Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am delighted to be able to continue my contribution, which was interrupted by the adjournment last evening. As I was saying then, the US industry currently has a problem disposing of nuclear waste, with one company, Silex, lamenting that it has a hole in the ground in Nevada, 63,000 tonnes of waste to fill it and a mountain of regulations to climb over to do it. Perkovich, whom I referred to earlier, describes it as an intractable waste problem. The US President may also be offering Australia membership of the exclusive GNEP club, and the Prime Minister appears to be highly receptive. He believes, apparently, that we should have a look at all the angles, including enrichment, if it is viable and safe. Should we supply raw fuel to overseas buyers as a member of GNEP? Should we be expected to take back their waste, and where would it go?

I would submit that this places further pressure upon the community of the Northern Territory to be the waste receptacle for not only Australia’s nuclear waste but potentially the world’s nuclear waste, and I can tell you that that is not a prospect which the people of the Northern Territory would look forward to. That is why, as I said in the earlier part of my contribution, I am surprised at the audacity of the member for Solomon—whose electorate, after all, is Darwin and Palmerston, 333 square kilometres—in trying to speak on behalf of the rest of the residents of the Northern Territory, whose country would have these waste repositories in it. He has no right to claim that he speaks on behalf of the people of the Northern Territory, particularly those people on whose country these waste sites would be. I know that the concern I have expressed in this place on a number of occasions now, over almost 12 months, about the prospect of these waste repository sites being in the Northern Territory is endorsed by the community which I serve, unlike the view expressed by the member for Solomon.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Australia’s legislation regarding nuclear and radiation issues has an unfortunate legacy that goes back to a past where the mere words ‘radiation’ or ‘nuclear’ engendered fear and loathing in the community. As such, we find that the legislation is overly prescriptive, with the result that many unforeseen issues that are currently appearing are not able to be adequately dealt with due to the rigid and overly confining clauses within the acts. The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 seeks to redress some of the issues that have surfaced.

For example, there are a number of Commonwealth facilities that deal with radioactive material in some form or another. Problematically, the act as it currently stands effectively prohibits ANSTO from assisting in preparing the material for disposal or indeed storing this material. The legacy of this is that there are numerous Commonwealth facilities throughout Australia that have radioactive material, and it is dealt with by these individual organisations. ‘Haphazard’ would be too strong a word to be used for the current situation, but it is fair to say that it would be preferable to have a coordinated approach for the Commonwealth radioactive material. It is also clear that Australia’s premier nuclear research organisation, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, is the body that is best equipped and resourced to accept responsibility for this coordinated approach.

I believe that most in this House would accept that some radioactive materials in Australia are essential. Some of our colleagues have benefited from nuclear medicine, and I am certain that they would acknowledge the benefits that have accrued from their treatment. As we know, however, everything has a cost, and the cost associated with this treatment is some radioactive waste. In addition to medical treatments, we accept that we need to conduct scientific research. Neutron scattering is used in the characterisation of many materials, and this brings considerable benefit to our understanding of material science. We also insist that houses and other buildings have smoke detectors. Smoke detectors use americium-241 in order to detect the smoke particles. The obvious cost, once again, is that we have radioactive waste that we need to dispose of.

We have future medical treatments that also need to be considered. I have spoken previously in this House about a very effective cancer treatment known as proton beam therapy. Hadron beam therapy is a very similar technology and, using a synchrotron, allows the generation of either hadrons or protons for treatment. My colleague the member for Moore has already spoken about this in his talk on the bill. The cost, once again, is some radioactive material that we need to deal with.

Radiation does not need to be feared; it needs to be understood. Radiation is all around us. There is no such thing as a natural background radiation level. Radiation levels vary with geology, building construction methods, climate, altitude and the time of day, among a whole raft of factors that influence the radiation that we are exposed to. European homes tend to have far higher radiation levels than Australian homes, due to the fact that they tend to be sealed in cold weather. As such, the radon that emanates from many of the building materials is not flushed by natural airflow that we enjoy most of the time in Australia with open windows. Perhaps members opposite who are paranoid about radiation should consider a career change. This building that we all work in has relatively high levels of radiation, due to the large amounts of granite used in the construction. Add to that the fact that the building is not open to natural airflow and you end up with relatively high radon levels as well. Radon is a daughter product of uranium decay.

The fact is we evolved in a sea of radiation. We are still bathed in a radiation sea, albeit of lower intensity than was the case many millions of years ago. Having evolved in the surrounding radiation, our bodies not only adapted to radiation but, indeed, need radiation to survive. Studies have been conducted and conclusively show this. Tests were conducted on lab rats where the level of surrounding radiation was reduced to the greatest extent possible. It was found that these rats became ill to a far greater extent than a group of control rats.

This has been further highlighted by studies conducted in the United States of America. Cancer rates were compared between three Rocky Mountain states and three gulf states. The Rocky Mountain states, being both at altitude and having large amounts of granite, have levels of radioactivity approximately three times higher than the gulf states. If people such as Helen Caldicott who say that there is no safe lower threshold and any additional radiation is harmful were correct, you would expect that the Rocky Mountain states would have a higher incidence of cancer than the gulf states. In fact, it was found that the reverse was the case, that the gulf states had a cancer rate 21 per cent higher than the Rocky Mountain states.

There was a similar instance in Taiwan with so-called ‘hot’ apartments. There were 1,700 apartments built in the early 1980s, and the steel used in the reinforcement had hot cadmium 60—and I am talking about ‘hot’ in a radioactive sense. When this was discovered about 15 years later, a study was conducted. It was found that some of the inhabitants had been exposed to radiation levels high enough that, if they had received this dose in one hit, they would have been killed. What is interesting is that, when the rates of both cancer and birth deformities for the inhabitants were analysed, it was found that the rates for the inhabitants of these ‘hot’ apartments were only about one-twentieth of the Taiwanese average.

This phenomenon is known to medical science as hormesis. In simple terms, it means that something that is fatal in large doses can actually be beneficial in small doses. Arsenic is an example of chemical hormesis, as is selenium. In fact we need some levels of arsenic and selenium in our systems in order to survive. As such, the so-called linear, no threshold hypothesis on exposure to ionising radiation is shown to be incorrect. This theory was the result of studies conducted on fatalities of people due to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The trend is correct at higher doses of radiation, but extrapolation for very low doses resulted in an error.

One of the facts that those deploring all things nuclear fail to acknowledge is that the waste from nuclear processes is contained and small in volume. The fact is that all of the waste can be safely handled and disposed of, unlike in many other industrial processes, where emissions go out of the flue and into the atmosphere. There are various other solid, liquid and gas waste forms that cannot be adequately handled and disposed of. These wastes, therefore, find their way into the natural environment with all of the resultant consequences.

