3CR
 Community Radio 855am

THE RADIO-ACTIVE SHOW

With Eric Miller and Linda Marks

Saturday at 10.00am

14th November 1998

Good morning you're listening to the Radio Active Show brought to you by the Sustainable Energy and Anti-Uranium Service. I'm Eric Miller. The Radio Active Show is a weekly program bringing you news and information on nuclear, peace and energy issues.

On today's show we hear about what happened during the visit to Kakadu by the World Heritage Commission. We speak to John Hallan from Friends of the Earth, Sydney. Also we speak to David Noonan, Campaign Officer for the Australian Conservation Foundation in Adelaide on the Beverley mine on the progress of the EIS for that mine.

The Beverley Uranium Mine in the Northern Flinders Ranges in South Australia's far north has been operating a trial mine since January 2nd of this year. It has produced over 25 tonnes of Uranium and it has had a radioactive leak that became public 5 months after it occurred. The mine uses in situ leaching where the acid is pumped underground into the ore body to dissolve the uranium. This solution is then pumped to the surface to extract the uranium.

On Friday, Senator Hill, Minister for the Environment, is due to submit his options for the mine to Senator Nick Minchin, Minister for Mines and Energy. This is part of the Environmental Impact Statement process. Heathgate Resources own the mine, a wholly owned subsidiary of the nuclear giant, General Atomics. I spoke to David Noonan, Campaign Officer with the Australian Conservation Foundation in Adelaide last Thursday. I asked him 'Where is the EIS process up to at this moment?'

David Noonan: Well, on Friday 13th, Senator Hill is obliged to inform the proponents, General Atomics of the US of his recommendations is regard to the Beverley mine proposal. Senator Hill's recommendations them inform the official decision maker, the Resources Minister, Senator Nick Minchin.

Eric Miller: He recommends if this project should go ahead in environmental terms?

David Noonan: Indeed. There is every indication from what they've done that they will approve the mine. They have fast tracked the mine by allowing them to construct and operate the mine, to discharge liquid waste back into the Beverley aquifer many, many months prior to conducting the Environmental Assessment and prior to the Government decision making process. This indicates that he will simply rubber stamp the mine proposal.

Eric Miller: The whole process of this mine, as you've said, has been fast tracked, but what are some of the things that Senator Hill should be concerned about?

David Noonan: If this approval goes ahead Australia will be used as a guinea pig for one of the most potentially dangerous uranium mines in the world. In the Western World this will be the first commercial sulphuric acid in situ leach uranium mine. The US mines use a less polluting alkaline leachate, and it's only in the former Soviet Union where sulphuric acid has been used on a commercial scale for this sort of uranium mining. So it really does set a series of adverse precedents for the protection of the Australian environment. For instance, this major US nuclear corporation, General Atomics, will be allowed to get away with not having to rehabilitate the ground water from the adverse impacts of their mining operation. It sets a serious precedent for other mining proposals in Australia. It will affect the proposal for the Honeymoon uranium mine in South Australia and a number of other in situ leach proposals in Western Australia. The company's also being allowed to discharge all of the liquid waste back into the Beverley aquifer with complete disregard for our natural heritage. The standards being applied here are so low that the Australian community has the right to be concerned whether Senator Hill is acting in the public interest as we would demand of him.

Eric Miller: Back in America would General Atomics get approval for this type of mining?

David Noonan: Well first, there are no sulphuric acid mines of this sort for uranium in the US. They would be required in the US to rehabilitate ground water. Certainly the documentation supplied in Australia through the company's draft EIS would not be acceptable in the US. The Australian Conservation Foundation used Freedom of Information Act to get access to the Government's own submissions to the Beverley EIS. So we know of the concerns of the Government's own advisers to this proposal. One of the serious concerns of Environment Australia was the failure of the company to adequately report in the EIS the operations and the impacts of the trial mine. The failure to report the level of change, the level of contamination of ground water at the site, and failure to report the full composition of the liquid wastes that are being discharged by the company back into the aquifer.

Eric Miller: They wouldn't be allowed to discharge tailings from a uranium mine back into the aquifer in America. It just wouldn't be acceptable there.

David Noonan: The only proposal in the US would be that if it was, in their terms, a deep well discharge area which is different to the near surface ground water body that we have at Beverley, North East of the Flinders Ranges in SA. The technology overall is dangerous so we're not saying that in the US it's practised in any creditable way. We're saying that the proposal for Australia is even more adverse than the practise in the US.

