What’s the radioactivity level of Lynas’ refinery thorium wastes?
https://m.malaysiakini.com/letters/458037, Citizens’ Health Initiative. Chan Chee Khoon, 29 Dec 2018, Lynas has repeatedly stated that the specific (radio)activity of their water leach purification (WLP) residues is low (but still above Malaysia’s regulatory limit of 1 becquerel per gm of material [the becquerel (Bq) is a measure of radioactivity, equal to the number of nuclear decays per second]:
“The WLP residue, although classified as radioactive material, has the same radioactivity level as the feedstock material (rare earth ore concentrates) used in the Lamp process (about 6 Bq/g of Th)”.
(More accurately, this should read 6Bq/g of WLP – pure Th232 has a specific activity of 4070 Bq/gm of thorium, so 1655ppm of Th232 in WLP residues would contribute 6.7 Bq/gm of WLP).
But saying that each gram of WLP contributes 6Bq of radioactivity amounts to saying that Th232 decays in a single step to a stable element which is not radioactive. Clearly, this is not the case as is evident from the decay chain for Th232 below: [on original]
In a stable equilibrium, the number of nuclear decays for each of the subsequent radioactive progenies in the Th232 decay series is equal to the number of nuclear decays of Th232.
Hence the specific activity of WLP would be 10x the Bq counts contributed solely by Th232 nuclear decays (followed by nine other nuclear decays in the decay chain of progenies in the figure above).
In line with this, p.38 of the Radiological Impact Assessment (Nuklear Malaysia, June 2010) stated that Lynas’ refinery would produce “32,000 tons per year of water leach purification residue (WLP) with radioactivity concentration of 61 Bq/g containing 1,655ppm (6.62 Bq/g) thorium-232 and 22.5ppm (0.28 Bq/g) of uranium-238”.
It is noteworthy that the RIA arrived at this estimate despite this qualification:
“All but one of the daughter products of thorium-232 is a solid. The one exception is radon-220, an isotope of radon, but commonly referred to as thoron [half-life 55 seconds]. There is a possibility of thoron being able to emanate from the concentrate, the residue or thorium bearing contaminated materials so that the entire radioactive series may not be in secular equilibrium. When in secular equilibrium the thorium-232 radioactive series has an activity ten times the activity of thorium-232”) (p.41)
Likewise, the Preliminary Environmental Impact Assessment includes a table on page 5-55 which states that the WLP contains 1655ppm of Thorium Oxide and 22.5ppm of Uranium Oxide, for a total specific (radio)activity of 62.0 Bq/g of WLP, i.e. 10 times the specific activity announced.
Lynas should explain why it is taking the boundary case (equivalent to a one-step decay of Th232 to a non-radioactive progeny), rather than in a decay chain including nine other radioactive progenies, occurring in a low-permeability clayey mass of WLP residues, which would retain much of the short-lived Thoron 220 and its decay progenies, and thus approximate a closed system tending towards secular equilibrium.
The biggest porky pies: How fake news has shaped our history
Read more at the Source: www.theage.com.au/national/the-biggest-porky-pies-how-fake-news-has-shaped-our-history-20181227-p50ohq.html By Julia Baird host of The Drum on ABCTV & a journalist and author 29 December 2018
“We can fact check lies – but who will tell the stories of those who have been ignored, stereotypes and scrubbed out of history? First Nations people have been fed fake news and lies about their history and their present for centuries. As have we all. And the impact of this endures.
Myths like: there is only one Aboriginal culture, voice, or viewpoint.. That Aboriginal people are inherently violent, lazy, drunk. That the impact of colonisation has long passed. That the first inhabitants of this land were simply hunter-gatherers. That Australia was just a wilderness before Europeans arrived.