This bill is about allowing ANSTO, as the foremost expert on things nuclear in Australia, to deal with these radioactive wastes—to handle and dispose of these wastes in a manner that has a minimal environmental impact. In this way, Commonwealth generated radioactive waste will be better and more safely disposed of than just about any other waste that is generated in Australia. As with many in the environmental group, I wish to see our industry and power generators leave a smaller environmental footprint. Earlier I indicated that the footprint left by the nuclear industry is minuscule compared with that of most other industries. This is something that we need to embrace, not shy away from.

There is also the economic cost of energy production to consider. When I stated to one of my constituents in Tangney that it might be possible to generate most of our power using renewables but at 10 to 15 times the cost, she said she would be happy to pay for it. This constituent, understandably, was from one of the more affluent areas in my electorate. I pointed out that, while she may be able to afford it, the majority of Australians do not have the luxury of the large amount of disposable income required to achieve this. This is a problem we have with some of the so-called green elites. It is very easy for them to say, ‘To hell with the cost—this is what we need to do,’ but it shows scant regard for the wellbeing of their fellow Australians, the people whom they state they are speaking for.

There are of course all the flow-on costs that would be associated with such an increase in the cost of electricity. Consider the motor vehicle industry. Car manufacturers are moving to using more and more aluminium in the structure of engines to reduce weight. This weight reduction will have a resultant beneficial effect on fuel consumption. Now think about what would happen if the price of electricity increased massively. Aluminium production uses electricity intensively, so a large increase in electricity costs would increase the cost of aluminium. Car manufacturers, who are focused on the bottom line, would then not continue the move to aluminium, instead returning to steel and thus using greater amounts of cheaper steel again. This would have a negative effect on fuel consumption, so more oil would be consumed, exacerbating our dependence on oil imports, whilst at the same time adding to emissions from vehicle tailpipes.

Many other industries would be similarly affected. In terms of the general cost of electricity production, we need to consider not only the situation now, but into the future. Natural gas has already seen significant increases in price, leading to higher gas generated electricity prices even before you talk about carbon capture. I have never shied away from the fact that I am a sceptic when it comes to anthropogenic climate change, but it appears that the world is moving toward carbon capture. State of the art with carbon capture technologies means that, if introduced right now, the price of electricity is likely to double for coal fired power. Optimistic projections are that around 20 to 30 years into the future the penalty would be about a 30 per cent increase in power bills. The problem with these capture technologies is that they reduce the efficiency with power generation, so more coal or gas is required. This means more oil will be consumed for the mining, transportation and so on of the fuel, adding to our imports and increasing the emissions from other sources, such as trucks or diesel electric trains, which would also not have carbon capture technologies.

Oil is running out. There are synthetic alternatives, such as oil from coal using the Fischer-Tropsch process. This has been used economically in South Africa for the past 50-odd years, and the process allows oil production at approximately $US40 per barrel, depending on the price of coal. The fact we need to face in this context is that the price of coal—or gas, as the Fischer-Tropsch process can be used for gas-to-liquids as well—will increase significantly, further adversely affecting the price of electricity. ANSTO recently commissioned an independent study on the economics of nuclear energy. This study concluded that nuclear power is competitive for Australia using advanced generation III reactors. This is provided that a few reactors are built and is the same as would occur with any other power generation method where the economies of scale associated with having more than one power plant are critical.

The economics associated with generation IV reactors will be even better, given modular construction, standardised design and inherent safety. The lower power output of these units will allow their introduction on a staged basis, allowing their economically viable introduction into service. A factor that is also included in the bill relates to allowing ANSTO to conduct analysis with any event where there is a presence of radiometrics. This is critical, as we need to have our most expert body involved in any event of this sort in order to facilitate a timely resolution to these events.

There has been some discussion of the possibility of a terrorist attack. A nuclear reactor is one of the toughest targets for a terrorist to attack. It would be far easier for them to target coal or gas fired power stations, various chemical factories, oil refining, et cetera. Nuclear reactors are extremely tough targets. They have very high site security. By their nature they are extremely tough, due to containment buildings. Many generation IV reactors will be sited below ground level, making effective attack very difficult. The contrast between this and many other chemical or power facilities is stark. In this age of terrorism, the most secure method of power generation is nuclear power. Of all the facilities that have been targeted, nuclear reactors have not been.

It was, sadly, predictable that many of the speakers from the other side of the House should seek to use this bill to continue their efforts to raise fear in the community regarding nuclear energy and waste. The reality is that community attitudes are evolving. People accept nuclear medicine. Many of us have friends and family members who have been assisted by these medical breakthroughs. Nuclear power generation is no longer the scary monster Labor seeks to promote. What Labor is really concerned about is that understanding brings acceptance, and for a party with little understanding and a lot of fear it exposes them to the electorate.

I encourage members opposite to contact ANSTO and ask for a site visit—to find out the facts and gain an understanding of the way that uranium touches each and every one of us in our daily lives. Then decide your policy position. It is scary and disconcerting to watch otherwise. The public are over your shuffling around. They want information and hard facts. You are in danger of losing the debate before it starts. They are suffering motion sickness just watching you. I commend ANSTO, their board and staff for their commitment and dedication. I trust that this bill gives them the additional protections and authorities they need. I commend the bill to the House.

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Childcare) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On the website of the International Atomic Energy Agency, there is a quote that says:

A State lacking control of nuclear material and activities may risk becoming the target of non-State actors involved in the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology or in clandestine nuclear-related activities.

That is the worst-case scenario with the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006. The legislation gives the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation the scope to handle, manage or store radioactive materials but also to deal with radioactive waste from Commonwealth entities or, in the worst-case scenario, if there were an accident or if a dirty bomb were used in an attack, it would allow ANSTO to assist state and federal authorities without limitations.

The bill goes some way to implementing—despite the fact that the government has not yet ratified it—the United Nations Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism, particularly article 2, which makes it illegal not only for anyone to possess radioactive material or to possess a device with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury or substantial damage to property or to the environment but also to use radioactive material or to damage a nuclear facility to cause a release of radioactive material. They are all, obviously, very sensible measures. However, Labor is concerned—and I am concerned—that in allowing ANSTO more scope to deal with radioactive waste, the Lucas Heights reactor and the land around it will become a de facto radioactive waste repository. I grew up in the Sutherland Shire and I did not take a particular interest in ANSTO, the reactor and the area around it. However, since I was a child, the area around Lucas Heights has become very much more populous than it was 30 years ago and a lot of families who live in that Menai, Illawong, Bangor and Woronora Heights area are worried about the potential for ANSTO, which is right in their backyard, to become a de facto repository for all sorts of radioactive waste. That is why Labor’s deputy leader moved a second reading amendment to this legislation that picks up on some of these issues about storing nuclear waste around Australia.