Eric Miller: South Australia hasn't got an abundance of water, to be treating water like this is quite, I don't know how to describe it.

David Noonan: Ground water systems are very little understood. The company claims that somehow the Beverley aquifer will permanently be separate from other water bodies really don't stand up to analysis and we know that through the scrutiny of ground water specialists such as Gavin Mudd from the Victorian University of Technology. That they intend to treat the ground water in that way and intend to discount the spiritual association of the local Aboriginal community, the Andymutna Community, with the ground water, shows a serious disrespect for the Australian natural environment and for social justice and equity to the broad Australian community including the indigenous people.

Eric Miller: What kind of substance are they pumping back into the ground after this mining process?

David Noonan: It includes all the liquid wastes from the mine, now that's sulphuric acid, it's heavy metals and other radio nucleides that are being discarded. They've first been dissolved in solution by the use of the sulphuric acid underground but in effect the company is only attempting to take out the uranium and then all those other heavy metals and radio nucleides they dispose of as a liquid waste. Where it was originally in a solid, immobile form in the ore body, the company is converting it into a mobile, bio-available, transportable, highly toxic form and then they are putting that back into ground water with the potential for that to move off site.

Eric Miller: Tomorrow Senator Hill is bound to give his recommendations and you have no sense that he will do anything else but let this process go through?

David Noonan: The formal decision maker is Senator Minchin, but I'm not aware that between them they have much understanding of the community's concerns about uranium mining. The community is concerned about the end product of our uranium, the intractable nuclear waste that occurs somewhere around the world that Australia always bears responsibility for. Tomorrow, on Friday 13th , it will be an in house Government process. But ACF is letting the community know what the government is doing at present. Their public announcement may wait until they think they have sufficiently orchestrated the performance to put across to the Australian people, perhaps as a joint South Australian and Commonwealth Government announcement.

Eric Miller: You expect if they do that, they'll do it 6o'clock Friday afternoon or something like that?

David Noonan: Well it won't happen on the day. On the day the Government will make their formal arrangement with the company and the public will only be let know later on.

Eric Miller: Thank you, David.

That was David Noonan, Campaign Officer with the Australian Conservation Foundation in Adelaide, I spoke to him on Thursday.

MUSIC

That was 'The River Runs Red' by Midnight Oil.

The World Heritage Commission that was here two weeks ago to have a look at Kakadu and to see if it is in danger or not have all gone back to their home countries. I spoke to John Hallam of Friends of the Earth, Sydney, and asked him 'What is the process for the United Nations World Heritage Commission now?'

John Hallam: Well, they'll all meet again in Kyoto. Starting on the 27th of this month. There will be furious lobbying, lots of people are going to write them letters over the intervening period. Lots of people are going to be asking them to put Kakadu National Park on the list of World Heritage in Danger. They'll be saying things like, 'You've heard evidence from the highest authority in Australia, from the Australian Academy of Sciences, from the Australian Academy of Humanities, and from IUCN and Ecomos Australia. They are actually kind of branches of the World Heritage, and you have accepted that there is a threat to Kakadu National Park, it would be crazy if you did not list it as in danger at this stage.'

Now one argument that is very strong is that they did already list the Yellow Stone National Park as in danger and the status of the Yellow Stone National Park was not nearly as threatened as that of Kakadu. In the case of the Yellow Stone National Park there were two gold mines that were going to be started up two and a half kilometres outside the outer boundary of the park. Now in the case of Kakadu we have an operating uranium mine, another projected uranium mine and a third possible uranium mine at Koongarra within the external boundaries of the park. They are on little mineral leases that are excised from the park but are none the less within the external boundaries of the park and they will definitely affect the park.

I think that our chances are reasonably good. They appear to have gone away pretty convinced that there are major problems in Kakadu National Park. So, we are doing a lot of moving and shaking in order to be able to come up with the right result come Kyoto. A whole team people are going to go down to Kyoto. Another team of people is going to be anchor people back here in Australia. It's going to be a busy time.

Eric Miller: These bureaucrats that have visited Kakadu and visited people around Australia will write a report recommending what should happen to the park.

John Hallam: They will write a report. That report will first go to the World Heritage Bureau and then to the World Heritage Committee. For that reason we're getting on the back of every single person that is on the Bureau or on the Committee and we are putting our case that it should be placed as 'World Heritage In Danger.'

