to do.
The second issue is the fact that this site is proposed to be a permanent disposal site for low-level waste and a temporary storage site for intermediate-level waste. To the extent that it proposes that it’s going to be a temporary storage site, it really stretches the ordinary concept of the word ‘temporary’. The problems with that are really quite considerable. There is a very serious risk, and no-one in this place should be ignorant of the possibility, that intermediate level waste will go to this site and it will be there forever, effectively. I’m sure that moving it from its current location will mean that the long-neglected task of preparing for a permanent disposal site will only be further delayed and ignored.
As other speakers have mentioned, low-level waste is mostly personal protective equipment and it contains limited amounts of long-lived radioactive substances. It needs to be stored for a few hundred years in what are described as near-surface facilities. At the moment, it’s stored in 200-litre drums in a big shed at Lucas Heights, and presumably it would be not dissimilarly stored at a site in South Australia if that’s where it went. Intermediate-level waste is something quite different. Intermediate-level waste comes from spent and reprocessed nuclear fuel and the residue from parts of the radioisotope production process. It does not decay in a way that makes it acceptable for near-surface-level disposal. You get a sense of the toxicity of intermediate-level waste when you consider the time frame that’s involved. The proposal here for the permanent disposal of low-level waste is for it to be stored and for the facility to be actively operated for a period of 100 years and then ‘institutionally monitored’— that is the phrase in the explanatory memorandum—for a further period of 200 years. Intermediate-level waste, by contrast, needs to be stored for thousands of years. It remains toxic for thousands and thousands of years. It needs to be buried deep in the ground.
I also make the point that there is no permanent disposal site for high-level waste anywhere in the world. At the time when members of the government are going around spruiking the take-up of nuclear power in Australia—in defiance of all logic, in defiance of the international trends away from nuclear and in defiance of the economic evidence and the energy needs of this country—let’s remember that this is a 70-year-old industry. It’s been around for 70 years, and the industry still is incapable of dealing with its most toxic waste.
In relation to this site, I want to make a few points about how we’ve got here. It has taken 40 years and, as I said, cost $55 million to get to the point of nearly selecting a site. Departmental officials came before the energy and environment committee when we were inquiring into nuclear energy, and they gave us some very rough estimates of what the construction of the site itself would cost. That will be somewhere around $340 million to $350 million. That’s for the construction of the site, and that was described to us as a conservative estimate. Bizarrely, there is no current process underway with even a single dollar of government resources going towards the issue of a permanent disposal site for intermediate-level waste. It’s quite strange. It’s almost hard to believe that, when it’s taken us 40 years to get to the brink of a permanent site for low-level waste, there is not yet any departmental group or any taskforce on this and there’s not a single dollar going to the process of site selection, engineering design or anything else around the question of a permanent disposal site. We actually have an answer on notice from the then Department of Industry, Innovation and Science on that issue:
“A government decision on the entity responsible for the waste management technical coordination function— in relation to intermediate-level waste—has yet to be determined and is required before an Intermediate Level Waste disposal project timeline and budget can be determined.”
So, while we’ve taken 40 years and $55 million to get to the brink of a permanent low-level waste disposal site, no process is advancing by a single hour, let alone a day or a year, towards what the department itself said will likely be another 30- or 40-year process.
So this bill says, ‘Let’s send intermediate-level waste to South Australia for temporary storage.’ What does ‘temporary storage’ mean to the average person? Do you think it means 30, 40, or 50 years or forever? I doubt that very much. But that is, in effect, what this bill seeks to do with intermediate-level waste, which is a whole other kettle of fish.
The government, in the material, suggests there are reasons for the waste being moved, and a lot of the members from the government have said that they’re running out of space at Lucas Heights. That might be true for low-level waste. It is not true for intermediate-level waste. Like the previous speaker, I’ve been into the enormous shed. It’s bigger than the chamber in which I stand—well, it’s about the same size as the chamber in which I stand—and there’s a canister of intermediate-level waste. There’s one of them. There’s another one due back before long. There is plenty of room in that interim storage facility, so there’s no issue with space as far as intermediate-level waste is concerned, and there’s no issue in relation to safety or health concerns either. That is really important. If anyone is suggesting that there are health and safety reasons for moving intermediate-level waste to South Australia, they should point to the evidence of that, and then they should answer the question of how it came to be there in the first place, because we started receiving intermediate-level waste, the reprocessed fuel rods, back in 2015. There was a proper process, supervised by ARPANSA, that saw that waste come and be stored at Lucas Heights, and there’s never been any suggestion whatsoever that there is a safety or health concern about the location of intermediate-level waste at that site. If the government are in possession of any evidence to that effect, they should share it with the public. The member who spoke previously said that he walked up and gave the canister a hug. I was there and I found that quite strange to observe. But where is the evidence that there is any problem with the intermediate-level waste staying where it is, as it should do, until the government of Australia identifies and resources an appropriate permanent disposal site for intermediate-level waste?