Before the last election, the government promised that there would not be a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory. That has changed quite dramatically—in fact, completely—since the election, and the government will impose a nuclear waste dump on the Northern Territory. To the people who live around the reactor, around Lucas Heights, any assurances that they have been given that this legislation will not encourage more and longer term storage around the reactor is probably pretty meaningless, given what is happening in the Northern Territory.

This bill, in conjunction with the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management (Related Amendments) Bill 2005, protects ANSTO from legal action and allows them to transport radioactive material from any Commonwealth entity or its contractor to Lucas Heights. Unlike the Sutherland Shire Council, which took successful action against ANSTO in the New South Wales Land and Environment Court in 1991-92, local residents will have absolutely no legal recourse under this bill to oppose more waste being transported to Lucas Heights. They will also have no way of preventing Lucas Heights from becoming a major storage facility for ANSTO. People in the Sutherland Shire area in particular are worried about this.

The majority of the waste that is held at the facility at the moment is of pretty low grade, but people who are raising their families near the reactor are worried about the fact that in the last 18 months there have been 13 separate recorded safety breaches at ANSTO, including the incident of a worker who was exposed to abnormally high levels of radiation. Earlier this year there were four incidents reported in just one week, including radioactive material spilling onto one worker’s clothes and another worker getting such material in their eye and, further, taking in a small amount of gas. Fortunately, none of these workers were seriously injured. The response of the minister was something that would have done Joh Bjelke-Petersen proud: ‘Don’t you worry about that.’ It was quite concerning and it does not give local residents any comfort that the government will consult with residents about what role the reactor at Lucas Heights will play as a storage facility into the future.

As I said, just as the government has refused to consult local residents around Lucas Heights about the role that the reactor facility will play in waste disposal or waste storage, there has been an absolutely appalling lack of consultation with the residents of the Northern Territory about what will happen with the storage facility there. The Minister for Education, Science and Training said in her second reading speech on this bill:

The Commonwealth’s resolve to establish the Commonwealth radioactive waste management facility in the Northern Territory for this purpose was made abundantly clear by the enactment of the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act in 2005.

I do not know whether it was. What Northern Territory residents were told very clearly before the last federal election, in particular by the member for Solomon, was that there would be no such facility in the Northern Territory. Even after the election, the member for Solomon said:

There’s not going to be a national nuclear waste facility in the Northern Territory ... That was the commitment undertaken in the lead-up to the federal election and I haven’t heard anything apart from that view expressed since that election.

He could not have been listening too well to his colleagues. It is a breathtaking broken promise to the people of the Northern Territory. They were promised very clearly before the election that such a facility would not be established in the Northern Territory. Since the election everything has changed.

In February the Minister for Foreign Affairs said that we need medium- and high-level storage as well. I think the people of the Northern Territory are pretty worried about the potential for high-level storage. The opposition of the residents, community organisations and the government of the Northern Territory has been fierce. They believe that they were lied to. In a public statement made last year, the Central Land Council also expressed their opposition. They said:

The traditional owners are concerned about safety and the future security of a nuclear waste dump, the waste being transported on the roads that they use every day, the negative impact on businesses ... the impact on their traditional country and the ability to hunt and get bush tucker, pollution of the water in the event of an accident and the future for their grandchildren.

I think there are many Australians who would understand that concern for the future of their grandchildren. It is really the fundamental flaw with nuclear power as a power source. The long-term problem of safely and securely disposing of waste, I think, makes this power source something that we should not be pursuing in Australia.

At one stage the government wanted to force a nuclear waste dump on South Australia. Fortunately, the South Australian government was successful in challenging the federal government. This bill makes it very difficult for state governments and the community to make these sorts of challenges. If the government does push ahead with its plans to impose a nuclear waste dump on the Northern Territory, it will be able to. There will not be anything that the Territory government or the community can do to prevent it.

It has been the Prime Minister’s dream for many years now to establish a nuclear industry in Australia—not just a mining and extraction industry; he talks constantly about downstream processing and perhaps even nuclear power for Australia. I think it was the head of the Sierra Club in the US who said that talking about using nuclear power as a way of dealing with pollution and global warming is like saying that you are going to take up smoking crack cocaine because you want to give up cigarettes. The point he makes is a very good one. It is an absolutely disingenuous intellectual argument to say that you will deal with one very serious environmental hazard, global warming, by creating waste that is dangerous to the people who are exposed to it and that is potentially able to enter the nuclear weapons cycle. You will create this waste that will hang around for hundreds of thousands of years. We cannot predict what Australia is going to be like in 500 years, let alone 1,000, 5,000 or 10,000.

While there is a substantial debate in the Labor Party at the moment about the mining of uranium—and there have been for many years a variety of views in the Labor Party about the mining of uranium—there is one thing that we are absolutely 100 per cent clearly agreed on, and that is that we oppose a nuclear power industry in this country. There is very good reason for that. There are all of the economic arguments against it. It is not an economical way of generating power for us.

Aside from the issues that I have mentioned—dealing with waste, the potential security threats of having this waste available and the lack of economic argument for nuclear power—the other reason I feel very strongly about this is that there are so many things that we could be doing better when it comes to sustainable energy sources. There are so many ways that we could be tackling global warming and Australia’s future energy needs that we are not doing. To say that we have a problem with greenhouse, for the Prime Minister to admit that and to reach, as his first solution, for the most potentially polluting alternative—polluting in a different way—is illogical. There is no logical follow-on from the proposition that because we have an environmental problem we should move right on to nuclear energy as the solution to that.

The film An Inconvenient Truth, which was shown here on Monday night, went through many of the many environmental effects that we are facing: the ice caps melting; the extreme weather events—I think that is what people are calling them; the size of storms; the effects they are having; the economic damage that they are causing; the potential that water levels will rise and what that means for environmental refugees, I guess you would call them; the effect that temperature changes are having on our flora and fauna; and the fact that we are losing species at a rate of knots because their environments are being altered and made uninhabitable for these creatures. Obviously these things are of concern to anyone who follows the issue, but the idea that the logical response to global warming is nuclear power is, I think, stunningly short-sighted. For a start, we could look at a national emissions trading system in Australia. We could sign on to the Kyoto protocol and start to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. We could change some of the ways that we live our individual lives: change the environmental footprint that each of us leaves.

