30 years ago, I visited Windscale with a group of Engineers who were reasonably familiar with the issues. I sat on the top of a reactor, looked at a fuel cell through 10 ft of brine and handled glassified waste. This waste was being entombed in granite and one of the ironies was that the natural granite being removed was many times more radioactive than the waste. There is currently a lot of distractive comment on the perils of nuclear waste and very little supporting fact. We need to ask; What is the natural background radiation on land? What is the natural radiation at sea? What is the natural radiation of the proposed rocks in the storage area? How much radiation is emanated by a luminous watch? What is the radiation level of the various types of waste? How could nuclear waste be converted into weapons grade plutonium and, if not, why not? The debate is becoming emotive and irrational and on the basis of factual answers, I would be prepared to evaluate my degree of support for mining, power generation and waste storage. I feel there is a great opportunity for value adding by producing fuel cells for power stations, meaning total product control. I have also heard that nuclear warheads are being reprocessed for power generation thus actually reducing the number of nuclear weapons in circulation, can this be confirmed? On a visit to Arkaroola, I noted that there were springs with dangerous levels of radioactivity (though the hazard level was not stated) and at Coronation Hill, nearby land was known as “sickness country. It may not always be safe to “leave it in the ground”. Is there a reliable and verifiable source of the relevant data? I hold a number of shares with some U interest.