When the interim facility was set up, there was no suggestion it was only for a few years. The licence that exists for the storage of the intermediate-level waste at Lucas Heights runs to 2055. ARPANSA itself addressed this issue in the submission that it made to the Senate inquiry. I want to quote from it, because this is important:
“ARPANSA is aware that some stakeholders have interpreted ARPANSA’s decisions regarding the IWS— which is the intermediate-level storage— as a requirement for relocation of the waste stored in the IWS, even suggesting that there is an urgent need for relocation. This is not correct. ARPANSA has not raised safety concerns regarding storage of waste at the IWS. ANSTO seems to share this view. ANSTO has indicated to ARPANSA that the mandatory recertification of the TN-81 casks every 10 years can be carried out at the IWS …”
But the claims that the government and government members in this place have made that intermediate-level storage needs to go to South Australia because there’s no room for it and that there are health and safety concerns about where it is currently are rubbish. And so it should stay where it is as a spur to the government to get on with the process, which currently hasn’t even started, of finding and resourcing a permanent disposal site. That is not occurring, and that’s one of the chief flaws of this bill.
The government is going about this important task the wrong way. Labor support a permanent national radioactive waste facility. We know it needs to be created. We just think the government should do it in the right way. They shouldn’t steamroll over the issue of community acceptance and community engagement, and they don’t need to. If they do that, they are going to put social licence at risk, and that will be even worse if they move intermediate-level waste to South Australia. They need to immediately start and resource the process of a permanent disposal site for intermediate-level waste. They should commit to maintaining that waste where it is currently stored, which is another reason for an inquiry on this issue.
More broadly, the government need to recognise that the social licence for nuclear technology is fragile at best. And that’s for good reason. We have our own chequered history in this country. We allowed the British to detonate 10 nuclear bombs in this country, all of which were as big or bigger than the bombs dropped on Japan. That didn’t go through a parliamentary process. What’s worse, we allowed the British government to explode nuclear material just to see what would happen if an aeroplane carrying nuclear material was shot out of the sky. That meant that radioactive material was strewn over South Australia, the clean-up efforts for which didn’t conclude until the early part of this century, and cost millions and millions of dollars, which the British government only very reluctantly contributed to. We know there are problems with uranium mining. We’ve watched events like Chernobyl and Fukushima. Yet there are members of the government running around saying that nuclear power should be part of our energy mix in our communities across Australia. Frankly, that is not only deeply irrational but ridiculous and unhelpful in the task this bill presents to us.
This bill is not a sensible or appropriate way in which to move towards the waste storage solution. It puts the program at risk. That’s why we don’t support the bill.” –
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Kimba nuclear dump project is a futile exercise that will be rejected by the International Atomic Energy Agency
Peter Remta, 4 Mar 21
For the past three years I have had to accept the disingenuous and ignorant comments by the federal government including the responsible ministers which quite frankly are at times personally offensive
I have been particularly disappointed by the comments of the present responsible minister Keith Pitt who from shortly after his appointment publicly stated that the whole Napandee community was highly accepting and in favour of the government’s nuclear waste facility in its locality when Napandee is no more than a farm with a population of the owner and his wife who are selling part of the property to the government for the facility.
In reality Napandee is better referred to as Kimba as the actual generic location
Regrettably from then on Pitt has continued with his ill informed and deceptive comments including his endorsement of the senior government officials who have also provided wrong and misleading information for the community
It is quite clear that the Kimba proposal will not get the necessary legislative approval even though Pitt has put implementing bill on the Senate order of business list on several occasions but never brought it on for a vote knowing full well that it would be defeated to the government’s embarrassment
While there are numerous technical and justifiable objections to the government’s proposals perhaps the most important is that the Kimba facility will not get the necessary licences for its construction and operations
It is considered at an international level that the Australian government and the regulatory entity of ARPANSA have fallen down badly on the licensing and other requirements in that regard and hence the International Atomic Energy Agency will demand a peer review by an external group which will take the whole process out of the government’s hands and lead to a swift rejection of the licence applications
No strong and effective relations and connections with leading experts in the field of nuclear waste are available to the government for its waste disposal plans
What is more the general view internationally is that Australia is lacking in any realistic expertise in nuclear engineering covering the storage and disposal of waste despite being so proficient in the mining of uranium and other radioactive materials
The Kimba proposal is a futile and purely politically driven exercise
Australia dodged a bullet in not getting nuclear power – Ian Lowe.