The truth is starkly different. In his brilliant book Dark Emu, Indigenous historian Bruce Pascoe documented how Aboriginal peoples lived here for millennia before Cook arrived, establishing a sophisticated, cultivated form of land management, carefully tended irrigation and extensive farming and fish-trapping practices – with villages with wells, dams, permanent buildings made of clay-coated wood and elaborate cemeteries – operating as a cluster of distinct but connected democracies. A land carefully tilled, a land built upon, a land that sustained an economy, a land that was theirs. … ”
Read much much much more at the Source: www.theage.com.au/national/the-biggest-porky-pies-how-fake-news-has-shaped-our-history-20181227-p50ohq.html
Review of ‘DarkEmu by BrucePascoe’
‘Required re-education readings’ BookReview by BenCourtice
groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/wgar-news/WH0DXuU9ntk/8XeB5QOuAAAJ;context-place=forum/wgar-news
astherivergoesby.wordpress.com/2017/12/27/required-re-education-readings-dark-emu/
Why Labor is taking the right course on nuclear disarmament
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Labor sets the right course on nuclear disarmament, https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/labor-sets-the-right-course-on-nuclear-disarmament-20181224-p50o22.html, By Gem Romuld, 27 December 2018 On the final afternoon of the recent 48th Labor national conference, Anthony Albanese took to the podium to announce that a future Labor government will sign and ratify the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. He declared that “people who change the world are ones that are ambitious”, after three days of intense negotiations on nuclear policy among senior Labor parliamentarians.The Coalition government has not only refused to join the treaty, but boycotted the negotiating conference and opposed the process leading up to it. While claiming to wholeheartedly seek a world free of nuclear weapons, foreign affairs ministers Julie Bishop and Marise Payne have failed to act. Their preferred path is one that doesn’t challenge the nuclear-armed states, especially our powerful ally, and protects the status quo.
After words of caution from Senator Penny Wong and MP Richard Marles in October, supporters of the nuclear ban treaty within Labor had to move a mountain to get the leadership on side. Even with former foreign minister Gareth Evans warning against the treaty, out of deference to the United States, on the eve of the resolution the supportive majority won out. With 78 per cent of the federal caucus signed up to support the ban, 83 per cent of Labor voters on side, and two dozen unions adding their voice, Labor has a clear mandate. Soon after the resolution passed unanimously, commentators rushed to dismiss the resolution as aspirational, ineffective and conditional upon whether nuclear-armed states join the treaty. This is not true; there are no binding caveats to the resolution. Labor must only “take account of” various factors ahead of signing and ratifying. Conservatives within Labor tried to attach binding preconditions, but their attempts failed. As for whether the resolution is aspirational, in fact it is binding. Therefore, it is no longer a matter of whether a Labor government will join the TPNW – only when. A recently published paper by Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic is clear that Australia joining the ban treaty would advance its stated goal of supporting nuclear disarmament without creating insurmountable legal obstacles to ongoing military relations with the United States. Australia signed up to the landmines and cluster munitions treaties when the United States did not, and still has not, signed on. The alliance relationship doesn’t bind us to include weapons of mass destruction in our defence policies. Further, the ANZUS Treaty contains no obligation to accept the policy of nuclear deterrence. The threat posed by nuclear weapons is real and urgent. More than ever, our security depends on an effective rules-based international order and strong multilateral institutions. No nuclear-armed states have yet joined the treaty, but this will change. No treaty, whether on disarmament or human rights or climate change, has ever enjoyed universal support at the outset. Support is always built up over time. Monumental strides forward in human history rarely begin with all parties coming together to agree on a common course of action. The majority of the world’s nations negotiated the TPNW based on their firm belief that it would have a profound impact on the behaviour of nuclear-armed states and their allies, even if its provisions would not, at the outset, be binding on those states. Treaties prohibiting other inhumane, indiscriminate weapons demonstrate this process; for example, the landmine ban treaty is widely regarded as a success, with massive reductions in use and production worldwide. Within the nuclear weapon ban treaty’s first year of existence, money is moving. The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund and the largest Dutch pension fund have decided to exclude nuclear-weapon-producing companies from their investment portfolios, citing the treaty as their reason. The Australian Medical Association and the Australian Red Cross have urged the Australian government to sign and ratify the treaty as a humanitarian imperative. Cities within countries opposed to the treaty are also joining the call for national action, including Los Angeles, Toronto, Manchester, Melbourne and Sydney. The ban treaty is a powerful new tool for advocacy, and nuclear disarmament is back on the political agenda. Since the treaty opened for signature in September 2017, 69 states have signed on and 19 have ratified. The 50th nation to deposit its instrument of ratification will enable the treaty to enter into force and become permanent international law. With dozens of nations currently undergoing domestic processes to sign and ratify, entry- into-force is expected by 2020. It is beyond time for Australia to quit our role as nuclear enabler for the United States. The nuclear weapon ban treaty presents us with a persistent question; will we join the global majority and contribute to the consensus against these WMDs, or remain implicated in the nuclear threat? Labor’s commitment clears a pathway forward for the next Government. Gem Romuld is the Australian director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear |
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Labor is right to support a nuclear ban treaty
The cold war is back. Labor is right to support a nuclear ban treaty https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/28/the-cold-war-is-back-labor-is-right-to-support-a-nuclear-ban-treatyLabor’s pledge to commit to nuclear disarmament puts the alternative party of government on the right side of history.
