The Lead South Australia

News leads from South Australia

Get The Lead in your inbox. Subscribe

Global nuclear waste solution progresses in South Australia

Government

SOUTH Australia will take a leap into the unknown with a nuclear future firmly on the agenda, after the release today of the final report of the Scarce Royal Commission.

Print article Republish Notify me

Sign up to receive notifications about new stories in this category.

Thank you for subscribing to story notifications.

The report emphasises the “safety” of increased participation in the nuclear fuel cycle – with a high-level global repository for spent fuel now a viable prospect – and the “significant and enduring economic benefits” to the local community.

 “SA can safely increase its participation in nuclear activities,” the report summary begins – before again re-emphasising that a nuclear waste dump could generate a potential “$100 billion income in excess of expenditure”.

That would include a $32 billion reserve fund for facility closure and ongoing monitoring.

However, given the significance of the potential revenue and multi-decade timeframes under consideration, the commission – headed by former South Australian Governor Kevin Scarce – concluded such an enterprise “must be owned and controlled by the State Government”, and the wealth “preserved and equitably shared for current and future generations of South Australians”.

“The immediate issue facing SA is whether, on balance, it considers the potential opportunities to be of sufficient benefit, and the potential risks to be manageable, so as to support the further and more serious investigation of the commercial development of such a project,” Scarce’s report concludes.

“The commission’s firm conclusion is that this opportunity should be actively pursued, and as soon as possible.”

As expected, the final report placed a premium on “social consent”, after Scarce’s tentative findings in February prompted outrage from anti-nuclear activists and some disquiet in the broader community.

This consent will require “sufficient public support to proceed with legislating, planning and implementing a project”, including from affected remote and Aboriginal communities, Scarce concluded.

He has long maintained identifying a suitable site was outside his purview.

Scarce had previously indicated that his final report would make the same broad conclusions as his interim submission, but that he would need to address community concerns over safety, including during the transportation of waste, with South Australia likely to become the hub for the world’s spent nuclear fuel.

His report concluded that “the risk of an accident occurring that could breach a cask of used fuel and cause radiation to be released is very low”.

“If a cask was lost at sea and was irrecoverable, there is potential for some members of the public consuming locally sourced seafood to receive a very small dose of radiation,” the report acknowledges.

In a list of recommendations, the commission urges the South Australian Government to pursue “simplification of state and federal mining approval requirements for radioactive ores” to streamline approval processes and ensure “full costs of decommissioning and remediation with respect to radioactive ore mining projects are secured in advance from miners”.

It also urges the Government to remove state prohibitions on the licensing of further processing activities, “to enable commercial development of multilateral facilities as part of nuclear fuel leasing arrangements” – and to push for similar removals at a federal level.

In a sign of further nuclear expansion in years to come, the report also recommends pursuing the removal of federal restrictions on nuclear power generation – “to allow it to contribute to a reliable, low-carbon electricity system, if required”.

The commission report was – like its February missive – bullish about the economic benefits of a waste dump, with its modelling estimating such a facility would grow the gross state product by “an additional 4.7 per cent – or $6.7 billion – by 2029-30”, adding 9600 full-time jobs to the workforce.

South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill told media today any repository required broad – and specific – community consent, saying a “comprehensive community engagement process” would be outlined soon.

“This will help the Government form its response to the report,” he said, adding that response would be delivered to State Parliament by year’s end.

“I encourage all South Australians to keep an open mind, appraise themselves of the findings within the report and for as many of them as possible to participate in this important debate about SA’s future,” he said.

Opposition Leader Steven Marshall welcomed the report and Scarce’s work on the issue, which he said “laid the ground work for a substantive community debate regarding the recommendations contained in the report”.

“I look forward to the people of South Australia having their say about the future of the nuclear fuel cycle in our state,” Marshall said.

The Australian Conservation Foundation condemned the inquiry’s final report saying the nuclear waste facility plan was “dangerous and divisive and could turn remote SA into a permanent radioactive waste zone”.

“The Royal Commission’s final report is deeply disturbing in what it says and what it fails to acknowledge,” said ACF campaigner Dave Sweeney.

Sweeney said the “exaggerated economic benefits and under-analysed risks detailed in an Australia Institute critique of the commission’s tentative findings in February have not been adequately addressed by today’s final report”.

“ACF urges Premier Jay Weatherill, who initiated this process in March 2015, not to use this flawed report to advance an irreversible and highly adverse nuclear dump plan,” he said.

“The essential pre-conditions for storing high level international radioactive waste – bipartisan federal support and broad national community consent – are both missing.”

This article first appeared in InDaily.

This is a Creative Commons story from The Lead South Australia, a news service providing stories about innovation in South Australia. Please feel free to use the story in any form of media. The story sources are linked in with the copy and all contacts are willing to talk further about the story. Copied to Clipboard

More Government stories

Loading next article