An obvious conclusion flows from the Fox Report’s 1976 comment about a lack of objectivity. We are not objective observers of the world: we all see reality through the lenses of our values and our experience. We all have a tendency to see what we would like to see…….
The probability that any person will be favourably disposed to the idea of nuclear power can be predicted from their values and from their view of the sort of future they would like to see. Fellows of the Academy of Technology and Engineering tend to favour a high-tech future, while conservationists are much more likely to favour small-scale local supply systems.
This is a reminder that the future is not somewhere we are going, but something we are creating. From my perspective, nuclear power now looks like an intractable problem we were just lucky to avoid. Most developed nations have nuclear power stations with mountains of accumulated waste, for which there is no effective permanent solution. The urgent task of moving to clean energy supply, mostly from solar and wind, is made more difficult when resources have been sunk into the nuclear power industry. I believe we dodged a bullet.
Griffith Review,by Ian Lowe, March 21, ON MY DESK there sits a well-thumbed copy of the 1976 Fox Report, the first report of the Ranger Uranium Environmental Inquiry. I grew up in New South Wales, where most electricity came from coal-fired power stations, but miners were often killed or injured and the air pollution from burning coal was obvious. So as a young scientist I was attracted to the idea of replacing our dirty and dangerous coal-fired electricity with nuclear power.
Transnational Memory and the Fukushima Disaster: Memories of Japan in Australian Anti-nuclear Activism
Transnational Memory and the Fukushima Disaster: Memories of Japan in Australian Anti-nuclear Activism https://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/index.php/portal/article/view/7094
Alexander Brown https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3582-9658, Jan 28, 2021
Abstract
This paper argues for the importance of transnational memories in framing Australian anti-nuclear activism after the Fukushima disaster. Japan looms large in the transnational nuclear imaginary.
Commemorating Hiroshima as the site of the first wartime use of nuclear weapons has been a long-standing practice in the Australian anti-nuclear movement and the day has been linked to a variety of issues including weapons and uranium mining.
As Australia began exporting uranium to Japan in the 1970s, Australia-Japan relations took on a new meaning for the Indigenous Traditional Owners from whose land uranium was extracted.
After Fukushima, these complex transnational memories formed the basis for an orientation towards Japan by Indigenous land rights activists and for the anti-nuclear movement as a whole.
This paper argues that despite tenuous organizational links between the two countries, transnational memories drove Australian anti-nuclear activists to seek connections with Japan after the Fukushima disaster. The mobilisation of these collective memories helps us to understand how transnational social movements evolve and how they construct globalisation from below in the Asia-Pacific region.fic region.
Australia’s purchase of vastly expensive French nuclear-powered submarine design, adapted to diesel, now to be scrapped?
These submarine designs were adapted from the French nuclear submarines. I thought, at the time, that they were chosen in preference to the more suitable, and more affordable German design, under the pressure of the nuclear lobby. Presumably, it would be practical to later adapt these submarines to be nuclear-powered.
