BACKGROUND Negotiations between Commonwealth and State governments for the establishment of a national radioactive waste repository began in 1979. In 1985 a national program of site selection for shallow burial of low level radioactive waste began. However until very recently no State or Territory government would agree to provide the site.
The Department of Industry, Science and Resources along with the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) are the main Commonwealth agencies promoting the proposed national repository (Commonwealth carriage was originally through the Department of Primary Industry and Energy [DPIE]).
These agencies argued that a single national waste dump was needed to dispose of low-level radioactive wastes from hospitals and universities totalling about 60 cubic metres annually (about three semi-trailer loads). It is argued that medical and research institutions shouldn't be burdened with the storage of these wastes. Further, it was maintained that a national dump would provide a site for the disposal of large quantities of soils contaminated due to experimentation, and would in future accept intermediate and high-level wastes such as spent fuel rods from the Lucas Heights nuclear reactor in Sutherland, in south western Sydney.
PRESENT SITUATION To date public consultation conducted by the DPIE has focused on a national site selection process over three phases. The current disposal option is for 'Near Surface' or shallow burial of low-level and short-lived intermediate wastes in a remote area. Despite analysis and criticism from environment organisations such as Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace throughout the site selection process the push from the Commonwealth for the shallow burial of nuclear wastes continues.
In 1995 the Senate Select Committee into the Dangers of Radioactive Waste conducted a wide ranging investigation into the production, use, storage and disposal of radioactive wastes. The report "No Time to Waste" although recommending in favour of a national repository, found that shallow burial was an unacceptable form of disposal. Rather it recommended that: "a national above ground storage facility be established which has the capacity to take low, intermediate and high level radioactive waste." (1)
However, the Coalition government has dismissed these recommendations stating that: "For low-level and short-lived intermediate-level waste, international standards and practice clearly indicate that near-surface disposal is appropriate rather than storage . . ." (2) It also happens to be the cheapest way of putting out of sight and out of mind dangerous radioactive wastes.
BILLA KALINA On 18th February 1998, Senator Warwick Parer, then Minister for Resources and Energy, announced that a 67,000 square kilometre region in South Australia had been identified as the most suitable area in which to site the dump. The area was called Billa Kalina after one of the ecologically unique mound springs located in the Lake Eyre South region.
Billa Kalina also extends over the traditional country of the Kokotha people to the south and Arabunna people to the north. Rebecca Bear-Wingfield, an Arabunna and Kokotha woman and Senior Aboriginal Women’s Representative of the Kunga Tjuta Kupa Piti has stated that the dump proposal is "an abuse of human rights which we will stop. Governments can’t keep dumping their poisons on us. We will make this a national and international issue." (3)
Drilling for site location and the Environmental Impact Assessment process should be finalised by the end of 1999. Despite the opposition of Arabunna and Kokotha people and environment organisations it is likely that the proposal will be given government approval. For this reason the Billa Kalina Alliance seeks your active support for this campaign. Only vigorous public opposition will prevent the further nuclearisation of Kokotha and Arabunna land (see pamphlet: Dispossession and Nuclearisation).
THE FACTS ABOUT SHALLOW BURIAL The proposed dump is planned to be about the size of a soccer field. This will include trenches of less than 20 metres deep into which the waste will be placed, usually inside steel drums. The drums are then covered with concrete or rammed earth. (4)
The Bureau of Resource Sciences openly states that the proposed design will not prevent leakage of water, nor human, animal or plant intrusion. (5) Exact plans for the design are vague and will not be fully disclosed until after a site is selected. This stands in stark contrast to the Senate Committee Recommendation 18 which stated that: "the national facility will be adequately engineered to withstand all possible climatic conditions, no matter how unlikely." (6)
The dump will be covered by an 'institutional control period' of 100 years. This means that the operating agency is responsible under law for this period of time. It is also claimed that the dump will have an 'engineering integrity' of 300 years. However, small quantities of Radium and other alpha-emitters typically found amongst low-level waste have half-lives that extend far beyond these periods. The half-life of Radium 226 is 1600 years, and gives rise to Radon, a gas, and its decay products which are the principle agents of lung cancer in uranium miners. (7)
The fact that Radium decays into a radiotoxic gas would require that the repository have the technical means to isolate radioactive vapours from the environment. Near-surface burial will not provide for this in any way. Other likely wastes such as Americium 241 have a half-life of 432 years and decays into Neptunium 237, which has a half-life of over 2 million years again far exceeding control periods required under law. (8)
Recent studies have shown that radioactive contaminants can migrate in groundwater over long distances faster than originally thought. (9) The study has broad implications for risk and performance assessment of shallow buried wastes and highlights the dangers presented to communities living in arid regions who use groundwater for drinking.
Siting the dump in a remote area only adds 'the tyranny of distance' to an already complex problem of radioactive waste management. Difficulties such as maintaining communications; adequate expertise; service provision; security and travel each compound the human rights and environmental abuses shallow burial on Aboriginal land entails. In addition, radioactive wastes would be transported across the continent putting numerous communities en route at risk to accidental exposure and contamination.
