Forums > General Discussion   Shooting the breeze...

Uranium Mining waste

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Created by Tractorguy > 9 months ago, 2 Oct 2014
Tractorguy
TAS, 543 posts
2 Oct 2014 9:11PM
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If you can believe the paper media, Our Federal resource minister, Ian Mcfarlane and he's A team are evaluating sites in the north of Australia for the dumping/burying of nuclear waste.
Why do we have to bury this ****e in gods country, I reckon , if the aussie public is forced into it, we should bury it close to home in Canberra with the people that make the call to reinstate the industry. Ha then it would never happen.

Mobydisc
NSW, 9029 posts
2 Oct 2014 11:19PM
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Ever driven across Australia? Its a pretty big place. Not many earthquakes and no volcanoes. Australia exports tons of uranium so its fair enough we should consider dealing with the waste material. Its pretty strange our radioactive waste has been exported by boat over to France. If Australians don't want to deal with the waste then Australia should not be digging up uranium and selling it for export. Its hypocritical to say the least to only expect others to deal with waste materials coming from minerals mined in Australia.

ONYX
WA, 116 posts
2 Oct 2014 10:00PM
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If I purchase a big macca or a cokeeecola.

It’s not their responsibility to pick up after me. I wanted the product.

Rails
QLD, 1371 posts
3 Oct 2014 6:43AM
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Ah yes but wait until the fat tax!
Anyway we would simply be stockpiling it until it became useful again

Green Cherub
WA, 296 posts
3 Oct 2014 7:18AM
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As far as I am aware the waste was produced in Australia by our biomedical industry & nuclear research facility. Not only did we mine it out of the ground but we also created it (...after first sending it to France for processing) and I think its our responsibility to deal with the waste. According to the ABC there are numerous cattle stations lining up to house the waste which is actually only the size of your laundry.

Mobydisc
NSW, 9029 posts
3 Oct 2014 9:45AM
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Select to expand quote
ONYX said..
If I purchase a big macca or a cokeeecola.

It’s not their responsibility to pick up after me. I wanted the product.




If you go to a McDonalds "Family Restaurant" they usually have a whole lot of bins around plus people regularly emptying them. If you are rude and leave your leftovers on the table an employee will come over and clean it up. Didn't McDonalds change the containers for their "burgers" a while ago from Styrofoam that never rots to paper? So they seem to take some responsibility.

Coke? I think their bottles and cans have a picture of a person putting the empty container in the bin. I don't think Coca Cola would be that keen on people throwing empty bottles and cans all over the place.

What it gets down to is it is fairly hypocritical to be happy making something and then saying you don't want to deal with the long term ramifications of making it. If Australians don't want to be a dumping ground for nuclear waste then that is fine but we shouldn't be mining the stuff in the first place.

In any case there would be few countries in the world better suited to storing nuclear waste than Australia. We are digging up half the place to ship overseas. That must be leaving some big holes around that could probably quite safely hold some nuclear waste material a few hundred meters or kilometres underground hundreds of kilometres away from anyone.

Anyway while the current mob run the show this looks like its the way its going to be. Representative democracy in the nation state in action.

seanhogan
QLD, 3424 posts
3 Oct 2014 9:49AM
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Agree with you Moby except for the part about being rude and leaving your leftovers on the table.

I actually make a point of doing it, it creates jobs and after all they name themselves "Mac Donald Restaurant", so why should I be doing the service ?

Mobydisc
NSW, 9029 posts
3 Oct 2014 9:55AM
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seanhogan said..
Agree with you Moby except for the part about being rude and leaving your leftovers on the table.

I actually make a point of doing it, it creates jobs and after all they name themselves "Mac Donald Restaurant", so why should I be doing the service ?