It takes about 10,000 years for high-level radioactive waste to be broken down. The notion that we can guarantee the political stability of this country, let alone its environmental stability, for that long or anything approaching it—even half that time; even 10 per cent of that time—I think is highly optimistic. It is also curious, when we are looking around—or the Prime Minister seems to be looking around—for alternative energy sources, that so very little support is given to renewable energy. Australia could and should be a world leader in renewable energy sources and renewable energy technology. We have the environment to do it, and the fact that we are missing this opportunity and instead are looking around for highly polluting, highly expensive, highly inefficient sources of power, like nuclear power, really is beyond belief.

ANSTO has said that, for a nuclear power industry to be viable in Australia, there would need to be at least three nuclear power plants built, preferably on the east coast. I challenge every member of the coalition who refuses to speak up against a nuclear power industry in Australia to tell us where these reactors are going to go. Where are these three reactors going to go? Under the Prime Minister’s desired plan, the east coast of Australia—the most populous part of Australia—would get three nuclear reactors and all of the associated waste that goes with a nuclear power industry. I think the Australian public deserves to know where those reactors would go under the Prime Minister’s plan. Certainly, if the broken promise to the people of the Northern Territory is any guide, even people who are told that they will not be getting a nuclear reactor in their backyard would be very sceptical about that promise if it were made to them.

This government has been completely unwilling to consult local communities about the disposal of nuclear waste. It has been unwilling to allow state or territory governments or major community representatives to have any say in the establishment of a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory. Why would Australians be confident that they would be consulted about the location of any nuclear power plants? Why would they be confident even if they were told that they were not getting a power plant in their backyard?

Martin Ferguson (Batman, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Primary Industries, Resources, Forestry and Tourism) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to participate in the debate on the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 and, in doing so, I seek to bring a bit of balance, integrity and honesty to the debate, given some comments that have been made over the last day about what is a pretty straightforward issue. The issue is ANSTO. This is not a debate about nuclear power and this is not a debate about downstream processing and the issue of enrichment in Australia. This is a debate about whether we as a nation are mature enough to select a site where we should store our low-level and intermediate-level nuclear waste. It is our waste; it is no-one else’s waste.

In that context, can I make it clear from the point of view of the Labor Party that there is no proposal to establish a nuclear power plant in Australia. It just does not stack up economically. In terms of processing, I simply say that there is a world excess capacity for at least a decade at this time and, more importantly, the International Atomic Energy Agency has said that we as a global community are obligated not to permit the establishment of any more enrichment facilities throughout the world until we attend to our responsibilities to review the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and improve the resourcing of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Given those comments, let us go to what this debate is really about. This debate is about ANSTO. I want to say at the outset that, as far as I am concerned, ANSTO is one of Australia’s iconic research institutions. It is as important as CSIRO, it is as important as our CRCs and it is as important as our universities. Every one of us has been the beneficiary—either personally or through family or friends—of the success of the operation of ANSTO. In that context I refer to our dependence as a nation on nuclear medicine. It is therefore our responsibility, if there are any weaknesses in the operation of ANSTO, to deal in a proper way with those weaknesses and improve the performance of ANSTO. It is our responsibility not to seek to politically destroy the reputation and standing of ANSTO but more importantly to improve its performance. There is no question in my mind that it is the appropriate organisation to have responsibility for managing radioactive materials in Australia. That is what the debate is about. ANSTO—and people should remember this—is Australia’s national nuclear research and development organisation and the centre of Australian nuclear expertise. That has been the position of all major political parties—that is, not one side of politics but all sides of politics; of the government and the alternative government, which on this occasion is the Labor Party—in Australia for decades.

ANSTO’s nuclear infrastructure includes the research reactor HIFAR, particle accelerators, radiopharmaceutical production facilities and a range of other unique research facilities that we as a nation should be proud of. The HIFAR is Australia’s only nuclear reactor. It is used to produce radioactive products for use in medicine and industry, as a source of neutron beams for scientific research and to irradiate silicon for semiconductor applications. It is well known that HIFAR will soon be replaced by a new reactor, to be known as OPAL, the Open Pool Australian Light-Water reactor. I am pleased to report that to date all the testing of the new reactor has been regarded as highly successful. I urge all members of this House to take the time, if they are interested in this debate, to go out to Lucas Heights and thoroughly examine and then debate what is actually going on at Lucas Heights. I have been there on a number of occasions, first as a union official in 1977 and since then in a variety of employment opportunities that I have had as a representative of the labour movement in Australia. I am certainly not ashamed of the existence of Lucas Heights. It has been to the benefit of all Australians.

ANSTO also operates—and people want to start remembering this—the national medical cyclotron and accelerator facility used to produce certain short-lived radioisotopes for nuclear medicine procedures. It is located, interestingly, right in the heart of Sydney in the grounds of the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital—and my parents have benefited from the operation of the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital—in Camperdown, next door to the University of Sydney. In addition, ANSTO manages Australia’s synchrotron facilities at a number of overseas locations. Just yesterday morning I attended a breakfast briefing by CSIRO on its Light Metals Flagship projects. Interestingly, the Australian synchrotron facilities overseas have been critical to CSIRO developing and understanding at an atomic level its new low-cost processes for the production of titanium powder, metal and parts. The potential of these new titanium technologies for Australian resources and Australian manufacturing is extraordinary. They can also make a major contribution to savings in energy consumption. The synchrotron facilities have been important infrastructure that have helped CSIRO achieve what it has with these new technologies.

I am pleased to say that Australia now has its own synchrotron, built by the Victorian government and located adjacent to the Monash University and CSIRO campuses at Clayton, Victoria. CSIRO and ANSTO are both foundation investors and members of the Australian Synchrotron Company. The synchrotron will be a world-class facility that will deliver beams of very intense X-rays with unique characteristics, which can be used for a wide range of scientific experiments, including—and it is about time some people thought about this, as they are things we will all benefit from—new drug design, advanced manufacturing, medical imaging, materials research and mineral analysis. And people want to destroy the standing of ANSTO! I just shake my head and wonder why some people are involved in the political processes in Australia.

That takes me to the need for the effective operation of ANSTO. The effective operation of the synchrotron will support a large number of Australia’s national research priorities and the associated priority goals. We are very fortunate to have this world-class facility at the leading edge of technology development in so many areas. I wonder why politicians are not talking up the benefits of this facility. CSIRO and ANSTO are both outstanding research and development organisations, and Australia would be simply the poorer without them. Unfortunately, ANSTO is too often pilloried by those who should know better, for their own political purposes. It is one thing, I suggest to the House, to run an antinuclear campaign underpinned by sound science, logic and belief. It is quite another to stoop to ludicrous fearmongering about ANSTO and the Lucas Heights nuclear facility, which is so important to the Australian community for its contribution to nuclear medicine, to industry and to the future of high technology manufacturing in this country.

