Blacks and Whites gather together against Muckaty Nuclear Waste Dump Plan
Alyawarr, Anungu (APY lands) Warlpiri, Anmatjirra, Arrente, Warramungu, NSW Land Council people – we are now joining together to make a stand at Uluru and will be calling on our Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal friends, unions and churches to stand with us.
Time to make a stand, Tennant & District Times 12 March 2010, – RICHARD DOWNS, SPOKESPERSON FOR THE ALYAWARR WALK-OFF CAMP. Last week Richard Downs, spokesperson for the Alyawarr Walk Off Camp, wrote to the Northern Land Council Chairman, Kim Hill, regarding the consultation process which eventuated in the nomination of Muckaty Station as the site for a nuclear dump. This is what he wrote: Continue reading
Uranium prices too low to make production economical – AREVA
AREVA May Cut Uranium Production By Melissa Pistilli, Uranium Investing News, 15 March.2010, Depressing uranium prices have forced French uranium miner AREVA to plan a review of its projects, which may lead to a 20 per cent cut in its 2012 output target.
Last September, the company pegged its 2012 production number at 12,000 tonnes of U308, but now says uranium prices are too low to make production costs economical. Continue reading
Biodiversity is for future ages. Uranium mining is short term
When a respected institution known for its measured and considered responses to issues of public importance, such as the Museum, asks the Government to pay attention, it would be foolish to do otherwise.
A time to err on side of conservation, The Advertiser Editorial, March 16, 2010 THERE are certain places in the state and the nation which should be off limits for mining. Continue reading
South Australia’s museum rejects uranium mining in wilderness areas
The museum says the biodiversity evaluation in Seeking a Balance is “greatly flawed”.
South Australian mining plan would potentially kill off species Adelaide Now, Cameron England,
March 15, 2010 A STATE Government plan which would allow mining in sensitive parts of the Northern Flinders Ranges is “greatly flawed” and should be “rejected totally”, the SA Museum says. Continue reading
Exploitation of impoverished Niger, by foreign uranium miners, including Australia
Uranium Major Niger Urged to Review Contracts, ABC News, NIAMEY (Reuters) 14 March 2010, – The new junta ruling in Niger, one of the world’s biggest uranium producers, should review and possibly renegotiate dozens of resource exploitation contracts, civil rights groups said on Saturday. Continue reading
Radioactivity is radioactivity, whether from uranium or from nuclear power
Now here’s a new slant on a wobbly word! It’s “NUCLEAR” In the item below, we see the Parks authority reassuring us that the radioactive waste dumped in Kakadu National Park is OK, because, you see, it’s only radioactivity from uranium mining – it’s not from a nuclear reactor! Well, isn’t that reassuring!
Radioactive waste dumped in Kakadu National Park
Toxic waste dump in Kakadu, Northern Territory News , NIGEL ADLAM, March 13th, 2010
THE equivalent of six Olympic-size swimming pools of radioactive soil and mining equipment has been buried in Kakadu National Park.Parks Australia said it was not nuclear waste and the level of radioactivity was low.
The soil and equipment had been stored in shipping containers.
It has now been put in containers with a structural life of 1000 years and buried four metres down.
Nuclear spin intensifies in lead-up to Obama’s Australian visit
the PR teams of the nuclear industry have been hard at work trying to make the idea of a nuclear future more palatable. The same sorts of spin doctors that once sang the praises of asbestos and denied any link between smoking and cancer
En Passant » Nuclear power is no environmental alternative, by Andrew Cheeseman, Socialist Alternative online, 09 March 2010
Once more, the Rudd government is talking up a nuclear future. There are plans for a new nuclear waste dump and it’s quite likely that this month’s meeting between US President Barack Obama and the Australian parliament will see further discussions of so-called “uranium leasing”. [ The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership] Continue reading
Faltering start to new South Australian uranium mining ventures
...The uranium expansions are having to factor in lower uranium price expectations. Prices …. have been steadily declining…..The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics said the price decline reflected the situation where supply would exceed demand for the second year in a row.
Uranium mining cranks up at Honeymoon, Sydney Morning Herald BARRY FITZGERALDMarch 12, 2010 COMMISSIONING of Australia’s fourth uranium mine begins next month…..Honeymoon is nevertheless set to reach the production stage before what was meant to be Australia’s fourth uranium mine, the Four Mile joint venture between Heathgate and Alliance Resources. Continue reading
Australian govt quietly planning expansion of ANSTO’s nuclear facility
Central Australia to get nuclear waste dump Herald Sun AAP * March 09, 2010 “…federal parliament’s public works committee is holding an inquiry into proposed extensions to the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) facility at Lucas Heights, in Sydney’s south. Continue reading
Women walking to Canberra to oppose NT nuclear waste dump
“We will also be talking to people about the deadly effects of the nuclear cycle and draw attention to people that Australia is contributing to the nuclear cycle by digging up uranium and how the government is planning to open a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory.”
Cassie joins peace walk, Ipswich Queensland Times. 9th March 2010 On Saturday Ms McMahon will join a 1400km walk from Brisbane to Canberra to encourage a peaceful and sustainable future as part of the Women’s International Peace Walk. Continue reading
A reminder of uranium mining’s connection with nuclear weapons
Secretive Arms Tycoon Behind New Uranium Mine | The Media Freedom Foundation, 9 March 2010, James
Neal Blue, who helped devise the Predator unmanned aircraft that are in use in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, is the director of a company that bought the Four Mile uranium mine in Australia. Blue is the chairman of Quasar Resources, which is affiliated with General Atomics, a major United States weapons and nuclear energy corporation. Continue reading
Foreign uranium companies, including Australian, endanger Niger’s water
water in the region had 10 times the level of radioactivity considered safe.
Niger’s uranium coup, boilingspot: 7 March 2010 On February 18, Niger’s President Mamadou Tandja was overthrown in a military coup. A military junta calling itself the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, headed by Major Salou Djibo, took power Tony Iltis | Green Left Online | 6 March 2010 “……the junta is unlikely to confront the causes of Niger’s extreme poverty: Western-imposed neoliberal austerity and the environmentally and socially destructive plunder of natural resources, particularly uranium……. Continue reading
Muckaty nuclear waste dump plan threatens groundwater
Muckaty station sits above an ancient aquifer which is used by both the aborigines for drinking water and white station owners to water their cattle. It also experiences large intermittent rainfalls during the year.
A heresy is occurring in Australia, anthropologyworks by Helen Caldicott, 8 March 2010, “….the current abuse and desecration of several aboriginal tribes inhabiting their land in the Northern Territory. This land called Muckaty station is conveniently located adjacent to the railway line, constructed recently by Dick Cheney’s former company Halliburton, which bisects Australia connecting Darwin, a port in the north, to Adelaide a port in the south. Continue reading
Who pays for nuclear power’s “Front End” and “Back end” ?
Who pays for the hidden costs of nuclear power? Why don’t we talk about the short and long-term costs of the “Front End” – the uranium industry, and of the” Back End” – finished nuclear reactors, and nuclear wastes. (Doncha love that euphemism “Decommissioning” of the dead nuclear reactors? )
1 This month
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
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