Saturday, 28 April, 2007

by Alec Marr
The Wilderness Society

Giving the go ahead for a nuclear power industry in Australia would only increase the unsolved problems of nuclear waste and leave a dangerous legacy for future generations, The Wilderness Society said today.

"Building a nuclear power station would be irresponsible as it is leaves behind toxic nuclear waste and there is still no safe long term way to dispose of nuclear waste anywhere in the world," Alec Marr, Campaigns Director at TWS said.

"The Prime Minister has said he wants to develop a nuclear industry but what he isn't saying is that Australia is being lined up to become the world's nuclear waste dump.

"Mr Howard’s plan to enrich uranium is scandalous and would result in toxic waste that remains deadly for 4.5 billon years.

"A nuclear industry in Australia, including increased uranium exports, will create vast new amounts of toxic waste that will be deadly to humans for as long as 250,000 years.

Nuclear energy is very expensive and is only ever possible through massive government subsidies, Mr Marr said.

"The Prime Minister has a responsibility to tell taxpayers just how much of their money he will use to prop up a nuclear industry in Australia.

"At a time when clean, safe renewable energy solutions such as solar, wind and energy efficiencies are available and ready to go now to meet our thirst for electricity, it makes no sense whatsoever to even consider an unsafe, unready toxic idea such as nuclear.

"We need long lasting and economically viable solutions to climate change - solutions that are not going to leave a toxic nuclear legacy," Mr Marr said.

"This is happening in Australia at a time when the United States is facing a nuclear waste crisis, with the failure of its proposed national high-level nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, to open due to environmental and safety concerns," Mr Marr said.

"No other country has a safe, long term storage solution for nuclear waste."