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Government submarine contract sunk and unlikely to resurface, Independent Australia, 1 Mar 21, The submarine deal France proudly called ‘the contract of the Century’ appears to have collapsed, reports Alan Austin.IF THERE WAS one thing which should unite all media commentators, economic and military analysts, and informed citizens in outrage against the Morrison Government, it is this. The Government has wasted billions of dollars on a deal to buy 12 new submarines which have virtually no chance of fulfilment. As this is written, the head of the French naval construction company Naval Group, Pierre Eric Pommellet, is in Australia meeting federal ministers in an attempt to rescue the contract. Tragically for Australia – and for Monsieur Pommellet – not one of those ministers has the experience or competence to wrangle a successful result. Many informed commentators in France, Australia and elsewhere now expect the much-celebrated deal to be abandoned. If that happens, replacing the current ageing submarines would be delayed many years, depending on the timing of the change of government to a capable administration. Although defence is just one example of Coalition mismanagement, this is where Australia’s losses are arguably most devastating: both in billions of dollars wasted and in the risk to national security. Responsibility for the projectMultiple failures are evident. The most basic is accountability. Since negotiations with France began, Australia has had three prime ministers, three deputy PMs, three failed treasurers, five defence ministers and four ministers for defence industry. Of the 15 individuals to have held these portfolios, seven have left the Parliament. None remaining has the competence to deliver for Australia or the mettle to take responsibility. The current Defence Minister is in hospital on leave. Political priorities paramountA major factor in dashing into the connection with France was the set of promises the Coalition hoped to make chasing votes. In the run-up to the 2019 election, then Minister for Defence Industry Christopher Pyne promised hundreds of new jobs, the “majority of which will be based in South Australia”. Cost and defence considerations were secondary. Many military observers were dismayed at Australia taking the French Shortfin Barracudas over the lower-cost and more suitable alternatives tendered by Japan and Germany. Design and cost errorsSeveral of Australia’s specifications were plain foolish, as Binoy Kampmark summarised for IA. A nuclear submarine with a diesel-electric engine is a fail. An American combat system won’t work in a French vessel because the Americans and the French do not talk. Lead-acid batteries will be obsolete well before the subs are delivered. France’s original tender documents put the cost of the project at between $20 billion and $25 billion. The cost in the initial agreement signed in late 2016 was $50 billion. By February 2020, the Parliamentary Library research service reported that the acquisition cost:
Today, estimates range up to double that quantum. Missed deadlinesDelays so far have pushed back delivery of the first Barracuda from the mid-2020s to the early 2030s and now to the 2040s. The latest missed date was finalising the critical Strategic Partnering Agreement which governs the entire project. This was due before last Christmas………… Excessive secrecy, even from the SenateCompounding all these failures is Morrison’s Cabinet refusing to be answerable to the Parliament. In an ugly confrontation in last month’s Senate Economics References Committee, Defence Department head Greg Moriarty refused point-blank to provide documents which the Committee had the constitutional right to access. Independent Senator Rex Patrick warned Moriarty:
Moriarty steadfastly refused the Committee’s requests, insisting he would do the bidding of the craven Minister and Cabinet. The remedyThus the solution is for the people of Australia to get rid of this secretive bungling regime at the earliest opportunity: to save hundreds of billions of dollars and to ensure effective military capability. https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/government-submarine-contract-sunk-and-unlikely-to-resurface,14846 |
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Many people, both inside and outside Kimba, want a judicial review of the government’s nuclear waste dump decision
Commenting on the opinion piece: They have let it come: now build it InDaily
I respect the right of Sean Edwards to express his opinion. However, he makes a number of factual errors which should be corrected.
I will address one: ‘The people of Kimba don’t want judicial review’.
I personally know people from Kimba who do want judicial review.
Furthermore, many outside the Kimba region want judicial review, hence the widespread objection to the proposed amendment. – Andrew Williams https://indaily.com.au/opinion/reader-contributions/2021/03/01/your-views-on-vaccination-sa-nuclear-dump-jobseeker-reviews-and-more/
Australian Strategic Policy Institute – a stooge for weapons industries and China-haters
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Independent” think-tank ASPI behind push for more defence spending rakes in advisory fees, Michael West Media, 1 Mar 21, by Marcus Reubenstein | Jul 1, 2020 Funded by the Department of Defence, the Australia Strategic Policy Institute collects millions more as it drives the “China threat” narrative. As Marcus Reubenstein reports, while ASPI is the media’s go-to experts for public comment, ASPI is remarkably coy about revealing all its funding sources.
