Pangea Watch
UPDATE MAY 2001
Friends of the Earth national
anti-nuclear campaigner Bruce Thompson treated himself to a presentation
by Pangea director Marcis Kurzeme, who flew to Melbourne from his
secret hideout in Perth as the guest of the Australian Geomechanics
Technical Society at the Institute of Engineers, Melbourne, in May
2001.
People, Science and Economics
Mr
Kurzeme spoke of the public response over the last two years. Noting
that the project was made public by Friends of the Earth in England,
he canvassed the media response, pointing out that Sir Gustav Nossal
gave a positive opinion (failing to add that eminent citizen Nossal
was already a paid consultant for Pangea!).
He suggested that the Federal Government ‘went into panic mode’
due to their low level repository project and the guilt-by-association
problem. Mr Kurzeme seemed generally pretty upset about all this.
He described the WA Government Legislation as “a deal done with
the Democrats and Greens over the sale of a gas utility”.
Giz Watson’s response to this daft claim was that Mr Kurzeme
must have been hanging around nuclear waste too long and it had affected
his memory. “There was never any deal done on the sale of AlintaGas
with the Greens and this wasn’t even being debated at that time.
The unpleasant truth for Mr Kurzeme is that there was overwhelming
public opposition from all shades of politics and the Nuclear Waste
(Prohibition) Bill was welcomed and supported by all Parties."
He commented that the step away from co-location (i.e. burying the
different grades of waste at the same site) is farcical, believing
that it all had to be buried eventually.
Other locations as well as Australia would be Southern Africa, Southern
Argentina, and Western China. “That doesn’t mean there aren’t
other areas, just more complex geology,” he said.
Kurzeme was still keen to dangle a carrot - $10 billion direct investment
and $200 billion ongoing revenue for whoever wants to be one of the
world's nuclear toilets. And still no takers...HMMM.
Technical
Given that the audience were from specific technical backgrounds the
presentation aimed to impress, though they sparked some interesting
questions. On being asked whether detailed comparative risk analysis
had been taken with regard to above-ground site storage (the global
anti-nuclear movement’s favoured option for existing waste) he
said, “I haven’t done this personally, but this has been
done.” End of answer.
He noted that the politics were interesting due to a Federal election
looming and said a series of public reports were due in the next few
months.
Freudian
slip of the night:
“It’s
totally safe when properly damaged... um ..managed”
