Mining In Kakadu National Park
By Michael KrockenbergerACF Campaigns Manager
The Ranger uranium mine currently operates within the outer boundaries of Kakadu National Park. The Jabiluka (North Ranger) and Koongarra mines are new proposals for uranium mining within the park.
In 1991 Energy Resources Australia (ERA) bought the Jabiluka lease from Pancontinental and proposed to mill, treat the ore and dispose of tailings at the Ranger mine. Although arguably less environmentally damaging than Pancontinental's original proposal to locate the mine facilities adjacent to the Magela Creek wetlands and process ore on site, the current underground mine proposal shifts many of the impacts to Ranger. The ERA proposal will exacerbate the current problems of water management but the greatest concern is long-term tailings containment.
Tailings from uranium mining pose a significant hazard as they contain around 85 per cent of the radioactivity of the original ore. Current legal requirements stipulate that all mine tailings must eventually be stored in mine pits, not in tailings dams. However, there would be insufficient room to store all tailings produced by the Ranger and Jabiluka mines without the use of the Ranger tailings dam, leaving those tailings exposed to both erosion and leaching.
The Fox Inquiry recommended against the establishment of a central yellowcake mill and urged that mines be established sequentially, with new ones only being opened after old ones had been closed. ERA's Jabiluka proposal is inconsistent with these findings and would also include road and bridge construction in a currently undisturbed area. Although many traditional owners and affected people are not in favour of the mine, they will experience increasing company pressure to arrive at an agreement with ERA.
The proposed Koongarra mine site is visible from Nourlangie Rock, Kakadu's premier rock art site and tourist destination. It is in the South Alligator River catchment, one of the few river catchments in the world protected almost in its entirety by a national park. The Fox Inquiry recognised this sensitive location when it specifically recommended against the development of Koongarra.
Land at Koongarra was excised from Kakadu National Park for mining purposes but this now differs from the revised project area for the mine. The Koongarra Project Area Act (1981), passed in the Commonwealth Parliament during the term of the Fraser government, would allow for a change in the national park boundary and effectively excise the revised project area from the park. However, the Act has never been proclaimed. Although the national park boundary would change, the boundary of the world heritage area would not, as any change to this would require international agreement. Two-thirds of the revised project area would therefore be in the world heritage area. Open-pit mining within such an area would meet strong condemnation both here and overseas.
Article from "Unclean, Unsafe & Unwanted - The Nuclear Industry Nightmare",
a special insert prepared for the June 1996 issue of Habitat,
produced by the Australian Conservation Foundation.
Back to the SEA-US Front Page