The bill we have before us deals with the unavoidable consequences of nuclear medicine and nuclear technology in industry. This is an important debate. Let us have a factual, objective, non-emotional debate about this issue. It was interestingly started—and not many people refer to this—by Labor in government and the then Minister for Science and Technology, Simon Crean. The Labor government recognised two decades ago, as a responsible Labor government would and should, that Australia needed a national approach and a national solution to the issue of nuclear waste. I am delighted that the process was started by the forward-looking and performing Hawke and Keating Labor governments. There is not a member or senator in this parliament who would not agree that there is a need for us as a nation to solve our own problems.

It is time the games stopped at a state, territory and national level and at a political level. It is time we worked to deliver a responsible and honest outcome for the Australian community. Australians deserve and expect better from us than cheap politics over such an important national issue. So I am very pleased today to speak in this debate. The purpose of this debate is to permit ANSTO to handle, manage or store radioactive materials from a broader range of sources and circumstances than it is currently allowed to under the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Act 1987. ANSTO is a competent organisation. It has the required expertise to perform this role for Australia as a nation and for our community at large.

The fact is that, at the moment, radioactive waste—and not many have mentioned this; they want to create fearmongering in the suburbs of our capital cities and regional communities—is already stored at over 100 locations around Australia, in government stores, universities, hospitals and factories. Radioactive waste is disposed of at the WA government’s Mount Walton East integrated waste management facility and in the Queensland government’s purpose-built radioactive waste store at Esk. It is stored at Woomera in South Australia and the Lucas Heights facility in Sydney; in Defence facilities in and around Melbourne, Ipswich, Wodonga, Adelaide, Newcastle, Darwin, Sydney and Nowra; at CSIRO facilities in Canberra, Sydney, Adelaide, Mount Gambier, Brisbane and Melbourne; and—guess where?—right at the heart of Canberra, the national capital, at the Australian National University. And some suggest we cannot store it safely? It is not dangerous waste if it is properly managed and stored.

It includes contaminated laboratory equipment, such as protective clothing, paper, rubber gloves, plastic and glassware; lightly contaminated soil arising from previous CSIRO research into mineral extraction that was transported to Woomera in 1995; and low-activity disused radioactive sources like smoke detectors and exit signs. It includes intermediate-level waste like the residues from overseas reprocessing of—guess whose?—Australia’s spent research reactor fuel, waste arising from the production of radiopharmaceuticals by ANSTO and higher level disused radioactive sources from industry, medicine and research.

Whilst we can only assume that these wastes are already being safely stored in over 100 locations around this country, clearly it would be desirable and in the nation’s and the community’s best interests if the government could finally deliver a national repository for our nuclear waste—a national repository in the safe and trusted hands of ANSTO. The decision for the site for the national repository leaves a lot to be desired, based on recent political activities. The Labor Party supports a national repository and always has. It has reaffirmed that position as a result of the consideration of two ANSTO bills and at the shadow ministry and caucus level twice over the last 12 months, as a result of submissions by the appropriate shadow minister with the responsibility for this, the member for Jagajaga.

I do not agree with the arbitrary imposition of the national repository on the Northern Territory, without proper scientific assessment and community consultation. The government’s decision to impose the national repository on the Northern Territory is a ‘pin the tail on the donkey’ response to an issue that requires the most rigorous scientific, security, safety and consultation processes. It is a lazy decision and a quick-fit political fix. It is likely to backfire. The way it is being handled is not right.

I therefore draw attention to a forthcoming antinuclear campaign called the Beyond Nuclear Initiative Symposium being held in Melbourne later this month. Topics to be covered at the symposium include the proposed Northern Territory radioactive waste dump, and one—that particularly intrigues me, as the shadow minister for resources—which is billed as ‘radioactive racism’. For too long antinuclear campaigners, various environmental non-government organisations and other interest groups have used Indigenous communities for their own short-term political purposes. And what have Indigenous communities got in return? Certainly not jobs and economic prosperity, certainly not better education for Indigenous kids and certainly not economic empowerment. The simple fact is that Indigenous empowerment is not in the interests of special interest groups, including environmental NGOs, because they might make their own decisions.

I describe ‘radioactive racism’ as paternalism. Fortunately, Indigenous communities in the 21st century are awake up, and I am pleased to see they are starting to make their own decisions about these complex issues. They are working with industry—for example, Rio Tinto, Great Southern Plantations and Accor Asia Pacific—to get jobs, education and training, and sustainable business investment and opportunities for the future. They are seeking information from all sides of these debates. They are starting to determine their own future, and I encourage them to do so and, by doing so, to grow in confidence.

With respect to the Northern Territory nuclear waste dump, the government has made it easier for the antinuclear campaigners because of the process it pursued. How can a decision that is not properly based on scientific or appropriate consultation be defended? And that is where my head is at. There has been a lack of competence by government in determining this issue. A national repository is required by Australia. It is our nuclear waste and we have to sort this problem out. Also, as was considered by the Labor Party caucus in considering this bill, ANSTO has to be supported for the purposes of boosting our efforts in the area of nuclear waste technology research. I had hoped that that would be included in the second reading amendment, but it has not been. You cannot say that we have a nuclear waste problem unless you are also prepared to support efforts to solve the problem of storage and waste disposal.

For over 25 years, ANSTO has been a leading-edge research organisation in this capacity. I was therefore pleased to note ANSTO’s announcement last month to fund up to five fellowships each worth up to $250,000. This is about re-equipping ANSTO not just with a nuclear reactor but also with the manpower which will enable it to rebuild its scientific capacity in the nuclear field. I am calling on the nuclear industry and the uranium mining companies to also devote additional research money to assist in this endeavour.

We as a nation have a problem with respect to our own waste. It is our responsibility to engage with the Australian community to sort out where we store our waste based on scientific understanding and proper research. In that context, I also say that Australian scientists and engineers have a proud record in nuclear technologies, just like they have in solar, light metal, coal and other technologies. We have to continue to develop our nuclear technology capacity.

The Labor Party supports and has reaffirmed during the consideration of this bill the need to establish a national repository to store low- and intermediate-level waste. That support also potentially includes support for a site in the Northern Territory, if it is selected through a proper process, including scientific consideration. Our opposition to the current process relates to the manner in which the Australian government has gone about that process, lying during the course of the last federal election and, after the last election, coming up with a couple of sites picked out of nowhere in the Northern Territory for the purposes of resolving their own political difficulties.

I say to the Howard government: step back. The way you are going is wrong. You are undermining an important decision that this community must make. You are undermining a process that was, in a very proud way, commenced by Labor in government with Simon Crean as the Minister for Science and Technology. We are not opposed to this outcome, but we are opposed to the methods being pursued by the Howard government to solve their political problems.

