MEDIA RELEASE
Monday 15 February 2015

Response to SA Nuclear Royal Commission Tentative Findings.

South Australia is too good to waste.

Today’s Royal Commission 'Tentative Findings' report clearly states that nuclear power will not be economically viable. It also says that uranium conversion, uranium enrichment and nuclear fuel reprocessing are not economically viable. The state’s peak environmental body Conservation Council SA welcomes these findings.

However the report says that South Australia should consider importing international nuclear waste.

“We have had the Royal Commission, now any nuclear waste dump needs South Australia’s permission”, says Conservation SA Chief Executive Craig Wilkins.

“This is a decision for all South Australians.  The issue of genuine acceptance and consent is absolutely critical.

"If we pursue a nuclear waste dump path, we are saying “the best we can do is accept the worst the world has got”. I honestly think we can do better than that.”

An opinion poll commissioned by The Advertiser last year found that less than one in six (15.7%) ­­South Australians support a nuclear waste dump in SA.*

“Now comes the hard part. We’ve had a technocratic, distant process so far – now it turns to real people, real places and real values,” says Mr Wilkins.

"The Royal Commission presents an optimistic view of potential profits from offering Australia as the world’s nuclear waste dump. The Commission acknowledges that nuclear waste needs to be isolated from the environment for “many hundreds of thousands of years” yet there is no attempt to cost the management of waste over those timeframes.

“If there’s one thing we know, the nuclear industry is expert at overstating the benefits and radically understating the costs and risks.

“Ultimately, we think it’s essential that all current and future South Australians should have the freedom to choose. Saying yes to nuclear makes that choice forever, there is no going back.”

Release Ends

See also Conservation SA's submission and critique of the Royal Commission.

Media Contact:

Craig Wilkins 0417 879 439