The gulf between the shenanigans of way too many politicians, and the growing urgency of grave and looming threats has rarely seemed wider. Action on crucial issues languishes while parliamentarians make naked grabs for power, acting in the interests only of themselves. Poor personal behaviour seems endemic. On the two unprecedented dangers looming over all humanity – nuclear war and climate disruption – Australia has been not just missing in action, but actively on the wrong side of history, part of the problem rather than the solution.
The government’s own figures demonstrate that our country, awash with renewable sun and wind, is way off track to meet even a third of its greenhouse gas emissions reduction target by 2030 – itself nowhere near enough.
Not only is nuclear disarmament stalled, but one by one, the agreements that reduced and constrained nuclear weapons, hard-won fruit of the end of the first cold war, are being trashed. All the nuclear-armed states are investing massively not simply in keeping their weapons indefinitely, but developing new ones that are more accurate, more deadly and more “usable”. The cold war is back, and irresponsible and explicit threats to use nuclear weapons have proliferated. Any positive effect that Australia might have on reducing nuclear weapons dangers from the supposed influence afforded us by our uncritical obsequiousness to the US is nowhere in sight. Our government has been incapable of asserting any independence even from the current most extreme, dysfunctional and unfit US administration. The US has recently renounced its previous commitments under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT); we have said nothing.
The one bright light in this gathering gloom is the 2017 UN treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons. For its role in helping to bring this historic treaty into being, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (Ican) was awarded the Nobel peace prize for 2017 – the first to an entity born in Australia. This treaty provides the first comprehensive and categorical prohibition of nuclear weapons. It sets zero nuclear weapons as the clear and consistent standard for all countries and will help drive elimination of these worst weapons of mass destruction, just as the treaties banning biological and chemical weapons, landmines and cluster munitions have played a decisive role in progressing the elimination of those other indiscriminate and inhumane weapons. The treaty lays out a clear pathway for all states, with and without nuclear weapons, to fulfil their binding legal obligation to accomplish nuclear disarmament. It is currently the only such pathway.
Regrettably, the Australian government was the most active “weasel” in opposing the treaty’s development at every step and was one of the first to say it would not sign, even though we have signed every other treaty banning an unacceptable weapon.
Hence the Labor party’s commitment at its recent national conference in Adelaide that “Labor in government will sign and ratify the Ban Treaty” is an important and welcome step. It is a clear commitment, allowing no room for weaselling.
The considerations articulated alongside this commitment are fairly straightforward and consistent with the commitment. First, recognition of the need for “an effective verification and enforcement architecture” for nuclear disarmament. The treaty itself embodies this. Governments joining the treaty must designate a competent international authority “to negotiate and verify the irreversible elimination of nuclear weapons” and nuclear weapons programmes, “including the elimination or irreversible conversion of all nuclear-weapons-related facilities”. Australia should also push for the same standard for any nuclear disarmament that happens outside the treaty.