AUSTRALIA : THE WORLD’S NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP The DPIE has already indicated that the proposed low-level dump will be up-graded to accommodate intermediate and high-level wastes. (10) Referred to as Category S waste this would include spent fuel rods from nuclear reactors. The DPIE has also indicated that, "responsibility for site management and security arrangements may include . . . Government, [or] private operator control . . ." (11)
A privatised nuclear waste dump in Australia was given greater credence when a promotional video of US nuclear waste management corporation Pangea Resources was leaked to the media after it had been leaked to FoE England. The video enthuses about the potential Australia has for being the world’s nuclear waste dump. (12) Pangea Resources director, James W Voss later stated that, "those in industry that we have spoken to have expressed interest in Australia doing the right thing for the world to help rid the world of nuclear weapons and nuclear waste." (13) (emphasis added)
Robert Gallucci, US Special Envoy on Weapons of Mass Destruction has urged the Australian government to consider an international plan to establish a disposal site for the world’s nuclear waste. He maintained that "Australia could play a pretty unique role," adding to our already “incredible history supporting disarmament causes." (14)
Despite this, Government sources continue to deny that Australia will become the world’s nuclear waste dump. However, the search for a low-level dump continues and once a site is established it will be a simple matter of up-grading the facility to take any form of radioactive waste.
CORPORATE LINKS TO AUSTRALIA Pangea Resources Ltd is a wholly owned subsidiary of Golder Associates, an international employee-owned organisation of consulting engineers based in Seattle. Golder Associates have worked for many years on various nuclear waste disposal projects in the US, UK and Europe. It was closely involved with plans for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste at the Sellafield nuclear facility in the UK. These plans have been rejected by a planning enquiry after Friends of the Earth, England exposed flaws in the proposal. Golder Associates have offices all over the world, including Melbourne, Australia. There is speculation that Pangea Resources Ltd was set up to exploit the possibility of building the world’s radioactive waste dump in Australia. Its establishment coincides with the issue of radioactive waste storage becoming increasingly difficult throughout Europe, Japan, the UK and US, for technical, economic and political reasons.
BUILDING ALLIANCES To answer this challenge, the Kupa Piti Kunga Tjuta have formed an alliance with like-minded groups and individuals who are formulating the campaign to stop Australia from becoming the world’s nuclear dump site. In Melbourne the Anti-Uranium Campaign and Indigenous Solidarity Group of Friends of the Earth are playing a key role working closely with Rebecca and the Kunga Tjuta. The proposed dump cannot be seen in isolation from the on-going pressures upon Indigenous people, their communities and land. The Kokotha and Arabunna people have suffered a long history of impact from the nuclear industry including the testing of nuclear weapons at Maralinga; the testing of military rockets at Woomera; the siting of Nurrungar, a US military communications facility; and the mining of uranium at Roxby Downs.
Similarly the proposed new nuclear reactor at Lucas Heights in Sydney is intimately linked to the opening of a waste dump site. Without a dump to put the high-level radioactive wastes a new reactor becomes untenable. Although on January 18, 1999, ANSTO announced that "agreement has been reached with the French company COGEMA for reprocessing spent fuel" (15), less than a week earlier, COGEMA was notified that it was being placed under formal investigation - a step short of being charged - for alleged practices that "endanger the lives of others by exposing them to an immediate risk of death or injury". (16) This recent international development makes the situation more rather than less complex for any advocate for the proposed replacement reactor.
Activists from the Sutherland community and others associated with the campaign to stop the new nuclear reactor who attended the Forum are now co-ordinating campaign activities with the Billa Kalina Alliance that will highlight the links between these developments and the communities affected by them.
Join in! As with every social justice/environmental campaign, we need more people to get involved! Contact FoE, Fitzroy on 9419 8700 and speak to anyone from the Anti-Uranium Campaign or Indigenous Solidarity Group.
Daniel Voronoff Anti-Uranium Campaign Friends of the Earth, Fitzroy.
1 - see Recommendation 17 pp xix No Time to Waste April 1996. Also 7.11 pp 132.
2 - A Radioactive Waste Repository for Australia, Bureau of Resource Sciences, 1998 pp 3.
3 - Rebecca Bear-Wingfield, Media Release, Wednesday 13th Jan 1999.
4 - "Fact Sheet 9: What it will look like," Bureau of Resource Sciences, 1998.
5 - A radioactive waste repository for Australia. Bureau of Resource Sciences. pp 4.
6 - Recommendation 18 pp xx No Time to Waste April 1996.
7 - Issues Paper Number 6: Radioactive Waste Disposal in Australia. Dr. Rod Panter, Science , Technology & Environment Group. Dept of Parliamentary Library, 1992. pp 3.
8 - Ibid pp 20.
9 - American Chemical Society, 11 November 1998.
10 - A Radioactive Waste Repository for Australia, Bureau of Resource Sciences, 1998 pp 4.
11 - Ibid pp 5.
12 - Pangea Resources Promotional Video, 1998.
13 - South China Morning Post, 12 December 1998.
14 - The Australian, Tuesday 8th December 1998.
15 - ANSTO Media Release, 18th January 1998
16 - The Australian, Wednesday 13th January 1998
Page last updated February 22, 1999.
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