Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada

Prime Minister John Howard, Australia

 

Dear Prime Ministers:

 

                 We are writing to urge you to reject the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), launched by President George W. Bush last year. Under GNEP, the U.S. and a few other selected countries would reprocess the world’s commercial nuclear waste, and use the separated plutonium in fast neutron reactors. If implemented, GNEP would result in an enormous increase in polluting processes and highly proliferation-prone technologies, as well as in the need to dispose of numerous, large radioactive waste streams. For reasons of environmental protection, public safety and non-proliferation, GNEP must be rejected.

 

 

                 As a member of GNEP, Australia may be permitted to become a nuclear fuel supplier and to build an enrichment plant and possibly a reprocessing plant. (Canada too may be awarded nuclear fuel supplier status.) Uranium enrichment is a dangerous and polluting process. It creates depleted uranium, which is both radioactive and a toxic heavy metal that poses serious health risks to people when ingested or inhaled. Disposing of depleted uranium safely is highly problematic. The U.S., for example, has no safe, sound depleted uranium disposal policy after decades of uranium enrichment. This has led to risky ad hoc storage of depleted uranium on-site at uranium enrichment plants for decades on end, with no solution in sight. Uranium enrichment is also a proliferation-prone technology. Its expansion anywhere, including in Canada or Australia, would encourage expansion elsewhere. Any country with uranium enrichment capability could divert it, either openly or secretly, to nuclear weapons production.

 

 

                 Reprocessing will inevitably cause environmental devastation wherever it is carried out, by increasing the volume and ecological mobility of nuclear waste. The world has already witnessed severe cases of radioactive contamination from reprocessing: Lake Karachai in Russia, Hanford in the U.S., THORP in the U.K, La Hague in France. Billions of dollars annually continue to be invested in clean-up operations that have yet to succeed. Even if operational problems were to be solved, reprocessing would not eliminate the need for nuclear waste repositories and would actually increase the number and risk of radio active waste streams to be managed.

 

 

                 Far from advancing non-proliferation and disarmament, GNEP will add to proliferation risks by spreading nuclear technologies, materials, and know-how. Reprocessing makes it easier for terrorists to obtain the fissile material needed to make nuclear weapons, and undermines nonproliferation efforts. As a result of global commercial reprocessing, 250 metric tons of plutonium have been separated and remain vulnerable to theft. This amount of plutonium is sufficient to manufacture more than 30,000 nuclear bombs. Governments engaged in reprocessing could also divert weapons-usable plutonium streams from reprocessing – again, either openly or secretly – into nuclear weapons programs, expanding the arsenals of current nuclear armed states, and/or adding to the number of nuclear armed states.

 

 

                 The question of nuclear weapons proliferation is not only unresolved; it has become significantly worse in recent times, leading the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists to move the Doomsday Clock forward by two minutes – to five minutes to midnight. Their announcement on 18th  January this year included the following statement: "We stand at the brink of a Second Nuclear Age". Far from advancing non-proliferation and disarmament, GNEP will only add to proliferation threats.

 

 

                 In order to reduce the radioactivity of the reprocessed waste, it would be necessary to build one fast neutron reactor for every three light water reactors. Apart from the astronomical public expense, the history of fast neutron reactors throughout the world has been marked by serious safety failures, including fires, explosions, leaks, and a partial meltdown. Over twenty of these reactors have been built worldwide since 1951 in seven countries, all of which have been funded by governments. Only three fast reactors still operate in the entire world, one of which is slated for shutdown in the near-term.

 

 

                 Despite global expenditures that already exceed US $100 billion, no country has successfully commercialized reprocessing and transmutation technologies. As a result, each of these programs is heavily subsidized by their governments. Australia and Canada would better serve their citizens by spending limited resources on sustainable, clean technologies, not by exacerbating the environmental and health problems caused by the dirty nuclear fuel chain industries already borne by their peoples.

 

 

                 It is clear that the price for Australia’s full membership in GNEP would be to become an international nuclear waste dump. In all likelihood, international nuclear waste dumps would be located on land owned by indigenous peoples, despite the fact that such land is likely to be unspoiled, of high conservation value, and essential to the livelihood of the people who live there. The Australian Government has already passed legislation that paves the way for the Commonwealth to impose a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory, probably on remote Department of Defense land, immediately adjacent to Aboriginal-occupied land.

 

 

                 Although it has not been publicly discussed or disclosed, Canada too could one day be targeted for other countries’ highly radioactive wastes, due to its so-called sparsely populated granite regions in the north. But for environmental justice and hydrological reasons alone, this would be highly problematic and controversial, as Canada’s search for a geologic repository for domestically generated highly radioactive waste has already shown.

 

 

                 Moreover, international shipment of highly toxic radioactive waste along sea lanes, through sea ports and along public highways and railways is high risk (for people, communities and the environment) under any circumstances – but especially now, given the potential for terrorist incidents in addition to non-terrorist related accidents.

 

 

                 We strongly urge you to reject GNEP. As an alternative, the world must pursue efficiency measures and clean energy reforms. Such a direction will prove a safer, cleaner and more cost effective way to meet global energy needs and to address climate change.

 

                 Sincerely,

 

                 Beyond Nuclear                                                        Campaign for Ratepayers Rights

                 Tacoma Park, Maryland                                            Concord, New Hampshire