Second, the Labor resolution prioritises “the interaction of the Ban Treaty with the longstanding Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty”. The treaty has been carefully crafted to be entirely compatible with the NPT and explicitly reaffirms that the NPT “serves as a cornerstone of the nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime”, and that its full and effective implementation “has a vital role to play in promoting international peace and security”. All the governments supporting the treaty support the NPT, and the NPT itself enshrines a commitment for all its members to “pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament”. The UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, and the International Committee of the Red Cross are among those who have affirmed that the treaty and the NPT are entirely consistent, complementary and mutually reinforcing. Even opponents of the treaty recognise that prohibition is an essential part of achieving and sustaining a world free of nuclear weapons.
Third, the Labor resolution refers to “Work to achieve universal support for the Ban Treaty.” This too is mirrored in one of the commitments governments take on in joining the treaty, to encourage other states to join, “with the goal of universal adherence of all States to the Treaty.”
An Australian government joining the treaty would enjoy wide popular support in doing so – an Ipsos poll last month found that 79% of Australians (and 83% of Labor voters) support, and less than 8% oppose, Australia joining the treaty.
Australia would also stop sticking out like a sore thumb among our southeast Asian and Pacific Island neighbours and be able to work more effectively with them. Brunei, Cook Islands, Fiji, Indonesia, Kiribati, Laos, New Zealand, Malaysia, Myanmar, Palau, Philippines, Samoa, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Vietnam have already signed the treaty.
Most importantly, joining the treaty and renouncing nuclear weapons would mean that Australia would become part of the solution rather than the problem of the acute existential peril that hangs over all of us while nuclear weapons exist, ready to be launched within minutes. Time is not on our side. Of course this crucial humanitarian issue should be above party politics. The commitment from the alternative party of government to join the treaty and get on the right side of history when Labor next forms government is to be warmly welcomed. It is to be hoped that the 78% of federal parliamentary Labor members who have put on record their support for Australia joining the treaty by signing Ican’s parliamentary pledge will help ensure Labor keeps this landmark promise.
• Dr Tilman Ruff is co-founder of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (Ican) and Nobel peace prize winner (2017)
Despite 47.5 degrees Celsius heat, Senator Rex Patrick drove to Kimba to explore the question of “community consent” for nuclear waste dump
VISIT TO KIMBA TO DISCUSS NRWMF PROCESS
Today I drove to Kimba to meet with local residents about the ongoing process to determine where Australia’s National Radioactive Waste Management Facility will be located. I spoke with those ‘in favour’ of a local facility and those ‘against’.
Australia needs to take responsibility for its own low/intermediate level radioactive waste. We need a new national facility, but I don’t want to see it located anywhere where there is not ‘broad community support’. Actually, that’s the Government’s stated position too, but unfortunately they have not set a criteria for ‘broad community support’.
Imagine voting in the next Federal election without knowing how the winner will be determined. Even worse, imagine the current Prime Minister deciding the result of the election AFTER he had been told by the AEC what the voting outcome was.
This has to be fixed. So too does the fact that alternate Commonwealth sites have not been properly assessed. I had something to say about this in this morning’s The Australian newspaper https://www.theaustralian.com.au/…/fd851b6cefd7c5701d354c7e…
I talked to the locals about the need to have an alternate plan for the growth of Kimba in the event the facility is located elsewhere (e.g. Woomera, Leonora etc.). That’s a dialogue I want to continue.
Despite the mercury reaching 47.5 degrees, I took some time out after the meetings to have a look at a few Kimba tourist sites – have a look at their silo art. It’s worth spending some time in Kimba if you’re passing by. https://www.facebook.com/groups/344452605899556/
Flinders Ranges Traditional Owners take radioactive waste concerns to Australian Human Rights Commission
18 December 2018
The complaint, also being provided to the Australian Government, demonstrates the Traditional Owners’ continuing opposition to the nomination of Wallerberdina Station as a place to both dispose and store federal radioactive waste.
