Simon Evans reports that five experts who are a mixture of for and against the nuclear industry have been appointed to an expert panel as South Australia accelerates its Royal Commission into the nuclear fuel cycle with a deadline for a final report now set for May, 2016. Kevin Scarce, the former South Australian governor, who is presiding over the Commission, said on Friday he had put in place a self-imposed deadline of May 6, 2016, and the Commission would also be heading to several overseas countries to see first hand how the industry works on the ground.
Mr. Scarce said the Commission would visit countries including Finland, Japan, and the United Kingdom to assess how the industry operates, and also head to Vienna in Austria to closely examine the approach taken by world regulatory bodies. He has set a deadline because it was such a complex issue with so many emotional viewpoints from all sides. This could go on forever, he told reporters in Adelaide. He said Japan was a must to visit because of the problems encountered in the Fukushima disaster in 2011, and there would also be an element of public education required locally because of the need for an evidence-based approach. Mr. Scarce said the Commission would be methodical and disciplined but there was no doubt it needed to proceed carefully with any recommendations because of the catastrophic consequences when things did go wrong in the nuclear industry.
South Australia is home to one of the biggest uranium mines in the world, the copper - uranium operations at Olympic Dam owned by BHP Billiton, and there are also three other smaller mines in the State. The Ranger uranium mine in the Northern Territory, which is operated by ERA, is the only other uranium mine currently operating in Australia, although Toro Energy has approval to develop a 315 million dollar uranium mine in Western Australia, 960 kilometers north-east of Perth.
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