In conclusion: as the Australian Strategic Policy Institute reported in its paper last week, there is no security imperative for Australia to provide a safe service for the long-term storage of waste beyond our own needs, provided we store our own waste under proper supervision with appropriate safeguards. We have to solve our problems. Stop the emotion and dishonesty that surrounds this debate on all sides of politics, including amongst some of the Labor Party state and territory governments. Work with the Commonwealth government that has failed the test to date and front up to your responsibility to solve Australia’s problems about how we store our waste. We benefit from nuclear based medicines. Sort out the problems. (Time expired)

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Reconciliation and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There have been a number of contributions to this debate and I have listened very carefully to what members opposite in particular have had to say, and, of course, to members on this side as well. I listened in particular to the comments made by the member for Lingiari, who is the member of this parliament whose constituents are most affected by the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006, and the issues they face are addressed by the amendment that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition brought forward, to which I will speak today.

There is no doubt that the interests and rights of the people of the Northern Territory were both ignored and compromised by the Howard government in its recent legislative agenda on nuclear issues, including the bill that was forced through this parliament last year. There is a great deal at play here and a great deal of debate in relation to nuclear matters at present. The Howard government is pushing for a full-scale nuclear industry in Australia. It is enthusiastic about all aspects of the nuclear cycle itself, including expanding exports of uranium, possibly to India, although this would clearly compromise the terms of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. It has launched an inquiry—a very narrow inquiry, it has to be said, without the involvement of a single environment expert or any person with sufficient expertise to make a judgement about environment issues—on nuclear energy. That inquiry was launched with a preliminary broadside from the Prime Minister, when he observed and endorsed the virtues of nuclear energy. I hope that all the members of the inquiry had their hands firmly over their ears when those comments were made by the Prime Minister.

There is no doubt that the Minister for Foreign Affairs is particularly keen on the prospect of Australia getting into nuclear enrichment. According to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, it is all about money and we should get on with it as quickly as we can. I note concerns that have been raised at high levels by the Indonesian government about the comments by the foreign affairs minister, but as well as that I suspect there are concerns further afield. As the International Atomic Energy Agency has already observed, there are so many substantial problems with the existing safeguard protocols and regime that the prospect of any other nation at this point in time entering into enrichment further jeopardises an already fairly shaky safeguards regime. Mohamed ElBaradei has been pretty clear in his comments that there ought to be a moratorium on enrichment. One would have hoped that the foreign affairs minister, who is very keen about enrichment, would have reflected on that international dimension before he actually spoke. The foreign affairs minister also does not point out to the Australian public that the enrichment process actually produces nine times as much waste on the way through. Very difficult, intractable toxic waste comes about as a result of that.

Additionally, the government has been willing to accommodate the idea of global nuclear energy partnerships as part of the increasing push, particularly by the United States, for nuclear energy to be ultimately considered as a replacement technology to coal to combat global warming. It is true that there is a continuing debate worldwide about the best means of safely managing and disposing of nuclear waste, but it is a debate that is not resolved. The disposal of waste remains the intractable problem—the most difficult problem—in this debate, particularly in terms of the production of waste. There are many in the community who question what technologies we ought to be embracing as we seek to move into a world which is clearly carbon constrained. In the event that we cannot come up with a prudent, long-term, economically and ecologically feasible means of disposing of nuclear waste, there is strong community interest, I think, in considering those alternatives.

The ANSTO Amendment Bill is supported by the opposition. I have referred to the second reading amendment moved by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, and I will come back to that. The primary purpose of the bill—namely to extend to the role of ANSTO in the difficult area of management of radioactive material, including where such material could be involved in terrorist or criminal incidents—is supported by Labor. It is the case that the present situation, namely, that ANSTO can only provide advice to Commonwealth, state or territory governments or authorities, needs to be addressed. In the case, for instance, of a group or individual gathering material for a dirty bomb, it is prudent that ANSTO has a role sufficient to enable that organisation to handle that material itself, organise and conduct the transport of the material in safe containers, store the material safely at an ANSTO facility and so on. This is something that previously ANSTO was unable to do.

That the organisation could have offered advice but not actually applied its expertise to engaging with any incident that arose in the handling of nuclear materials was a deficiency, and it is a deficiency in the operating procedures of handling radioactive waste which is probably the most critical handling issue that authorities face. So these are important matters and they need to be addressed. Labor well understands the significant dangers and risks that attach to the transport and storage of radioactive materials, and it supports measures which increase the capacity and expertise available to manage that task. This bill, by permitting ANSTO to handle and store nuclear waste from other Commonwealth sources, including the Department of Defence and CSIRO, further remedies some gaping holes that were present in previous legislation.

I am a little surprised that this legislation has arrived so late in the day. It is a fact that the risk of terrorist attack has been with us for some time. It is certainly the case that it is more pronounced of late—that fact was recognised in the Gittus report. But there are a number of examples of earlier terrorist threats, including against the ANSTO facility at Lucas Heights itself. Serious questions have been raised, particularly by some parts of the media and the community who live in and around Lucas Heights, about the security of the Lucas Heights facility. It is the case that for a number of years it was simply something approaching a rather rickety old cyclone fence that surrounded this facility. I have been out to the facility and I am familiar with the fence. I am not being facetious or trying to make fun of the need for a facility like the reactor at Lucas Heights to be operated by ANSTO to be absolutely prudently and effectively secured. But it is clear that the institution itself has been vulnerable for some time, so why is this legislation only now making an appearance?

It seems that the legislation means that larger quantities of radioactive waste will be transported to Lucas Heights prior to eventually being stored at the Commonwealth’s planned nuclear waste dump, and that this is partly a result of the imminent return of reprocessed waste from overseas as well as waste stored in other Commonwealth facilities. It is a fact that in relation to the return of waste there may be, in that reimported waste after it has been reprocessed, waste which was not generated in Australia, so the legal capacity of ANSTO to handle that waste should not be subject to challenge. We on this side of the House accept that and support legislation which ensures ANSTO has the necessary powers to accept, manage and store the waste.

As the member for Jagajaga pointed out in her speech in the second reading debate, the government also needs to clarify whether the bill is aimed at expanding the Commonwealth’s defence of any possible future legal challenges to the nuclear waste dump decision contained in the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Bill 2005 and the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management (Related Amendments) Bill 2005. Immunity to legal challenge is already provided for in the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act. If briefings by the department to the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s office staff indicate that the bill is intended to have that effect of buttressing legal challenge then it is absolutely essential that the minister comes into the House and makes that clear, and we call on the minister to do just that.