The complaint has been prepared on a pro-bono basis by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers on behalf of the Adnyamathanha Traditional Lands Association (ATLA).
It alleges that both the ballot to assess community support for the waste facility, which excludes many traditional owners, and the damage done to significant cultural heritage sites by Commonwealth contractors constitutes unlawful discrimination.
Maurice Blackburn lawyer Nicki Lees, acting for ATLA, said the nomination process for the Hawker site has been fundamentally flawed from its inception and the AHRC complaint is necessary to seek independent insight into the adequacy of the process.
“From day one this process has shown a complete lack of regard for the Traditional Owners and for the significance of this site to the Adnyamathanha people,” Ms Lees said.
Vince Coulthard, CEO of ATLA and proud Adnyamathanha man, said that “ATLA remains strongly opposed to any nomination of their land for a future radioactive waste dump site and the lodging of an AHRC complaint is important in seeking a fair hearing for our deep concerns”.
There are also serious probity questions to be answered about this process – including the nomination of the site by senior South Australian Liberal Party figure Grant Chapman, without prior consultation with the Traditional Owners.
A separate application challenging the lawfulness of a ballot to assess community support in the Kimba region by the Barngarla people for the proposed waste facility is also currently before the Federal Court of Australia.
Maurice Blackburn Lawyers previously acted pro-bono on behalf of Traditional Owners who successfully overturned the nomination of Muckaty Station as a radioactive waste dump in the Northern Territory.
Australian government promoting Australia’s secret weapons deals to Saudi Arabia and UAE for murderous war in Yemen
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Documents reveal Australia’s secret arms deals with nations fighting Yemen’s bloody war, ABC News
Internal Defence Department documents obtained under Freedom of Information (FOI) and from parliamentary hearings reveal since the beginning of 2016, Canberra has granted at least 37 export permits for military-related items to the United Arab Emirates, and 20 to Saudi Arabia. They are the two countries leading a coalition fighting a war against Houthi rebels in the Middle East’s poorest nation, Yemen. The four-year war in Yemen has killed tens of thousands and an air-and-sea embargo has led to more than 85,000 Yemeni children under five dying from hunger, according to one children’s agency. Australia’s burgeoning exports to the UAE and Saudi Arabia may be connected to a plan announced by then-Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in January to drastically increase defence sales over the next decade. Australia will spend $200 million between now and 2028 in order to make Australia the 10th-largest arms exporter in the world. It is currently the 20th largest. The strategy states the Middle East is a “priority market” for defence exports. The Government has tried to keep details of the exports secret, but New South Wales lawyer and human rights activist Kellie Tranter has spent a year trying to shed light on the sales. Continue reading |
Why did Sir Mark Oliphant not speak out about nuclear bombs radioactively contaminating Maralinga?
My own research has been into why Sir Mark Oliphant, Australia’s premier nuclear physicist and a prime mover in the Tube Alloys group that showed the Americans how to build atomic bombs in time to use in the second world war, never spoke out about the contamination (from H-bomb tests) of his beloved home state of South Australia and further eastward just weeks before the 1956 Olympic Games took place in Melbourne.
He told me in 1993: “The Brits thought they could ensure any fallout or contamination was not too big. They were very pigheaded about it. The people in control were very haphazard about the estimates.” Why didn’t he speak out about the residual radioactive contamination at Monte Bello, Maralinga and Emu Field, even when he was governor of South Australia? He replied: “You can really decontaminate Maralinga by leaving it alone. Plutonium alpha particles contamination, I think, is grossly overplayed. The Aborigines are using it to the full. At the same time it was very naughty of the British to leave it, and to think of spreading it that way in the first place was very nasty. The British people were very reticent about revealing contamination, especially regarding food contamination. They hugged that to their chests very closely.”
I suggest that Sir Mark Oliphant was Australia’s – and Britain’s – J Robert Oppenheimer. The evidence is set out on my website www.rabbittreview.com and was mostly found in the files I accessed in the UK National Archives.