On the day the Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced a $270 billion defence spending plan, the Department of Defence paid the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) a $214,500 contract for “management advisory services”. Exactly one year ago today, it was awarded a similar “management advisory services” contract for the considerably larger amount of $614,536. ASPI has pushed hard for boosts to defence spending, in particular an upgrade of Australia’s missile capabilities. The Government says it will spend $800 million on the US-made AGM-158C Long Range Anti Ship Missile, manufactured by Lockheed Martin, which gave ASPI $135,909 in sponsorship funds in 2018-19. Go-to think tank on ChinaThe Australian Strategic Policy Institute is the “go to” think tank for the mainstream media seeking an “independent voice” to make sense of troubled times with China. Its analysts are knowledgeable and articulate, always forthcoming with research pointing to the strategic threat of China. However, it is less forthcoming about the funders of its research, although it is an open secret that foreign governments and multi-billion-dollar weapons makers are generous supporters. What is not widely known is the extent to which taxpayers are propping it up, through dozens of small contracts not listed in its annual reports. Last year, these contracts amounted to more than $2 million and were signed by the chiefs of a small group of government departments which, say ASPI’s critics, have vested interests in promoting China as Australia’s No. 1 strategic threat. On China’s radarTwo weeks ago, ASPI was again thrust into the international limelight after China’s foreign ministry directly named it as the source of claims by Prime Minister Scott Morrison that Australia was the victim of a sustained cyber security attack. Morrison did not name China but, ASPI’s executive director, Peter Jennings did. He told journalists it was a “95%” likelihood that China was behind the alleged attacks. Critics, including former foreign ministers, ambassadors and senior figures within the defence establishment, contend that ASPI is an anti-China lobby that has hoodwinked the media into believing it is independent. Labor Senator Kim Carr, who is pursuing ASPI through a Senate committee, argues it’s a conflicted government-funded body that lacks transparency, particularly in the way it reports who funds its research. It is an Australian government organisation, a Commonwealth company, and they’ve been at the centre of Sinophobia. This is what happened in the Cold War, you set up a front and create a world view that’s unchallengeable. Then you de-legitimize anyone who argues for engagement with China. Ironically, engagement with China remains official government policy”. Disguised defence largesseThe Howard Government set up ASPI in 2001 as an independent think tank that would challenge a supposed culture of stagnated thinking, weighed down by the defence bureaucracy. Its main funding was an annual grant from the Defence Department but over the past decade it has developed more and more revenue streams — and no obligation to reveal exactly who pays it what. Defence remains its biggest benefactor. Before the federal election, the Morrison Government not only increased this funding by more than 13%, it locked in a guaranteed $20 million until 2023. This largesse does not include one-off payments for sponsorship and commissioned reports. In its annual reports, ASPI declares the $4 million annual Defence grant but opaquely refers to this as “core funding”. According to Department of Finance figures, in 2018-19 it received an additional $1,363,002.84 in funding from Defence, which was not publicly declared. According to answers it provided to a Senate Estimates committee in February, ASPI collected $1,158,581.63 (pre-GST) in funding from Defence without clearly declaring the source of those funds. ASPI didn’t explain the discrepancy between its two reported figures. Shrinking support?In its annual report, ASPI splits income into two sources: “Defence funding” and “Sale of goods and rendering of services”. It also produced a gloomy graph [on original] showing how “core” funding had withered away from 100% of its income to a moderate 43%. However, the graph doesn’t take into account its numerous government tenders and contracts that have delivered a financial windfall. In the past five years the value of its government contracts has increased by more than 300%. (second graph on original] Figures from the Department of Finance’s procurement website AusTender show ASPI was awarded $2,133,716.62 in contracts between July 2019 and June 2020. ASPI records all these government payments in its annual reports but muddies the waters by consolidating them with sponsorships and other commercial revenue. ASPI has received 37 government contracts in the past two years. See below [on original] or click here for easier viewing………. Major backersASPI has received funding from the governments of Britain, Japan and Taiwan as well as NATO. Among its corporate supporters are global weapons makers Thales, BAE Systems, Raytheon, SAAB, Northrop Grumman, MDBA Missile Systems and Naval Group. Yet their contribution of over $330,000 last year is dwarfed by that of a handful of government departments and agencies. Disclosures to the Senate revealed that ASPI had at least 56 sources of income in 2018-19 which it categorised as either sponsorships or commissioned income. Critics might accuse ASPI of having a narrow world view, but its views are financially supported by a very broad base of benefactors. Michael West Editor’s Note: This is a special investigation by APAC News, Michael West Media and Pearls & Irritations https://www.michaelwest.com.au/independent-think-tank-aspi-behind-push-for-more-defence-spending-rakes-in-advisory-fees/ |
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A new motley crew of Australian politicians form “Friends of Nuclear”
Reporter Rosie Lewis, writing in THE AUSTRALIAN (25/12/21) recorded, with that paper’s usual pro nuclear joy and delight, that 21 Australian politicians have signed up to this group. They named only 9 of these MPs, a motley crew indeed, of minor party members, and 5 Labor Party ones.
It gets confusing, as Labor has a clear policy of prohibiting nuclear technology, ( excluding the Lucas Heights Opal reactor). But then, sabotage of Labor policies is not a new thing for Joel Fitzgibbon. He opposes Labor’s climate policy (which is strange, as nuclear’s big push is about purporting to combat climate change)
However, you can bet that the remaining 12 ‘nuclear friends’ would be Liberals and Nationals.
Meanwhile, the 9 mentioned have an odd assortment of views on energy – some support renewable energy, some oppose. There’s some scepticism on climate change, where you’d expect nuclear being touted as the solution. And Pauline Hanson is on record as opposing the nuclear lobby’s plan for a nuclear waste dump at Kimba, South Australia.