I used to have that attitude till a friend started working there and complained about the lazy bastards leaving their leftovers behind. The way I figure it now is why make their life harder? Of course in a 'restaurant' I don't take the plates back to the kitchen after eating. I guess in a 'family restaurant' its whatever you want so yes its probably wrong to say its rude to leave your leftovers on the table. The McDonalds across the road from where I work employ a fellow with down syndrome to clean the tables and he is quite happy to pick up the trays himself so yeah, I might start leaving my tray behind when I go there next.

felixdcat
WA, 3519 posts
3 Oct 2014 8:32AM
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Green Cherub said..
As far as I am aware the waste was produced in Australia by our biomedical industry & nuclear research facility. Not only did we mine it out of the ground but we also created it (...after first sending it to France for processing) and I think its our responsibility to deal with the waste. According to the ABC there are numerous cattle stations lining up to house the waste which is actually only the size of your laundry.


France should take most of the world's nuclear waste just to make amend for fckuking Mururoa atoll!

felixdcat
WA, 3519 posts
3 Oct 2014 8:36AM
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Select to expand quote
Mobydisc said..

ONYX said..
If I purchase a big macca or a cokeeecola.

It’s not their responsibility to pick up after me. I wanted the product.





If you go to a McDonalds "Family Restaurant" they usually have a whole lot of bins around plus people regularly emptying them. If you are rude and leave your leftovers on the table an employee will come over and clean it up. Didn't McDonalds change the containers for their "burgers" a while ago from Styrofoam that never rots to paper? So they seem to take some responsibility.

Coke? I think their bottles and cans have a picture of a person putting the empty container in the bin. I don't think Coca Cola would be that keen on people throwing empty bottles and cans all over the place.

What it gets down to is it is fairly hypocritical to be happy making something and then saying you don't want to deal with the long term ramifications of making it. If Australians don't want to be a dumping ground for nuclear waste then that is fine but we shouldn't be mining the stuff in the first place.

In any case there would be few countries in the world better suited to storing nuclear waste than Australia. We are digging up half the place to ship overseas. That must be leaving some big holes around that could probably quite safely hold some nuclear waste material a few hundred meters or kilometres underground hundreds of kilometres away from anyone.

Anyway while the current mob run the show this looks like its the way its going to be. Representative democracy in the nation state in action.



Have a great idea............... print a picture of someone ditching it in France so problem solved!
Also if they do not want to deal with it they should not buy it in the first place.
Do we take back all the old with good of the world that have been made with the iron we export to china?

thomas11
VIC, 160 posts
3 Oct 2014 10:52AM
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The countries can pay to dump their waste here.
Good for the economy.
We seel them the uranium and get paid to hold their waste.
Sounds like a win win to me.

seanhogan
QLD, 3424 posts
3 Oct 2014 11:10AM
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Select to expand quote
felixdcat said..


Green Cherub said..
As far as I am aware the waste was produced in Australia by our biomedical industry & nuclear research facility. Not only did we mine it out of the ground but we also created it (...after first sending it to France for processing) and I think its our responsibility to deal with the waste. According to the ABC there are numerous cattle stations lining up to house the waste which is actually only the size of your laundry.




France should take most of the world's nuclear waste just to make amend for fckuking Mururoa atoll!



well at least they did most of it underwater, unlike the nuclear testing in oz ;-)


Mobydisc
NSW, 9029 posts
3 Oct 2014 11:14AM
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Select to expand quote
seanhogan said..

felixdcat said..


Green Cherub said..
As far as I am aware the waste was produced in Australia by our biomedical industry & nuclear research facility. Not only did we mine it out of the ground but we also created it (...after first sending it to France for processing) and I think its our responsibility to deal with the waste. According to the ABC there are numerous cattle stations lining up to house the waste which is actually only the size of your laundry.