It is important that the minister is up front about this issue because the government has not been up front on any other part of the issue of the storage of nuclear waste. Labor supports prudent and effective management of radioactive waste; it does not support forcing a nuclear waste dump on the people of the Northern Territory—on small and remote communities—in the absence of a proper, thorough, participatory, scientifically exhaustive and consent based process. The decision by the Howard government to dump nuclear waste in the Northern Territory was a clear breach of an existing election promise. The legislation was rammed through the parliament last year and it represented another glaring broken promise of the Howard government. The member for Solomon promised the people of the Northern Territory that there would not be a nuclear waste dump in the NT. He was elected on the basis of that promise, and the government promptly tore up his commitment to the people of the Northern Territory once they were re-elected.

The Commonwealth radioactive waste management acts that enabled that decision were a disgrace. There was no willingness to adopt a proper and consultative process; instead we had legislation which overrode existing laws that this parliament had passed previously to protect the environment and the cultural heritage of the people of the Northern Territory, particularly Indigenous communities who now face the prospects of a nuclear waste dump being forced on them in their country and against their wishes. This legislation overrode the EPBC Act, the Native Title Act and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act. We have witnessed previously an assault in this House on land rights legislation. This was yet another indication of the approach that the government takes to land rights and the rights of traditional owners in the Northern Territory. The legislation, by overriding so much existing Commonwealth legislation, sets an extraordinary and worrying precedent for the government’s plans for an expanded nuclear industry as well.

If amending legislation prevents legal challenges and overrides existing legislation that protects the environment and Indigenous heritage become the norm for this government, what will happen when it takes the logical next step in its embrace of all things nuclear, including enrichment and power plants, in Australia? It is clear that the government wants enrichment and nuclear power plants.

The Prime Minister’s vision is for Australia to produce greater volumes of nuclear waste, but he has an additional component to this vision—that is, to take the problems of nuclear waste disposal that other countries face, particularly in the United States, and offer up Australia as the world’s storage place for all long-lived radioactive waste—tonnes and tonnes of it. This is not a vision that we on this side of the House share. I certainly do not.

The principle of prior informed consent is one that for some time has been a yardstick by which decisions in relation to proposed developments—be they mining or construction developments—slated to take place on or around people’s land, including Indigenous people’s land, have been measured. In the case of nuclear waste, the United Kingdom’s Committee on Radioactive Waste Management, which reported on 31 July this year, stated:

There is a growing recognition that it is not ethically acceptable for a society to impose a radioactive waste facility on an unwilling community.

They considered the issue of safe storage of radioactive waste and made a number of recommendations that are pertinent for this House to consider. They recommended that community involvement for any proposal for the siting of a long-term radioactive waste facility be based on the principle of volunteerism. I would argue in this House that this is the bedrock of democracy. Communities, wherever they are located, should be involved in decisions of this magnitude, and even more so when there is a distinct possibility that a proposed facility will, at a later stage, be under consideration as a storage location for even greater volumes of waste generated in Australia and possibly overseas. Yet we have not had that debate in this House.

Further, if community involvement in the proposal for siting the location of a radioactive waste dump is the bedrock of democracy and given that the sites chosen by the government in an ad hoc process are either on or near Aboriginal land, then equally such community involvement and consent is the bedrock of reconciliation. How can we reconcile ourselves with the Indigenous people of the Northern Territory when the government insists on imposing a nuclear waste dump in the country of Indigenous people against their wishes?

The experiences of the United Kingdom and other places abroad clearly demonstrate that there are many failures with what might be described as the ‘top down’ approach to implementing long-term radioactive waste management facilities. There is the example of Yucca Mountain in the United States, which has been an extremely long, drawn out saga of waste disposal. There is also ample evidence from the way in which the Japanese government and authorities are approaching the issue of long-term storage of waste. A voluntary process is essential—and communities will demand it—to ensure equity, efficiency and the likelihood of successfully completing any process. The UK committee simply asserts that it is not ethically acceptable for society to impose a radioactive waste facility on an unwilling community. I think that applies in this case more than in any other. There is no indication in this legislation that the potential host community would be afforded any of these measures.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I draw your attention to the history of identifying sites. A number of proposals and processes have been undertaken over time. In 1997, there was a list of 14 sites, including some in New South Wales, in Western Australia—the electorates of O’Connor, Pearce, Brand and Canning—and in South Australia—the Mount Lofty Ranges and, of course, Woomera. A number of sites were identified but kept secret from the public. The former Minister for Science, Mr McGauran, said that the short-listed sites should be kept secret because ‘release of information about alternate sites may unnecessarily alarm communities in the broad areas under consideration’.

The original site selection process for low-level waste facilities went for 10 years. It followed criteria established by the National Health and Medical Research Council. Woomera was the first site chosen, and no Central Australian sites were nominated. The National Store Advisory Committee siting process identified a further 22 sites but, again, no sites were identified in or around Central Australia. The fact is that Aboriginal people are the closest to the proposed new low- and intermediate-level sites being imposed by the Howard government on the people of the Northern Territory. Even though the Commonwealth has already called for tenderers for a contract to manage, coordinate and undertake the technical assessments of the site identified in the bill, there has been no requirement that I am aware of to survey Aboriginal social and cultural interests in relation to the site.

No consideration has been given to the fact that the proposed site near Alcoota and Harts Range is only 16 kilometres from the community at Engawala. Mount Everard is only four kilometres from the community at Werre Therre, 16 kilometres from Athengehere, 22 kilometres to Jay Creek and other Aboriginal communities, and 23 kilometres from Alice Springs. Additionally, and of most concern, is the prospect of significant flooding in some of the proposed sites, particularly at the Harts Range site, where there is ground water. The site is located between two active waterways—the Engawala and Anarama Creek.

For any government process that involves the introduction of a radioactive waste site to be fair, it has become increasingly acknowledged that the local community should be better off after the siting than before. This reflects and acknowledges that the community provides a service to society at large. In any process of this kind, community involvement needs to be developed through a partnership approach, where there is an open and equal relationship between the host communities and those—in this case the government—responsible for the implementation of a project.

In a democratic nation, there can be no more glaring example of the failure to implement the processes so necessary for something like this proposal to take place than those that led to the government imposing a nuclear waste dump on the people of the Northern Territory. Once this stuff gets in you cannot get it out, at least not without enormous difficulty and cost. Any problem experienced, such as faulty storage techniques, accidents, climate change induced extreme weather variations, disturbance of the site or political instability, means that the government’s action of imposing sites on the people of the Northern Territory is completely unacceptable. (Time expired)

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The purpose of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 is to amend the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Act 1987 to allow the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, ANSTO, to condition, manage and store radioactive material and radioactive waste which is not derived from their activities. This will be done by adding six new definitions to allow some changes to be made to the applications.