“Dr Gillespie and Senator Gallacher said their priority was on educating other MPs — particularly within Labor — about nuclear energy.” “We can introduce the best scientific minds into our parliamentary friendship group and bring them to Canberra.”
Of course, those “best scientific minds” will come from “Australia’s Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation and other government and industry bodies” which function primarily as nuclear promoters, anyway. I don’t think they’ll be inviting Dr Helen Caldicott, Dr Jim Green, or Dave Sweeney fron the Australian Conservation Foundation.
Australian government obsessed with preventing legal appeals against its nuclear waste dump plan
Commenting on the opinion piece: They have let it come: now build it , In Daily Dave Sweeney, Australian Conservation Foundation InDaily 25 Feb 21
Sean Edwards’ defence of the federal governments push for a hotly-contested national radioactive waste facility near Kimba on the Eyre Peninsula fails to recognise that the deeply flawed plan has once more hit the rough.
Mr Edwards speaks of respect, but there is nothing respectful in the governments new legislation seeking to remove people’s rights to legally appeal or challenge the plan.
Access to a day in court is a fundamental democratic right, and the governments obsession with removing this should sound alarm bells in the wider community, just as it has in the Senate where the planned law was again deferred this week after it failed to garner broad political support.
The plan shirks the hard questions about responsible long-term radioactive waste management in favour of a sub-optimal short-term political ‘fix’.
The waste comes from the Lucas Heights reactor in Sydney. There is a growing call that it should stay at this secure federal site until there is a credible pathway for its long-term management. Moving it to an area in regional South Australia where there are far fewer management assets and resources is both unnecessary and irresponsible.
This is not a decision about on which hill to put a mobile tower. Deciding on Australia’s first purpose-built national radioactive waste facility requires much more evidence, effort and evaluation than has occurred to date.
If radioactive waste lasted as long as our politicians it would hardly be a problem. But it doesn’t. This is Australia’s most serious radioactive waste and some of it needs to be isolated from people and the environment for 10,000 years.
Our nation needs a credible, evidence-based approach to the long-term management of radioactive waste.
Sadly, neither Minister Pitt’s plan nor Mr Edward’s assurances deliver this. It is time the current approach was scrapped and the federal government got serious about advancing responsible waste management. – https://indaily.com.au/opinion/reader-contributions/2021/02/26/your-views-on-nuclear-waste-submarines-and-jobseeker/
Legislation banning nuclear power in Australia should be retained
Murdoch papers and Murdoch’s Sky News have ramped up their campaign to have nuclear laws repealed, and far-right Coalition MPs and former MPs are along for the ride. The post Legislation banning nuclear power in Australia should be retained appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Legislation banning nuclear power in Australia should be retained — RenewEconomy
State parliaments in NSW and Victoria have completed nuclear inquiries over the past two years but the governments of both states have no intention of repealing laws banning nuclear power.
The Morrison government established an inquiry into nuclear power in 2019 but made it clear that the federal ban would be retained regardless of the findings of the inquiry.
Nevertheless, supporters continue to campaign for the repeal of federal and state laws banning nuclear power. The Murdoch papers and Murdoch’s Sky News have ramped up their campaign to have those laws repealed.
Far-right Coalition MPs and former MPs are along for the ride.
And a tangled web of far-right conspiracists and fossil fuel interests: for example a recent article promoting nuclear power in Australia was written by a Policy Associate at the impressive-sounding Institute for Energy Research — the impressive-sounding, Koch-founded, fossil fuel-funded Institute for Energy Research.
There’s conflict within the Coalition, as demonstrated by the unwillingness of the federal and NSW Coalition governments to repeal legal bans, and submissions opposing nuclear power to the federal inquiry from the SA and Tasmanian conservative governments as well as the Queensland Liberal-National Party.
Coalition Senator Matt Canavan is at war with himself, previously noting that nuclear power would increase power bills but now supporting taxpayer funding for nuclear power through the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.
Yes, it’s entertaining watching the Coalition at war with itself over an energy source that has well and truly priced itself out of the energy debate and has instead found a home in the culture wars.
Former PM Malcolm Turnbull describes nuclear power as the “loopy current fad … which is the current weapon of mass distraction for the backbench”.
But there’s a serious side to the problem.
Firstly, the promotion of nuclear power muddies the energy debate and helps to delay the transition from fossil fuels to renewables. Economist Prof. John Quiggin notes that, in practice, support for nuclear power in Australia is support for coal.
Secondly, politicians who are silly enough to promote nuclear power over cheaper renewables would probably be silly enough to gift billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies to nuclear companies.