France should take most of the world's nuclear waste just to make amend for fckuking Mururoa atoll!




well at least they did it underground, unlike the nuclear testing in oz ;-)


The French tested a fair few bombs in the atmosphere in the South Pacific. Ever see that bomb testing timeline animation? It seems like whenever the British tested some nuclear bombs the French had to test a few too, and then a few more and a few more after that. Probably just to make sure they work and to let the British know too.



seanhogan
QLD, 3424 posts
3 Oct 2014 11:25AM
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indeed probably that good old British/French rivalry.... knew they shouldn't have burnt Joan

and the French surely exaggerated.... tested 10 times more than the pommies

I remember having a hard time on my holiday in oz at the time....

Cambodge
VIC, 851 posts
3 Oct 2014 11:33AM
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Australia would be an ideal place to hold radioactive waste. Huge, sparsely populated areas, geologically stable, politically stable, etc. We should set up shop for the rest of the World's waste, too. And charge an annual rent that expires when the half-life has reduced the radioactivity to an agreed level. Hugely profitable! And if a customer defaults on paying their rent then it's dug back up and shipped back to them.

It's actually quite brilliant! We dig stuff out of the ground and sell it and we stick stuff back into the ground and charge rent. Cash for sending stuff out and cash for sticking stuff back in. [Obviously not in the same place].

And we'd have a sustainable business model until the development of space craft capable of transporting the waste out into the Sun.

Cobra
9106 posts
3 Oct 2014 10:05AM
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Select to expand quote
Mobydisc said..

ONYX said..
If I purchase a big macca or a cokeeecola.

It’s not their responsibility to pick up after me. I wanted the product.





If you go to a McDonalds "Family Restaurant" they usually have a whole lot of bins around plus people regularly emptying them. If you are rude and leave your leftovers on the table an employee will come over and clean it up. Didn't McDonalds change the containers for their "burgers" a while ago from Styrofoam that never rots to paper? So they seem to take some responsibility.

Coke? I think their bottles and cans have a picture of a person putting the empty container in the bin. I don't think Coca Cola would be that keen on people throwing empty bottles and cans all over the place.

What it gets down to is it is fairly hypocritical to be happy making something and then saying you don't want to deal with the long term ramifications of making it. If Australians don't want to be a dumping ground for nuclear waste then that is fine but we shouldn't be mining the stuff in the first place.



so a car manufacturer is responsible to dump your car when your finished with it.

Dawn Patrol
WA, 1991 posts
3 Oct 2014 10:18AM
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Select to expand quote
Cambodge said..
Australia would be an ideal place to hold radioactive waste. Huge, sparsely populated areas, geologically stable, politically stable, etc. We should set up shop for the rest of the World's waste, too. And charge an annual rent that expires when the half-life has reduced the radioactivity to an agreed level. Hugely profitable! And if a customer defaults on paying their rent then it's dug back up and shipped back to them.

It's actually quite brilliant! We dig stuff out of the ground and sell it and we stick stuff back into the ground and charge rent. Cash for sending stuff out and cash for sticking stuff back in. [Obviously not in the same place].

And we'd have a sustainable business model until the development of space craft capable of transporting the waste out into the Sun.


Australia isn't the geologically stable paradise that people tend to believe. We have our fair share of earthquakes over the country, and that is only with a couple of hundred years of data.

Now if we imagine the amount of time this stuff will be dodgy for, hundreds of thousands of years (we only know <0.5% of this time with our records), we have absolutely no way of guaranteeing the security of the storage.

Can we even build something that will last that long?

Wherever they choose to put this stuff, how does it get there? Trains come off rails (not very often, but they do), trucks have accidents...something like that would be disastrous on the country side.

And about the hypocrisy of selling it and forgetting it, well should we have to take responsibility for the impacts of our coal export, or any of our other products. It isn't our fault they want it, They can quite easily not have a waste problem.
And the Maccas analogy is kind of silly, they are only keeping it clean in their backyard, I've never seen a Maccas employee going down the highway picking up their rubbish...once it leaves their store it is forgotten. Maybe we could stamp a "Dispose of this waste properly" logo on our Uranium exports.

Mobydisc
NSW, 9029 posts
3 Oct 2014 12:20PM
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Cobra said..

