Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move the amendment standing in my name:

Schedule 1, page 5 (after line 17), after item 8, insert:

8A  After subsection 5(2)

Insert:

     (2A)    The Organisation must not condition, manage or store high level radioactive material except material generated by, or associated with, the operation of the Lucas Heights Research Laboratories, or any health or medical facility operating within Australia.

      (2B)    For the purposes of subsection (2A), high level radioactive material includes radioactive waste.

Note:   High level radioactive material is defined in section 3 of the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act 2005.

The government has been very equivocal, to say the least—wishy-washy, some might say—on the issue of storing high-level radioactive waste in this country that might come from other countries. We are concerned that the government intends or is under increasing pressure for Australia to in fact be a repository for high-level waste generated by other countries, particularly those to which we export uranium. As we all know, the government is very keen to massively increase the amount of uranium which leaves our shores. The capacity of Roxby Downs, for one, is proposed to be increased by about 4.5 times the current level.

We have heard a good deal from the government about the concept of product stewardship with regard to uranium. That refers, of course, to leasing uranium—that is another term that has been used—whereby the supply of fuel to reactors and the subsequent management and storage of reactor spent fuel would become part of Australia’s operation. Specifically, if Australia were to join the US-led Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and become involved in enrichment, which is another proposal by the Prime Minister that comes and goes, it would be assumed that Australia would store the nuclear waste as part of that arrangement. In fact, on 14 May this year the deputy leader, Mr Mark Vaile, told the Nine Network that the door was open to take back nuclear waste fuel. On 15 May, the Prime Minister told journalists that he was not ruling out storing nuclear waste from overseas. The journalist said:

It is ruled out, guaranteed the waste won’t be coming back ...

The Prime Minister replied:

Look there’s nothing to rule out. See with respect you’ve … I think with respect you’re misunderstanding what’s involved in this process. We sell uranium, we don’t have anything on the table at the moment that involves the processing of uranium for sale or lease as nuclear fuel.

So, as always, the Prime Minister proposes something, then steps back from it and says: ‘Well, we’re not actually proposing it. We’ll see how we go. We’ll have a task force. We’ll try it out. We’ll let you know when we’ve actually reached a decision.’

On 19 November this year, Senator Ian Campbell told Laurie Oakes:

... the Prime Minister has made it quite clear that we won’t be storing other people’s waste in Australia.

Laurie Oakes asked:

And what about the question of storing nuclear waste here? Will we store only our own, or will we become goodwill citizens in the eyes of some and store the waste of other countries?

Senator Campbell replied:

Well, they’re the issues that we need to address but we have, Laurie, exported enormous amounts of uranium to the rest of the world and storing waste has not been an issue. We haven’t stored any waste from that at this stage and the Prime Minister has made it quite clear that we won’t be storing other people’s waste in Australia. But I think we should wait for the Switkowski Review. I think the important aspect is that if you are serious about climate change, you have to be serious about nuclear ...

Again, two messages go out in almost the one sentence.

Ziggy Switkowski’s draft nuclear report has been released and it has suggested:

Should the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership ... be fully implemented, there may be opportunities—

‘opportunities’, I ask you to note—

for Australia to dispose of its spent fuel in an international repository in a fuel supplier nation such as the United States.

The report of the Australian industry framework also noted that the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership proposal ‘does not place an obligation on uranium producers, such as Australia, to take back nuclear waste’. So, even if Australia did engage in a global nuclear partnership, there is no obligation for Australia to take back nuclear waste.

However, what we know is that the government has a very poor record on keeping promises, particularly with respect to nuclear waste dumps. In 2004 the government ruled out a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory, yet this time last year the government forced through a bill overriding the Northern Territory government’s powers to allow for a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory. While the Prime Minister might stick to his word about not storing nuclear waste from overseas, his push for nuclear power in Australia means we would have to find somewhere to store high-level waste.

The Switkowski draft nuclear report suggests that Australia could have 25 nuclear reactors around the country and that we could have nuclear power within 10 years. The report notes that no country has yet implemented permanent underground disposal of high-level waste. So no country at all has yet done that, yet the report says:

Establishing a nuclear power industry would increase the volume of radioactive waste to be managed in Australia and require management of significant quantities of HLW—

that is, high-level waste. The report goes on to say:

Long-term HLW management options for Australia could include disposal in a national geological repository or an international geological repository. Australia has large areas with simple, readily modelled geology in stable tectonic settings and favourable groundwater conditions potentially suitable for nuclear waste disposal.

The report talks about the dangers of radioactive waste, noting that the potential hazard from high-level waste is ‘greatest in the first few hundred to 1,000 years’ and that the ‘geological repository must isolate waste from the biosphere over this period’. We are not talking about a couple of years; we are talking about 1,000 years and more that this waste is deadly to humans, animals and our ecosystem. The report goes on to note:

At around 10 000 years, the level of activity is approximately the same as that in the original uranium ore body. However, protection is still required from long-lived transuranic elements and actinides.

We are not talking about a barrelful of waste. In fact, the report states:

Assuming a reactor lifetime of 60 years, 37 000 to 45 000 tonnes of spent fuel would be produced by a 25 GW nuclear industry in Australia.

That is 45,000 tonnes for one nuclear reactor, which would be equivalent to 1,125,000 tonnes of deadly toxic waste for 10,000 years.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Abetz interjecting—

Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I put it to you, Senator Abetz, since you seem to think this is a bit of a joke—

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I’m talking to Senator Sterle—don’t misrepresent me.

Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

that this is a very dangerous legacy for your children and your children’s children in future generations. This Prime Minister is prepared to leave this legacy to his children and to your children, Senator Abetz, and your grandchildren and their grandchildren and so on. That is the current situation in this country. For that reason, we have moved both a second reading amendment and an amendment in this committee stage. I will provide some details of this amendment. It requires that ANSTO ‘not condition, manage or store high level radioactive material except material generated by, or associated with, the operation of the Lucas Heights research laboratories, or any health or medical facility operating within Australia’.

The crux of our amendment is to stop this government from allowing this country to be a dumping ground for the rest of the world’s radioactive waste. In America I think that billions of dollars has already been spent on a facility at Yucca Mountain, but it is still not acceptable to the American people. If Australia were to accept radioactive waste, we would certainly be solving a lot of political and environmental problems around the world for countries that do not want to deal with this waste, even though some might argue they have benefited from having nuclear energy. This amendment will assure Australians that this government has made a decision not to take waste from other countries. There has been an ‘on the one hand, but on the other hand’ approach and we have been told ‘maybe we will and maybe we won’t’, so this is the government’s opportunity. If it supports this amendment then it will be clear to all of us that we are not going to be that waste dump. If it does not support it, then we can assume that the real agenda is to turn this country into a waste dump.

No doubt Aboriginal land will be used, because we heard this evening that the proposal to effectively remove native title from land in the Northern Territory in order to allow the radioactive waste dump to operate there is already underway. We have seen the interests of Indigenous people overlooked. We have seen processes put in place which take away fairness and the reasonable ability of people to object to having a nuclear waste dump on their land. This land is a long way away from major metropolitan areas, so therefore we must assume the waste is dangerous if it has to be taken so far away. But, of course, no consideration is made for the interests of Indigenous people or their title over the land.

Progress reported.