By Francesca Davis
Even as the blockade at ERA's Jabiluka uranium mine site was broken up by the Tactical Response Group last week, the campaign to stop uranium mining in Kakadu was gathering support. That support is founded on a widespread acknowledgment that uranium mining is inherently dangerous.
In a context in which environment regulations are not enforced by government and the industry does its own environmental audits, it is highly likely that mining at Jabiluka, in Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory, will result in major environmental and radiation safety problems.
Jim Leggate worked as the environment manager at Ranger uranium mine in the NT from 1983-86. Now an environment consultant, he is known as the whistle-blower of the mining industry, particularly in Queensland. Leggate was responsible for radiation safety at Ranger. He was appointed by and accountable to the federal regulatory body the Office of Supervising Scientists (OSS), as well as being a mining company employee at Ranger.
According to Leggate, government regulators today are intimidated, coerced and in some cases bribed by the industry to ignore their statutory responsibilities. They facilitate rather than regulate the industry, he told Green Left Weekly. "In Queensland, academic researchers, often the custodians of the information about the environmental impact of mining, refuse to disclose their information or enter into public debate because they receive their funding from the industry. This cooption process extends to environmental consultants and professionals who are also dependent on the industry for their living."
Nuclear researcher and Democratic Socialist Party member Dr Jim Green agrees. "Whether you're talking about the OSS, Nuclear Safety Bureau (NSB) or Australian Radiation Laboratory (ARL) you are invariably talking about captured bureaucracies which are doing the bidding for the nuclear industry." The result is an industry largely free of environmental restraints.
A key tool for governments' environmental regulation is the environmental impact assessment process. Leggate argues, however, that the EIA process is greatly flawed. "My experience over last 10 years is that government simply checks the procedural things. I've seen people in the federal government just tick whether the items in the guidelines have been raised. An EIA can be very thorough and complete, but that doesn't mean the project should proceed. It may have established on the basis of evidence that there's enormous impact."
Given recent revelations about the minister for primary industry, Warwick Parer's investments in mining, doubts about his department's handling of mining-related EIAs are reasonable. But the main problem, say Green and Leggate, is that the EIA is prepared by "independent" environment consultants employed by the company seeking approval for the project.
According to Leggate, many EIAs include promises with environmental objectives that the company can't deliver — either because it hasn't set the money aside, or because the technology to carry it out doesn't exist yet. "If it doesn't meet its promises, industry justifies this by saying 'we did our best'. The consequences can be seen in places like Ok Tedi and Bougainville, and I fear this is happening in Australia too."
Green is equally critical. "EIAs are great public relations stunts. They are designed only to determine whether a project should go ahead in the first place. It's not an inherent part of the regulation that there must be monitoring or follow up, let alone any punishments if there isn't any. The time frame for public comment is also too brief.
"All that comes out of an EIA is a recommendation from the environment minister to the 'action minister', in the case of Jabiluka, Warwick Parer. It's a joke. The action minister can ignore it completely if he wants. I'm not aware of any major project that has been rejected through the EIA process in Australia."
Guidelines
Leggate points out that there has been a significant shift away from strict statutory requirements and codes to the flexibility of "guidelines".
"I was involved in drafting a code for the rehabilitation of large open-cut coal mines in Queensland around 1989. It was reported in parliament that the development of an environmental rehabilitation code was taking place. Behind the scenes, however, the industry outright refused to have a code involving statutory limits and standards. The government was forced to back down and accept wishy washy guidelines with an indemnity on almost each one saying 'this is just a guideline, you don't have to do it if you don't want to', giving the industry complete flexibility.
"Guidelines are hopeless for protecting the environment. What's required are firm contractual arrangements involving statutory, numerical standards. Instead, industry talks about 'environmental excellence, best practice and continued improvement', but environment and safety always miss out."
In the uranium industry, says Green, there have only ever been guidelines. Regulation of the uranium industry since the 1950s has been spread across different agencies. Even the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO), an industry body, at one time had a role. Now, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency will replace the NSB and the ARL.
The federal government regulates the industry through the Environmental Protection (Nuclear Codes) Act 1978, which provides national codes for implementation through state laws. The codes focus on the health of uranium workers, uranium mining waste and the transport of radioactive materials.
Since most monitoring is done by the industry, government regulation revolves mainly around setting radiation safety standards. Although enforcement is an issue, deciding on radiation levels is a more important one.
Australian radiation levels are already higher than those in other countries, including Britain which has stricter guidelines despite its bigger nuclear power and reprocessing industries.
