To our elected representatives, we call on you to make Australia nuclear-free:
- End uranium mining and exports, and clean up all old uranium mines
- Say no to nuclear power – it is high-risk, high-cost and a dangerous distraction from real climate solutions, like clean energy from the sun and wind
- Take a strong stand against nuclear weapons – this includes signing and ratifying the UN nuclear weapons ban treaty
- Manage radioactive waste transparently and responsibly
From ancient rock formations to mountains swirled with ochre, this continent is a geological wonderland. Some of our minerals are even vibrant green – and radioactive. In fact, around a third of the world’s uranium reserves are found in Australia.
But we must leave the uranium in the ground to keep our communities and the nature we rely on safe.
Mining these radioactive rocks pollutes our air, soil and water. It can damage the genetic and reproductive systems of plants, animals and people.
All of Australia’s operating uranium mines have a history of leaks, spills and accidents – and none have ever been properly rehabilitated. To this day, radioactive waste percolates in the local drainage system of the now abandoned Mary Kathleen mine in Queensland.
Nuclear power is nothing but a dirty, dangerous distraction from real climate solutions like clean energy from the sun and wind.
And there is no secure, long-term solution to cope with the millions of tonnes of radioactive waste from mining operations, or the more risky and longer-lived radioactive waste from nuclear power stations.
Yet for two decades now, successive governments have tried imposing uranium mines and radioactive waste dumps on unwilling remote communities. Right now, they're pushing to ship, store and bury national radioactive waste on Barngarla country in South Australia, even though SA and Barngarla Traditional Owners said no to being an international waste dump.
Decisions on handling radioactive waste last longer than this generation. Let's get it right and make Australia nuclear-free.
Header image: Sea lions gather on the beach on the Eyre Peninsula. At the top of the Peninsula is Kimba, where the government is proposing to put a national radioactive waste site despite unanimous opposition from Barngarla Traditional Owners
Latest Supporters
We have seen how risky it is from the past. As well the problem with the waste is still not solved. No not here. We have wind and sun as no other country.
Uranium needs absolutely to stay in the ground rocks, where it has always been; mining of this product results in long term environmental destruction/contamination, and there is ever the potential for the mined product to fall into the hands of terrorists and toxic terrorist regimes, which have the potential, at best, to blackmail their perceived adversaries, and, at worst, to use the product in its most destruction form as weapons of mass destruction. Even the “peaceful” use is hazardous, as the disasters at Chernobyl and Fukushima, (and others), have shown, and now, currently we have the plant at Zaporizhzha under threat and blackmail from the occupying brutal Russian forces. Absolutely leave the blithering highly dangerous product in the ground.
Nuclear power is never a safe option. Renewables for the future
Renewable wind and solar energy:
1. is already far cheaper than nuclear power
2. never needs to be refueled with highly toxic metal
3. doesn’t require $2 billion cleanups of former mines like Jabiru
4. creates no pollution – in fact it saves many lives from avoiding air and water pollution
5. does not rely on huge volumes of increasingly scarce water for cooling – a lack of cooling water has shut down nearly half of the reactors in France – this is the real cause of Europe’s current energy crisis
6. does not take decades to construct or result in huge cost overruns
7. waste free – no extremely hazardous waste is created with a half-life of 100,000 years
8. No one is ever going to create a ‘solar bomb’ or a ‘wind bomb’
9. has much less maintenance requirements
10. creates far more local jobs
11. saves the planet from global heating
12. does not rely on a global workforce with a specific set of skills that is rapidly reaching retirement age, with almost no new recruitment occurring.
I want Australia to be nuclear free because it is irresponsible to be mining and exporting uranium when we know the harm the nuclear power industry has caused in impacts on indigenous people when u-mining is executed, The experiences of nuc power when it goes wrong should be enough to turn all away from that crazily expensive way of generating electricity. We have feared nuclear power being weaponised in warfare – See Zaporishia in Ukraine.
I want Australia to be Nuclear Free for the welfare of my grandchildren and all future generations. Australia is in a perfect position to use renewable energy sources for the total of our energy needs into the foreseeable future.
Leave Uranium the ground! Nuclear power – SO last century!
Nuclear power has not resolved the waste or weapons proliferation issues
I want Australia to be nuclear free because there is no future with nuclear – no treatment, no safety – and we don’t need it
Leave Uranium in the Ground
I want Australia to be nuclear free as I don’t want to have a nuclear waste dump in Eyre Peninsula (my back yard) and not have a vote counted on this issue. I want Australia to be nuclear free because I don’t want any more uranium mines to be built in SA or WA . I want Australia to be nuclear free so children of the future don’t have to live with the fear of a nuclear war. I want Australia to be nuclear free and there is safe way to store the waste products. I want Australia to be nuclear free so that the water table is not contaminated and used up in the processing of uranium. I want Australia to be nuclear free as I stand with the Traditional Aboriginal Owners of these Nations when they say ‘Leave it in the Ground’
The cost/ benefit factor just doesnt add up.
There’s safer and more efficient ways to supply power which doesnt effect the environment. Accidents may be infrequent however when they happen its catastrophic
There are safer and less polluting alternatives for 0 carbon emissions