Defence Department accused of deception over Woomera radioactive wastes
Defence under attack on nuclear waste dump https://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/defence/defence-under-attack-on-nuclear-waste-dump/news-story/fd851b6cefd7c5701d354c7ed1adf09d LUKE GRIFFITHS @_LukeGriffiths DECEMBER 27, 2018
Woomera must be revisited as a potential site for Australia’s first nuclear waste dump, says Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick, who accuses the Defence Department of deception over claims the site is unsuitable.
Senator Patrick said he would question Defence officials at Senate estimates hearings over why the department dismissed Woomera as a potential site because of an “intolerable risk” and its “impracticability” — a position since backed by Resources Minister Matt Canavan.
The 122,000sq km Woomera Prohibited Area, located in the South Australian outback 450km northwest of Adelaide, is a military testing range under federal government control.
Senator Patrick said significant nuclear waste materials had been stored there since 1994, including 10,000 drums of low and intermediate-level waste from a CSIRO research facility at Fishermans Bend in Melbourne.
In a report published on its website last week, the CSIRO said tests had found the material posed no threat to health or the environment. Tests in May found radiation levels adjacent to the storage had “natural background values” for Australia, as would be found in typical soil and rock.
“The report findings make a mockery of Defence claims there’s no way a national radioactive waste management facility could be located anywhere in the enormous expanse of the WPA,” Senator Patrick said.
“The reality is radioactive waste has been safely stored at Woomera for a quarter of a century. Defence can expect considerable scrutiny in the new year over the bureaucratic obfuscation and deception on this issue. It seems Defence is never stronger in defending territory than when it comes to defending its own.”
Senator Canavan has short-listed two sites near Kimba, 465km northwest of Adelaide, and one site near Hawker, in South Australia’s mid-north, for the waste facility.
The process, which has divided both communities, stalled after a Kimba ballot scheduled for August 20 was delayed by court action from an Aboriginal group that believes traditional owners should vote, despite not living within the shire’s boundaries.
In a similar move, traditional owners at Hawker last week lodged an Australian Human Rights Commission complaint, prepared by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers, that alleged a “fundamentally flawed process”.
Labor has not said how it would proceed should it form government after the election, which must be held by mid-May.D The Department of Defence did not respond to questions.
Scorching temperatures sweep across Western Australia
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Comments on the drums of radioactive waste at Woomera, South Australia
Kazzi Jai No Nuclear Waste Dump Anywhere in South Australia This is the radioactive waste that should never have even been transported over to South Australia in the first place! It was only because it was on Department of Defence land which is Commonwealth land. The Eastern states from where it was made in the first place are welcome to have it back!Fighting Adani: An Interview With Wangan and Jagalingou Council’s Adrian Burragubba By Paul Gregoire | 21/12/2018
“Indian mining giant Adani filed an application with the Federal Court last week asking that a legal challenge to its proposed Carmichael coalmine be thrown out, unless the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners fronted up with $160,000 in potential court fees within two weeks.
On Tuesday, Federal Court Justice Alan Robertson said that Adani’s demand was “disproportionate and unpersuasive”. He ordered that the traditional ownerspay $50,000 in security costs by the end of January or their legal challenge could not go ahead.
Adani’s attempt to have the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners’ case thrown out has caused the mining company further setbacks with its terminally delayed mine, as the case will now take place in May, when it was initially scheduled for next month.
The traditional owners are appealing an earlier ruling by the Federal Court. They assert that the Indigenous land use agreement (ILUA) that is essential for the Adani mine to go ahead is void. In August, Justice John Reeves found that this claim had “no merit”.