The government intends that ANSTO, as the most expert body on radioactive materials and radioactive waste technology in Australia with the facilities and trained personnel for managing radioactive material and waste, should be able to fully participate in the management of radioactive material and waste in the possession or under the control of any Commonwealth entity. The bill ensures that ANSTO is able to provide effective assistance to state and territory jurisdictions, if asked, to ensure public health and safety in the event of an incident, including a terrorist or criminal incident, involving radiological material. Authority to accept and manage radioactive material arising from a terrorist incident is an important component of Australia’s counterterrorism response.

Spent nuclear fuel from ANSTO’s reactors is sent overseas under contractual arrangements for reprocessing to convert it into an intermediate-level waste form suitable for long-term storage and eventual disposal in Australia. Australian spent fuel may be combined with spent nuclear fuel from other sources and processed in bulk campaigns. Accordingly, the bill clarifies ANSTO’s authority to condition, manage and store the material returned to Australia as a result of the contractual arrangements entered into for this purpose. The bill allows ANSTO to manage radioactive material at the ANSTO Lucas Heights premises, or elsewhere.

There has been some discussion on this bill. The matter came before the Senate Employment, Workplace Relations and Education Legislation Committee, to which the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies, FASTS, submitted that, although they agreed with the basis of the bill, they felt there were two additional issues the committee should consider with a view to possible amendments: firstly, to clarify that ANSTO may also condition, manage and store radioactive materials and waste for state and territory organisations and other licensed entities, including private firms; and, secondly, that services provided by ANSTO to the Commonwealth, states and territories and their entities, law enforcement agencies and disaster or emergency services should be on the basis of full cost recovery.

One of the reasons governments invest in public sector research is to build and sustain high-level scientific capacities and capabilities as a form of insurance against risk and uncertainty. It therefore follows that an important policy principle of publicly funded science should be that the knowledge and expertise of organisations such as ANSTO is not unnecessarily constrained and is available to serve the public good.

Permitting non-Commonwealth entities to access ANSTO’s expertise and facilities on the same basis as Commonwealth agencies not only is a rational use of Australia’s pre-eminent nuclear and radioactive materials agency but also ensures there will be no technical and scientific impediments should some or all of the states and territories seek to enter into arrangements with the Commonwealth to consolidate all radioactive waste in the one facility.

FASTS also suggests it is appropriate that ANSTO should provide its expertise and facilities to the Commonwealth, states and territories and their agencies on a full cost recovery basis. This means ANSTO will not be financially penalised through broadening its functions. It is reasonable that governments and their agencies can access the expertise and facilities of a publicly funded agency without a commercial premium being charged above costs. What arrangements ANSTO makes with private firms in such circumstances is a commercial matter for the ANSTO board and management, and there is no need to specify that in this legislation. These suggestions to the Senate committee were clarified in the press recently. Professor Snow Barlow put it very succinctly in an article in the Canberra Times. He stated:

Much of the political debate has focused on site selection for storing radioactive waste. But storage is only one part of the equation. Australia must aim for safe and efficient disposal.

Quite so. He argues:

The key object of safe disposal is to sufficiently dilute radioactive materials so that its radioactivity is comparable to naturally occurring background radiation. In the case of long-lived radioactive waste (materials with a half-life of more than 30 years), radioactive waste needs proper shielding from the biosphere in a geologically stable site.

Australia has the relevant scientific and engineering expertise to design, build and manage disposal of such waste.

At the moment, the amount of waste generated under the state and territory licences is small. This waste is currently stored in over 100 locations around the country in metropolitan and regional sites. Professor Barlow said:

Dispersed storage of radioactive waste is not a viable long-term strategy and is potentially hazardous, inefficient and impossible to be completely secure. That is why the States and Territories must demonstrate political leadership and join the Commonwealth to ensure the proposed site is a comprehensive national facility that is state of the art in terms of environmental safety, efficiency and security.

The next debate will be that Australia needs to adopt a similarly responsible attitude to waste generated from our export of uranium. If we are to seriously ramp up our participation in the nuclear industry then the option of being a full service provider must be considered, including accepting the waste as a part of the deal.

The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation is Australia’s national nuclear research and development organisation and the centre of Australia’s nuclear expertise, and it is very capable of being the adviser and manager of things nuclear. With a salaried staff of approximately 860, ANSTO is responsible for delivering specialised advice, scientific services and products to government, industry, academia and other research organisations. It does so through the development of new knowledge, delivery of quality services and support for business opportunities.

ANSTO’s nuclear infrastructure includes the research reactor, HIFAR, the high-flux Australian reactor; particle accelerators; radiopharmaceutical production facilities; and a range of other unique research facilities. HIFAR is Australia’s only nuclear reactor. It is used to produce radioactive products for use in medicine and industry, as a source of neutron beams for scientific research and to irradiate silicon for semiconductor applications. A replacement for HIFAR, OPAL—the open pool Australian light-water reactor—is in its final stages of construction. ANSTO also operates the Australian medical cyclotron, an accelerator facility used to produce certain short-lived radioisotopes for nuclear medicine procedures. It is located in the grounds of the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Camperdown. ANSTO also manages Australian synchrotron facilities at a number of overseas locations.

ANSTO also undertakes research in its own right. ANSTO has for many years been involved in studies of radioactivity in coastal and marine environments. These investigations focus on applied and strategic research on in situ oceanographic processes relating to the biogeochemical cycling of radionuclides and stable trace elements. Nuclear tracer and dating techniques are combined with advanced analytical facilities and oceanographic expertise to provide a unique perspective on the pathways of natural and contaminant material entering the world’s oceans. There are many projects involved in this process. They have included local investigations on the fate and behaviour of contaminant discharges in Sydney coastal water, studies of climate-induced changes in beach morphology and offshore sediment movements in the New South Wales coastal zone and assessing the contribution of large tropical rivers to the global flux of terrestrial material to the oceans through participation in the international Tropical River-Ocean Processes in Coastal Settings Project. Projects have also included defining the role of plankton—that is, microscopic marine plants and animals—in controlling the natural distribution and dispersion of radionuclides and trace elements in the marine environment, assessment of the radiological situation at Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls following the nuclear testing in French Polynesia, and coordinating International Atomic Energy Agency, United Nations Development Program and AusAID projects sponsored by a regional cooperative agreement.

So we are dealing with an organisation which could be at the forefront of research and environmental monitoring, and it is important that its expertise is available to both state and federal governments. I believe that we have an opportunity here to expand the debate on the value of nuclear technology while having in place a tool to ensure the safety and prudence of current operations. We will be supporting the bill.

Debate interrupted.