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Looks Like Australia Is Getting a Permanent Dump for Nuclear Waste

According to South Australia's tourism commision, the Flinders Rangers "will stay with you forever." This phrase is about to get a whole new meaning.

Around 500 million years ago the Flinders Rangers were a mighty mountain range running the full length of the Gondwanan east coast. Erosion has since taken its toll, and now they'll house some nuclear waste. Image via.

South Australia's Flinders Ranges is a "beautifully rugged, 540 million-year-old landscape [that] will stay with you forever and change the way you look at the world," according to the state's adjective-heavy tourism website.

But soon the Ranges may be getting another impressive descriptor: The home of Australia's first nuclear waste dump. In fitting with the area's "stay with you forever" vibe, 13 percent of the world's radioactive waste will likely be stored for eternity at a remote cattle station just outside of the small SA town of Barndioota.

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And while few people would want the country's first nuclear dump on their land, the government might not have too much trouble convincing Barndioota's co-owner: Liberal Party president Grant Chapman.

Resources minister Josh Frydenberg has promised Chapman won't get kickbacks for the deal—telling ABC local radio the longtime SA Liberal senator will only receive $100 per hectare for the land. A former marketing executive for the oil industry, Chapman was a vocal advocate for nuclear storage in SA during his time in politics.

As for bringing the rest of Barndioota's population—est. three people—around to the idea, Frydenberg has earmarked $2 million in compensation for local community projects.

Other potential sites, volunteered by landowners around the country in the Northern Territory, New South Wales and Queensland, stirred significant community backlash. However, in SA the federal member for Barndioota, Rowan Ramsey, is so supportive of the dump plan he even volunteered his own land.

"Obviously there is no downside, I mean we don't stop buying champagne or French cheese because gee whiz it comes from a country that's got nuclear facilities," he told the ABC. "Overwhelmingly, the strongest support was in this site," Frydenberg told ABC Radio National, echoing Ramsey's sentiment.

However, the state's law seems to disagree with both men: the Nuclear Waste Storage Facility (Prohibition) Act 2000 pretty explicitly prohibits a facility like this to be built in SA.

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Another group pushing back against the plan is the Indigenous Adnyamathanha people, who the government apparently forgot to ask during the 120 day community consultation process with Barndioota locals. As elder Enice March told ABC radio Friday morning the news comes as "a total surprise. It's a disaster, and the only other way I can describe it from my personal point of view is I feel absolutely shattered."

Last year, Indigenous groups in the area vowed to fight any plans for a nuclear dump site, concerned about the impact it would have on their traditional lands. The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting protesters may have little recourse because the land is "held under a perpetual lease and cannot be subject to a native title claim."

"I don't care how safe they say it is,'' Indigenous artist and local resident ­Regina McKenzie told The Australian. "If it's so safe, why don't they take it back and put it in their own backyards. If it's so safe, have it in Canberra where all the pollies sit."

Much of Australia's nuclear waste is currently held in Lucas Heights, NSW home to a controversial HIFAR reactor, which has just produced its four millionth dose of nuclear medicine. Growing global demand for X-rays, imaging, and cancer treatments mean the reactor has upped its production.

In December last year, 25 tonnes of nuclear waste from France arrived by ship to Port Kembla. The canisters will be held in Lucas Heights until the government can decide where the storage facility will be built.

Over the next 120 years, the government estimates the SA dump could generate $257 billion (at a cost of $145 million) for state's economy, which has been struggling to shrug off economic depression. The Australia Institute think-tank has challenged these numbers though, arguing they are "overly optimistic."

Either way if the idea of having the world's potentially deadly nuclear waste dumped in your backyard in perpetuity sounds appealing, the government is still accepting applications for land. The application form is not particularly clear on whether Australian citizens can nominate public land.