And not all of these MPs are fringe figures like Craig Kelly — some have real clout such as NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro, former Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, and former PM Tony Abbott (who thinks the Coalition should promote nuclear power to “create a contest” with unions, GetUp, the Greens, the ALP and the “green left“.
There are plenty of recent examples demonstrating how badly nuclear power projects can go wrong.
All of the recent projects in the US and western Europe have cost about A$20 billion per reactor and all of them are at least A$10 billion over budget and many years behind schedule.
Multi-billion-dollar taxpayer and ratepayer subsidies for these failed projects have been ever-expanding. It would be naïve to expect a better outcome — in other words, a non-disastrous outcome — in Australia given our lack of experience and expertise.
Thirdly, culture wars based on lies and conspiracy theories can escalate beyond anyone’s wildest imagination, as we see with the MAGA movement in the US.
There has to be push-back against irrational ideologues lest they become dangerous irrational ideologues.
The rest of this article summarises the reasons to oppose nuclear power in Australia and to keep legal bans in place. This summary comes with the caveat that rational arguments won’t shift the culture warriors; a cult deprogrammer might shift them, but not rational arguments.
Nonetheless, the rest of the population needs to be inoculated against the misinformation of the ideologues. Continue reading
Australian government’s nuclear waste plans unacceptable – Dr Margaret Beavis
 Long-term impact of quick nuclear dump fix https://indaily.com.au/opinion/2021/02/23/long-term-impact-of-quick-nuclear-dump-fix/Legislation to set up a national nuclear waste storage site on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula is being debated by federal parliament. Margaret Beavis argues that both the site selection process and storage plans for long-lived intermediate nuclear waste are unacceptable.
Today, the government is planning a Senate vote to lock in moving highly radioactive nuclear waste to Kimba. This bill will deny any judicial oversight or review, despite major flaws in the proposal. However there is no rush to find a home for Australia’s nuclear waste. The federal nuclear regulator, ARPANSA, has been crystal clear; the nuclear waste at the ANSTO Lucas Heights reactor can stay there safely for decades. Claims that moving the waste is urgently needed to continue nuclear medicine in Australia are patently false. As a GP, I use nuclear medicine and ongoing access is necessary. Other arguments that we need to consolidate nuclear waste at one site are misleading, given hospitals will be handling waste for as long as there is nuclear medicine. Hospitals currently manage their own nuclear medicine wastes on a ‘delay and decay’ basis on site; after use in a patient, the waste very rapidly loses its radioactivity. After a few months the vast majority is safe enough to go to a normal rubbish tip. There will always be multiple sites. Many South Australians would be unaware that this proposed “temporary storage” of nuclear waste in Kimba is a second-rate cheap solution. World’s best practice requires deep geological disposal, which costs a lot more. Countries such as Finland have spent over 40 years researching locations and properly involving communities. They are only now building a deep geological repository, at a cost of over A$5 billion In contrast, the Kimba plan will cost shift onto future generations, who will be left to do the job properly at great expense. Indeed, whilst the government promises to move the waste yet again some decades hence, there are no plans whatsoever for proper longer-term disposal. It is highly likely to end up stranded at Kimba and a significant liability for South Australians. In addition to the dodgy storage proposal, there are many other flaws. The big ones include: four years of a misleading government marketing campaign, a deciding vote using a biased sample of residents and a complete disregard of profound opposition by the Traditional Owners. The site selection process has been poor. The community has endured several years of very one-sided marketing, and remains deeply divided on the issue. Low-level waste has been the major focus thoughout, yet the elephant in the room is the intermediate waste that is radioactive for over 10,000 years. The community vote was based on town boundaries, which biased the sample towards businesses who may profit from the facility. It excluded farmers who are closer to the site than the township. At the alternative Hawker site last year, a much less biased vote with a 50 km radius was used, and the waste was clearly rejected. This current proposal also rides rough shod over the clear opposition of the traditional owners. In April 2020 the Federal Parliament’s own Joint Committee on Human Rights found the National Radioactive Waste Management Act does not sufficiently protect the Barngarla’s rights and interests. The Federal Government admits its proposed legislation will deny farmers, Traditional Owners and other interested parties a right to a judicial review. Indeed, the legislation is designed to do just that. This bill locks in a second-rate process for a second-rate facility that will be a major future liability for South Australians. Highly radioactive intermediate level nuclear waste is going to be with us for a very, very long time. There is plenty of time to do it right. We need a proper disposal plan, not moving the waste unnecessarily to a temporary store and leaving it for our kids to pay for. This waste is highly radioactive for millennia. If this legislation passes, it will come back and haunt South Australians for generations to come. Margaret Beavis is a GP and vice president of the Medical Association for Prevention of War. |
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Assange’s partner exposes ongoing denial of his legal and democratic rights,
 Assange’s partner exposes ongoing denial of his legal and democratic rights, https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/02/22/assa-f22.html?pk_campaign=assange-newsletter&pk_kwd=wsws, Oscar Grenfell, 21 February 2021 In an online post last week, Stella Moris, the partner of Julian Assange and mother of his two young children, outlined the ongoing denial of the WikiLeaks founder’s fundamental legal and democratic rights, even after a British Magistrates’ Court ruled early last month against his extradition to the United States.