Mobydisc said..


ONYX said..
If I purchase a big macca or a cokeeecola.

It’s not their responsibility to pick up after me. I wanted the product.






If you go to a McDonalds "Family Restaurant" they usually have a whole lot of bins around plus people regularly emptying them. If you are rude and leave your leftovers on the table an employee will come over and clean it up. Didn't McDonalds change the containers for their "burgers" a while ago from Styrofoam that never rots to paper? So they seem to take some responsibility.

Coke? I think their bottles and cans have a picture of a person putting the empty container in the bin. I don't think Coca Cola would be that keen on people throwing empty bottles and cans all over the place.

What it gets down to is it is fairly hypocritical to be happy making something and then saying you don't want to deal with the long term ramifications of making it. If Australians don't want to be a dumping ground for nuclear waste then that is fine but we shouldn't be mining the stuff in the first place.




so a car manufacturer is responsible to dump your car when your finished with it.


Looks like that is the way its going:

http://www.epa.gov/oswer/international/factsheets/200811_elv_directive.htm

To be honest I am usually against this sort of thing where the manufacturer is responsible for the product throughout its whole lifecycle. However I just think its two faced on the one hand to be happy to dig a mineral out of the ground and then on the other hand to refuse outright the fallout from the use of this mineral. Plus it seems to ignore the reality there are probably very few places in the world more suited to storing this sort of poisonous materials than Australia. Also as mentioned above storing of nuclear waste is probably a good business opportunity for people owning what is otherwise fairly useless land.


felixdcat
WA, 3519 posts
3 Oct 2014 12:21PM
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seanhogan said..
indeed probably that good old British/French rivalry.... knew they shouldn't have burnt Joan

and the French surely exaggerated.... tested 10 times more than the pommies

I remember having a hard time on my holiday in oz at the time....


Ahahaha! I think it is not! The French need a good nuke since they lost all the wars they got involved in!

Rex
WA, 949 posts
3 Oct 2014 12:41PM
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seanhogan said..
so why should I be doing the service ?


Because its on your way out and its the civilised thing to do. Can stand grubs that leave their rubbish when it takes almost zero effort to dispose of it .

seanhogan
QLD, 3424 posts
3 Oct 2014 7:42PM
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It's not a question of "civilised thing to do" or effort , it's a restaurant, they employ staff to clean the tables, next thing they'll hire less people because they expect you to do it.

Had to check grub in my dictionary... "larve" yourself Rex

Carantoc
WA, 7202 posts
3 Oct 2014 6:01PM
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seanhogan said words to the effect of..

"McDonalds - it's a restaurant"




Sean, only in the US of A do they consider McDonalds to be a "restaurant".

Unless New Caledonia is a bit different and they put quail eggs on the McMuffin for breakfast and offer a choice of an Angry foie-gras or Mighty foie-gras for lunch.



seanhogan
QLD, 3424 posts
3 Oct 2014 8:11PM
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^
good one !!

I was only refering to the fact they call themselves restaurant.

On holiday in Oz I had a short conversation with the cleaning lady in a food court at Australia fair about that matter (wasn't the first topic, started with how cute my kids were... ). She told me that she had no issues with picking up the trays (what she was paid to do) , what gave her the sh... was the people spilling food on the tables and leaving it that way.

Carantoc, I see you know your French gastronomy !!! (now you're going to get me flamed because we force feed ducks... )

Macroscien
QLD, 6808 posts
3 Oct 2014 8:53PM
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There is nothing like nuclear waste at all.
We could safer say that is the valuable material, commodity that can not be use right now due to our insufficient knowledge and technology to utilize that raw material.
But not for long. Future breeding reactors are able to process it and Russians are the only one at the moment having industrial capability.
www.rt.com/news/168768-russian-fast-breeder-reactor/
and
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BN-1200_reactor



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Forums > General Discussion   Shooting the breeze...


"Uranium Mining waste" started by Tractorguy