However, on Tuesday, Justice Robertson also upheld that the appeal will be going before the full bench of the Federal Court, as there’s an “arguable case of error” in the decision of the primary judge. …
Sydney Criminal Lawyers spoke with Wangan and Jagalingou spokesperson Adrian Burragubba about his thoughts on Adani’s latest tactic to try and thwart their ongoing opposition, why the Adani ILUA is a sham and how the system of native title needs a complete overhaul. … ”
Read the interview at the source document: www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/fighting-adani-an-interview-with-wangan-and-jagalingou-councils-adrian-burragubba/
Australian Labor Party’s very limited support for the United Nations nuclear ban treaty
Bill Shorten wins cautious agreement on foreign aid, recognising Palestine and nuclear ban treaty, SMH, By Michael Koziol18 December 2018 A federal Labor government will pursue the recognition of Palestine, a treaty banning nuclear weapons and an increase to foreign aid – but final decisions will be left for cabinet under an agreement struck between the party’s factions.Three controversial issues in the foreign relations portfolio were settled in backroom deals on Tuesday morning to ensure there were no contentious votes and Labor leader Bill Shorten ended the party’s national conference on a united note.The changes to Labor’s platform urge the next Labor government to recognise Palestine as a sovereign state as an “important priority”, but leaves the final decision to cabinet acting on expert advice.Labor has also given in-principle agreement to the United Nations nuclear ban treaty – but only after taking account of whether nuclear-armed states had signed up (so far none have) and whether they were abiding by the treaty’s terms…….
Senator Wong and defence spokesman Richard Marles led the negotiations, while the Left’s Anthony Albanese was heavily involved in the nuclear talks ……..
The controversial nuclear treaty bans states from using, producing or stockpiling nuclear weapons, and prohibits them from assisting any other state to engage in such activities.
Mr Marles – who has criticised the treaty as “the non-nuclear world thumbing its nose at the nuclear world” – said it was “no secret” some in Labor were sceptical about the treaty and its impact on Australia’s alliance with the US.
A Labor government would need to be “certain” the treaty would not endanger that alliance, Mr Marles told the conference, and it was essential there was a realistic pathway for nuclear powers to sign up.
As recently as October, Senator Wong said there was “no realistic prospect” of any nuclear states signing the treaty, let alone ratifying it, and it would have “no effect” without their endorsement……https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/bill-shorten-wins-cautious-agreement-on-foreign-aid-recognising-palestine-and-nuclear-ban-treaty-20181218-p50mw8.html
Radioactive waste at the Woomera Test Range
CSIRO 19 Dec 18 “……..Where did the waste come from?Almost 10,000 210-litre drums of waste now stored at the Woomera Test Range came from the clean-up of a former research site at Fishermans Bend, Melbourne, in the early 1990s and comprises of mainly soil and building materials…..
What is CSIRO doing about it?
CSIRO is using robotic equipment to better understand the physical condition and contents. This work will take 12–24 months and will inform future activities to characterise, separate and repackage waste and reduce its volume for transfer to the NRWMF. The robots are able to travel between the tightly packed drums which cannot be reached by people.
The robotic work will also help us better understand the physical integrity of the drums before further testing. The painted or galvanised drums are just over half way through their expected useful life of around 40 years……
Some material will be low level radioactive waste (LLW) and a very small amount may be intermediate level waste (ILW). Measures will be taken to ensure the material is safely stored to meet ARPANSA regulations until a final disposal pathway has been identified.
What does this mean for a National Radioactive Waste Management Facility (NRWMF)?
Further analysis and separation of material is needed to clarify how much of the material currently at the Woomera Range will require future disposal (LLW) or storage (ILW) at the proposed NRWMF.
The waste could not be transferred to a NRWMF until its contents are known and it is packaged to comply with the strict Waste Acceptance Criteria for the Facility. The current storage arrangement at the Woomera Test Range poses no health or environmental threat……. https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/Environment/Land-management/Radioactive-waste-Woomera?fbclid=IwAR2WeaBCrmpzBS5rZEqa-wH3IMh_sG7_L3Me5C3Ur5V6XhZo7WmiLCw7kEs
Scorching weather predicted for Queensland
Heatwave set to blaze across Queensland for next few days, ABC News, By Aneeta Bhole and staff, 21 Dec 18, Scorching weather has been predicted over the next four days in Queensland, with temperatures set to soar over 40 degrees Celsius in the state’s western interior.
1 This month
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
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/235274195556
19 May – Webinar- Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-05-19 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-05-19 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 