Australian regulations are normally taken from the International Commission of Radiological Protection. However, Green says that the ICRP's levels are questionable. "Risks are going up with every research finding, but the regulations are not tightening up comparatively. Studies from Japan indicate that the radiation risk is four to five times that of previous estimates, but the ICRP only reduced annual radiation dose levels by 2.5 times."
In Australia, special exemptions allow even higher doses and, according to the Sutherland Shire Council, the US Environment Protection Agency now sets a dose limit for public exposure to radioactivity three times more stringent than that set by ANSTO.
Green says: "A 1997 US study suggests that health impact of radiation has been underestimated by as much as a factor of 10, but the contestable nature of the science leads industry to argue that higher levels of radiation doses to be allowed."
The considerable staff cross-over from industry to the regulatory bodies doesn't help. According to Green, approximately half of the employees at the Nuclear Safety Board are former ANSTO staff. The transfer of staff was considered such a serious problem that it was noted in the 1993 Research React Review which said, "perceptions of potential conflicts of interest arising from cross-over between ANSTO, the NSB and the Australian Safeguards Office are well based". As Green points out, "The Australian nuclear industry is relatively small and there's nowhere to go if you're not in ANSTO, a regulator or working for a company".
Self-regulation
Where there are defined rules rather than guidelines, the mining industry ignores them. In Queensland, on the basis of Leggate's submissions, the Criminal Justice Commission recently investigated the industry for possible breach of public trust and official misconduct. It found no such breach — not because there was not one, but because, says Leggate, "it is widely understood that there exists a policy of non-enforcement with regard to environmental regulations in the industry".
The government has also passed laws to exempt a particular company or industry from compliance. In 1992, the NSW Lands and Environment Court upheld a complaint by Sutherland council about the storage of radioactive waste at Lucas Heights, ordering the removal of some of the waste. In response, the federal government passed the ANSTO Amendment Act 1992 to allow ANSTO to store radioactive waste irrespective of state, territory and local government laws.
Compounding the issue of regulatory capture and lack of strict standards, "another problem is that the industry is environmentally self-auditing but is not required to take on the onus of proof, provide evidence that they are following the guidelines and standards", says Leggate.
Currently, the onus of proof that guidelines are being broken rests on the public, but the sort of evidence needed is not easily accessible to the public.
The problems with industry self-auditing are particularly significant in the uranium industry. As Leggate says: "Unlike most mining safety hazards, with radiation workers just have to assume it's there. They have to take management on trust. They can't see it, smell it or feel it."
Relying on management to do its own environmental audits in an economic system driven by profits is inherently dangerous. "When shareholders demand higher and higher profit margins there is tremendous pressure on operators and regulators. When big mining companies cry poor, what they're saying is they can't make their 25-30% profit as well as doing their environmental audits. And the 'acceptable' level of profit is increasing all the time."
Leggate describes other problems facing government regulators. "The biggest challenge is to overcome the production at all costs mentality common on mine sites. Initially at Ranger, the work ethic fostered by management was production is everything, anything else is subservient."
The dangers of self-regulation can only increase as federal and state governments take an increasingly "hands off" approach.
Impending changes to Australian environment law which will narrow the federal EIA process will further free the industry from responsibilities to the federal government. Green argues that, although the federal government's record is no better than the states', uniform, national legislation is a far better solution than leaving regulation to whim of each state.
Critics
With the exception of political protests by environment activists (like that against the Jabiluka uranium mine), the mining industry is rarely challenged. Scientists in the field are funded by both universities and the industry, and academic critics of the industry are few.
"There are some examples of whistle-blowers", Green told Green Left. "Arthur Tucker, who did research for the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), ANSTO's predecessor, between 1964 to 1985, claimed that on numerous occasions his studies into staff health were obstructed or his findings kept secret.
"He said he was directed to stop his studies into links between the use of metals such as beryllium and the lung disease sarcoidosis, and that his research results were not published. He also claimed that later attempts to reinforce his studies were thwarted as funds and facilities were withdrawn and imported reference materials were burnt by the AEC."
Even trade unions face a difficulty when it comes to confronting the uranium industry. Best-practice international guidelines dictate that uranium miners' can only be exposed to a certain amount of radiation, after which they must leave the industry. So, while the unions want better regulation, this works against keep their members in jobs.
The solution to the lack of regulation and accountability of the mining industry, says Leggate, is to "impose a levy on the industry to fund government-appointed, honest minded environment consultants".
This would undoubtedly be an advance on the current situation. When it comes to uranium mining, however, nothing short of no mining makes sense. No matter how strict the regulations, or how honest the regulators, uranium waste cannot be disposed of safely.