Eric Miller: The Bureau and the Committee, are they made up of people of different countries?

John Hallam: Yes they are. The Bureau has about 10 countries on it. The Committee has 21 countries on it. Basically the Bureau is kind of like an inner cabinet of the Committee. The Bureau has on it the Japanese, it has a representative from Benin, Equador, The US. We are reasonably optimistic as I said that most of those people will vote in the way that we want them to vote, but we are leaving no stone unturned to place pressure on them. We are getting environment groups right across the planet to write to those people and to put the case for Kakadu to be placed on the In Danger list.

I might say as well, there is one practical way in which people can help. They can write to the World Heritage Bureau and the World Heritage Committee. The way to do it is to write to Chairman of the World Heritage Committee. Anything you write should be reasonably brief, it should be respectful and it should allow for the fact that they have already been through the arguments. All they need to do now is to take that final step and put it on the In Danger list.

Eric Miller: Will all this information be on the FoE Sydney web site?

John Hallam: It won't be on the web site yet, but it can be. We can get it to you. It's not a problem.

Eric Miller: If they get in contact with FoE Sydney?

John Hallam: Yes. There will be a model letter going out sometime in the next week.

Eric Miller: The Australian Government will be doing exactly the same as us, won't they?

John Hallam: They will doubtless be moving and shaking to obtain the opposite result from what we are. But we have the entire international conservation movement on our side.

Eric Miller: So a lot of politicking becomes part of this decision, doesn't it?

John Hallam: Yes, absolutely. It is going to be a big fight. The job that the team that goes down to Kyoto is going to have to do is huge, they are really going to have their work cut out for them.

Eric Miller: Because isn't it not always the case that is the up front argument that wins, it's often the politics behind it that really pushes these things when you are dealing with the United Nations?

John Hallam: I think it really helps if you've got a good argument, and in this case we definitely have the best case. I think we also have the most dedicated people and as I said, we definitely have the support of the international environmental and conservation movement. We've got conservation groups, we've got business groups, we've got anti-nuke groups from all over the planet that are moving and shaking to get things happening in our direction. That's really helpful.

Eric Miller: We've got 'til the end of the month to get this process over?

John Hallam: Yes, they days between the 26th and the 5th December are going to be really difficult. We are going to be on the edges of our seats.

I might mention while I've got you there on a slightly different tack. There is a really important vote coming up in the United Nations tomorrow. The New Agenda Coalition, which is an initiative to rid the world of nuclear weapons, is being voted on in a preliminary form in the United Nations General Assembly tomorrow. Our Government is likely to vote against it. The Senate today, about an hour and a half ago, passed a resolution asking the Government to vote for it. That's is going to be quite interesting.

Eric Miller: This is a change of what the Government was saying before they got elected.

John Hallam: Yes. What they are doing is that they are lining up with the big nuclear weapons states, and they are saying that anything that threatens what those states are doing can't be allowed to pass. We think that it's ridiculous that the Government would want to vote against the resolution to rid the world of nuclear weapons.

Eric Miller: Thank you, John.

That was John Hallam, Friends of the Earth, Sydney. And I interviewed him on Thursday. That United Nations vote was yesterday, on Friday 13th. You're listening to the Radio Active Show on 3CR.

What's ons:

  1. Next Thursday, 19th, there is a Stop Jabiluka Rally. Meet at 1pm at the Flinders Street Station and them move on to a secret radioactive site.
  2. On the same day in the evening at 7.30 there is a Jabiluka up date film night and live music. It is a benefit for Jabiluka arrestees. It's on at the Open Seasons Café at 29 Best Street, Fitzroy. The entry is $5 or by donation.
  3. The Indigenous Right and Survival Conference, the 2nd gathering of solidarity of Indigenous People being put on by Friends of the Earth on the 20th – 22nd November. Get in contact with FoE for more information.
  4. On the 5th & 6th of December in Melbourne there will be a Nuclear Free Australia Forum. Get in contact with FoE for details.
  5. Also on the 6th December there is the Stop Jabiluka rally. It starts at 4o'clock at the State Library.

That's all we have time for on the Radio Active Show this week. Please listen in next week. Goodbye for now.

Transcript produced by Linda Marks - with much thanks!!!
Page last updated January 8, 1999.
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