- Nuclear material
Site safety
5.1Evidence provided to the Committee over the course of the inquiry highlighted public fear and concerns for safety over the presence of nuclear material at the sites across Australia being used to build and maintain nuclear submarines. This includes fears of nuclear reactor accidents, submarines sinking, dangers to human health, and the inability of the relevant regulators to prevent safety non-compliance.
5.2In addition, the Committee received a number of submissions raising concerns about nuclear safety and the potential risks to local communities despite, as the Royal Institution of Naval Architects (RINA) told the Committee, nuclear-powered submarines being safely operated by other countries for ‘well over 50 years.’
5.3Further, the witnesses discussed how transparency is essential to ensuring social license of the AUKUS sites:
To get social license, you've got to have a very public explanation of what is intended and what the consequences and implications are for the people living there.
5.4When questioned at the public hearing in Adelaide about the need for improving community engagement and consultation to obtain nuclear social licence, ASC Pty Ltd stated that while it was doing some proactive work in this space, this role would ultimately fall to Australian Submarine Agency (ASA). ASC Pty Ltd also stated that it had commenced community engagement activities around the Osborne site aimed at addressing concerns about safety and environmental management.
5.5At the public hearing in Canberra, representatives for the ASA stated:
It is certainly part of our social licence strategy to include community engagement with regard to radioactive waste, including by increasing the understanding of what's really involved. We have set up community liaison teams in both South Australia and Western Australia to help start that process, and we are further developing and maturing our strategy and enhancing the engagement arrangements across those communities to build awareness of and comfort with what will be occurring at HMAS Stirling. With respect to the local council, I would say that there is deep and ongoing engagement with the councils, particularly in WA and South Australia, and that's a very important part of the engagement that many of my colleagues in the Australian Submarine Agency are undertaking on a regular basis. Ms Kelton has also been very involved in those consultations. So we are very much committed to building community awareness, engaging with communities about their concerns and providing information, where we can, to address those.
Nuclear waste
5.6The Agreement states that:
Australia shall be responsible for the management, disposition, storage, and disposal of any spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste resulting from the operation of Naval Nuclear Propulsion Plants transferred pursuant to this Article, including radioactive waste generated through submarine operations, maintenance, decommissioning, and disposal.
5.7Some submitters expressed concerns to the Committee about the amount of nuclear waste that Australia will be responsible for, and the prospect of it being ‘dumped’ on land without community consent, especially in the case of Indigenous communities.
5.8Others were worried that Australia would be ‘pressured’ to accept nuclear waste from the United Kingdom (UK) or United States of America (US), however the Australian Government confirmed that this is not the case. The Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Act 2024 clarifies that storage or disposal in Australia of spent nuclear fuel that is not from an Australian submarine is prohibited.
5.9Currently, the nuclear waste which is produced in Australia usually takes the form of small articles such as wipes and gloves from the medical industry and is referred to as low-level or medium-level waste. Australia has not stored high-level waste, such as would be generated by nuclear-powered submarines, in the country previously.
5.10Some low-level and medium-level waste will be created during routine maintenance of the nuclear-powered submarines. This is being taken into account in the design for the upgrade of HMAS Stirling, where it is expected it will be stored until ‘such time as it may be economical or required to transfer it.’
5.11As previously stated, fuel waste from nuclear-powered submarines is regarded as high-level nuclear waste. According to the ASA, the amount of nuclear fuel in each submarine’s reactor would be the equivalent in volume to a wheelie bin:
You've got eight of those, one for each reactor from the submarines that we will acquire. That is over many, many decades of course, because they won't all reach end of life at the same time.
5.12This high-level waste will require a correspondingly higher level of management and security to store. Details about the storage of the waste are not laid out in the Agreement, and no permanent site for nuclear waste storage has been determined in Australia. The submarines will not start reaching end-of-life until the 2050s, and the radioactive material will remain contained in welded ‘power units’ until that time.
5.13Australia is already compliant regarding the storage of low and medium-level waste, and will no doubt continue to be compliant with high level waste storage.
Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Regulator
5.14On 24 October 2024 the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Bill 2024 received assent. The Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Act 2024 establishes a framework to regulate the nuclear safety aspects of Australia's nuclear-powered submarine enterprise, including regulating the storage and disposal of spent nuclear fuel from Australian submarines.
5.15In addition, the Act establishes the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Regulator as a statutory agency located within the Defence portfolio which will operate within Australia’s existing system of regulation.
5.16Throughout the course of the inquiry, several witnesses raised concerns about the independent regulator residing within the Defence portfolio, suggesting that this would likely result in less transparency.
5.17Caring for South Australia stated that:
…the current bill provides the minister [for Defence] to give the regulator directions in some circumstances. This is not independence, and it's a serious flaw in the proposed legislation in a democratic country.
While we note that the minister is required to table in each House of Parliament a statement that such direction was given to the regulator, we note again with concern that this is merely an information exercise after the event that in no way inhibits the power of the minister before he acts.
5.18When asked by the Committee how it was ensuring that the independent regulator is independent, the ASA stated:
…the new Australian naval nuclear safety regulator, will sit within the Defence portfolio but will be independent from the ADF [Australian Defence Force] and the broader Department of Defence. A number of measures were taken as a result of the consultations in the preparation of that bill to address some of the issues that you have raised, including ensuring that there is a 12 month period between someone finishing in the ADF and potentially taking up the head role of that agency, as well as ensuring that the head of the new regulator cannot be part of the ADF. So there are some important measures in there. Really, the reason why the regulator is sitting within the Defence portfolio is the unique circumstances required for the regulation of nuclear-powered submarines and the specific military context in which they operate.
5.19Questioned separately, RINA stated that although they had initial concerns about the ‘regulator becoming another branch of Defence’ they believe ‘the amendments accepted by the government in that bill, when it was passed, go some way towards securing that independence.’
Committee comment
5.20The Committee acknowledges that some people in the community have fears around nuclear energy and radioactive waste. The Australian nuclear industry is small, and is contained mainly to medicine and research. A high profile, high level nuclear defence project such as AUKUS is bound to raise concerns in a country where the population does not have much familiarity or experience with nuclear energy.
5.21The Committee is satisfied that the evidence presented by the Department of Defence, ASA and relevant departments and agencies disproved many of the common AUKUS ‘myths’.
5.22It is for this reason that the Committee believes that the public must be kept truly engaged with the development of the AUKUS program, especially in the areas where nuclear material will be used, transported, or stored, to support the social licence of the navy sites to operate.
5.23The Committee considers it of particular importance that the Australian Government ensure that its development of a nuclear waste plan for the submarines, reactors and any other related radioactive waste be as transparent as possible, and engage directly with affected communities in order to alleviate any safety concerns or misinformation.
5.24The Committee was pleased to hear that some concerns surrounding the location of the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Regulator within the Defence portfolio have been addressed, and that the regulator would remain independent from the ADF and the broader Department of Defence.
5.25The Committee accepts some opponents to AUKUS will never be satisfied as their objection is an ideological opposition to nuclear energy. In a robust democracy such as Australia, this inquiry has allowed throughout the submissions and hearings process such voices to be heard.
5.26The Committee recommends that community and worker consultation, engagement and public transparency be prioritised in the development of the plan for the management, transportation and storage of AUKUS-related nuclear waste.
5.27The Committee recommends that advice published by the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Regulator be made publicly available within a timely fashion to enhance transparency.