1. The Current Situation

The government's story: The government wants to open more uranium mines in Australia and increase the export of uranium. The government says this will earn Australia more export income.

The real story: There is a concerted push for Australia to import deadly nuclear waste produced from the uranium we export. The more uranium we export, the greater this push will become.

Australian of the Year, Dr Tim Flannery, and former Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, are two prominent Australians who have backed this idea. They argue that Australians have a moral obligation to take back nuclear waste produced from Australian uranium.

Dr John White is another major proponent of this idea. Dr White chaired the Federal Government’s Uranium Industry Framework, a group that prepared a report to the Minister for Industry and Resources, Ian Macfarlane, on uranium policy.

Dr White has also established the Nuclear Fuel Leasing Group. This an international group from Australia, the US and the UK whose aim is to change government policy to allow the importation of nuclear waste into Australia, waste that was produced from Australian uranium.

Some even believe that Australia would be the best place in the world to store any deadly nuclear waste, regardless of where the uranium came from. See, for example, ARIUS: http://www.arius-world.org/. ARIUS was in Australia in October 2006, pushing their views.

WA Premier, Alan Carpenter understands this threat. He has consistently refused to open up uranium mines in Western Australia because he understands the strong link between uranium mining and the pressure to import deadly nuclear waste.

The government's story: Until recently, we were told that the government was just keeping a ‘watching brief’ on George Bush’s Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. GNEP is a major push by the US President to have the US coordinate a so-called ‘global nuclear rennaisance’. The Prime Minister, John Howard, was briefed about GNEP when he visited Washington in May 2006. During APEC2007, the Prime MInister announced that it was his government's intention to join GNEP and that the Government would attend a GNEP meeting in Vienna on 16 September 2007. Now we are being told that GNEP would NOT mean that Australia would build an international nuclear waste dump.

The real story: GNEP is about a small nuclear club that has enrichment capability leasing nuclear fuel to the rest of the world. Leasing means that the GNEP club - or a small subset of its members - would take back the highly toxic nuclear waste, after the fuel is burnt in nuclear power plants.  The United States is keen to have Australia participate in GNEP because Australia is a friendly ally, with a large stable land mass and a relatively small population - ideal for a place to dump the world's nuclear waste. 

In June 2007, the Liberal Party unanimously endorsed establishing the entire nuclear fuel cycle in Australia, including an international nuclear waste dump. This endorsement is a necessary prerequisite for the Government signing off on such a development in Cabinet.

The government's story: The government is considering the establishment of a uranium enrichment plant in Australia. The public reason is to ‘add value’ to uranium and earn more export income.

The real story: With an enrichment plant, the government would have the ability to develop nuclear fuel, a key role of "fuel supplier" nations within GNEP. The government would also have the technical ability to make fuel for nuclear weapons. A decision to build an enrichment plant in Australia could trigger a nuclear arms race in the Asian region.

An enrichment plant in Australia would produce large volumes of radioactive waste (called ‘depleted uranium’). Where would this waste go?

The government's story: The government is pushing hard for 25 nuclear power plants in Australia by 2050. The story we’re being told is this: if we’re concerned about global warming, then we must accept that nuclear power is part of the solution.

The real story: Even the country with the biggest domestic nuclear power industry in the world – the US – hasn’t been able to build a centralized high-level nuclear waste dump, far from where people live. So, after 50 years, all the deadly nuclear waste from US nuclear power plants is being stored indefinitely at these plants, close to major cities. And, after 50 years of the nuclear industry, there is no safe, proven method of long term disposal.

And another thing: the PM’s nuclear report – released on 29 December 2006 – shows that even with 25 nuclear power plants, Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions are projected to rise very significantly. The real solutions to climate change are energy efficiency and renewable energies. The government has consistently failed to promote these two safe and lasting solutions.

The government's story: The government’s report on the nuclear industry – released by the Prime Minister – says that nuclear power plants will not be a terrorist target.

The real story: The government has built a terrorist shield over the research reactor at Lucas Heights, in southern Sydney. According to the government agency in charge of the reactor, this shield would shred a plane flying into the reactor. Why does a small research reactor need a terrorist shield, when 25 much larger nuclear power plants are apparently not a terrorist target?

The government's story: The government is planning a Commonwealth nuclear waste dump. It says this nuclear waste dump is just for ‘low’ and ‘intermediate’ level waste. But it won’t declare what exactly the wastes are and how long they will remain toxic to people and the environment. All that they are saying is that some is short-lived and some is long-lived.

The real story: The government appears determined to impose a nuclear waste dump on the Northern Territory, against the wishes of the local residents: indigenous Australians. The government is considering three, possibly four, sites and will make an announcement in the second quarter of 2007 about the preferred location. In 2005, the government introduced legislation to remove the democratic rights of all Australians to use lawful means to object to the nuclear waste dump.

The nuclear waste planned for storage at the dump is highly dangerous. It includes spent nuclear fuel from the research reactor at Lucas Heights. This spent fuel was sent to France for reprocessing and shipments of the deadly waste will start returning from 2011 at the earliest.