Moris provided a succinct summary of the issues of democratic principle at stake, in the US attempt to prosecute Assange for lawful publishing activities that exposed war crimes, and updated his supporters on the current stage of the legal campaign to secure his freedom. The January 4 verdict, forbidding extradition, had “taken into account” the “extensive medical evidence” presented during last year’s trial, Moris explained. Assange’s dispatch to the US had been blocked on the grounds that it would be “oppressive.” His health issues, including serious depression, and the brutal character of the US prison system, meant there would be a great risk of Assange taking his own life if he were extradited. The US immediately responded, in the final days of the administration of President Donald Trump, by formally signalling an appeal. Trump’s Democratic Party successor, President Joe Biden, in his first weeks in office, rejected calls by civil liberties and press freedom organisations for the US Department of Justice to drop its pursuit of Assange, demonstrating the bipartisan character of the persecution. The High Court will decide after March 29 whether prosecutors, acting on behalf of the US state, will be permitted to proceed with their appeal. Moris stated that the next stage for the defence was to submit a response to the US grounds of appeal. She then reviewed the anti-democratic implications of Judge Vanessa Baraitser’s January 4 ruling. It had denied Assange’s extradition on health grounds, but “did not side with him on the wider public interest arguments.” Baraitser had upheld virtually all of the prosecution’s substantive arguments, effectively green-lighting future attempts by governments to prosecute journalists and publishers for exposing material that they deem to be “classified” and of “national security” significance, regardless of the public interest of what is exposed. Continue reading |
The remediation of Ranger uranium mine: will it really restore the environment?
Traditional owners were given land rights in return for their support for the Ranger mine, and Kakadu National Park was born. ……. the land will finally be returned to the traditional owners… the question is, in what state? ……… we could find the site an eroding heap of substandard scrub.
As part of cleaning up the mine site, contaminated buildings and equipment will be buried in one of the mine’s enormous pits.
We’ve been told that burying the equipment and the contaminated material in the mine site is out of step with global best practice in the mining industry.
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Kakadu in crisis, ABC 22 Feb 2021, Crisis in Kakadu: The turmoil threatening Australia’s biggest national park
“It’s gone downhill. No one basically trusts anybody, no one respects each other anymore. That’s how bad it is here.” Traditional owner Kakadu is one of the great natural wonders of the world. The stunning landscape, teeming with wildlife, is a major tourist destination with scores of Instagram friendly sites. For tourism operators it is an iconic symbol of what Australia has to offer. “It’s one of the most special places in Australia. It’s for so long been one of the reasons why people visit Australia and for Australians, one of their must do life experiences.” Tourism industry representative Despite its beauty, there is trouble inside Australia’s biggest national park. This World Heritage listed site is in crisis. “It’s an absolute mess because the institutions responsible for fixing it up aren’t doing their job.” Traditional owner On Monday Four Corners investigates accusations of mismanagement and neglect which have fuelled a bitter dispute between the park’s traditional owners and the authority that runs the park. |
National Farmers Federation want govt to support renewable energy (not coal or nuclear)
released on Tuesday, the NFF makes the call for renewable energy to be part
of new investment to address the $3.8bn annual shortfall in infrastructure
in regional Australia. The paper, which makes no mention of coal or nuclear
energy supporting jobs in the regions, comes as the Nationals push for the
Clean Energy Finance Corporation to invest in those technologies.
1 This month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
15 April – Zoom –Nuclear Power is Not the Solution
Apr 15, 2026 01:00 AM in Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney
Join the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) on Tuesday, April 14th for a timely webinar exploring the risks associated with nuclear power and challenging the myth that it offers a simple, safe, carbon-free solution to the climate crisis
21 April Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-04-21 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-04-21 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
Event Type: Virtual
A virtual link will be communicated before the event.
Host Contact Info: australia@icanw.org
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 