I almost choked on my cereal hearing Federal Science Minister Peter McGauran describe the ‘clean-up’ of the Maralinga nuclear test site as ‘world’s best practice’ on ABC radio recently.

Thanks to nuclear engineer and Maralinga whistle-blower Alan Parkinson, we have a wealth of internal project information which clearly contradicts the minister’s claim. For example, a senior official in the regulatory agency, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, complained about ‘a host of indiscretions, short-cuts and cover-ups’ at the Maralinga clean-up site.

Likewise, project documents clearly and unequivocally demonstrate that vitrification of plutonium-contaminated debris was abandoned in favour of shallow burial as a cost-cutting measure. Vitrification was described as world’s best practice, then when that was abandoned as a cost-cutting measure, shallow burial was described as world’s best practice. Both cannot be true.

Sadly, this sort of Orwellian double-speak is also in evidence in relation to the federal government’s plan for a national nuclear dump at Woomera, South Australia.

Jim Green
Sydney, NSW

The Maralinga project is one we can be proud of. This is the first time that a clean-up of a former test site on this scale has been completed anywhere in the world ("Double-speak on Maralinga clean-up", AFR Letters, August 16). The program of remediation was developed and monitored by leading technical specialists and was consistent with guidelines produced by the International Atomic Energy Agency on the rehabilitation of contaminated sites. The clean-up of the main test sites at Maralinga was successfully completed in 2000 and the independent regulator, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, has confirmed that the clean-up met the standards agreed to by the Commonwealth, South Australia and the traditional owners (Maralinga Tjarutja) at the start of the project.

Claims that the Government cut corners at Maralinga and abandoned the in situ vitrification process because of cost concerns are completely wrong. More than $108million was spent on site remediation and the Government at all times acted on expert scientific advice, achieving a world's best-practice result.

The Government is adopting a similarly responsible approach to the establishment of a national repository for Australia's low-level waste. The national repository represents the best long-term solution to the management of this material.

Peter McGauran, Federal Minister for Science
Canberra, ACT.

The Minister for Science, Peter McGauran, continues the fiction that the treatment of plutonium-contaminated debris at Maralinga was not a cost cutting exercise. ("Maralinga clean-up meets all standards", AFR Letters, August 9).

As the Commonwealth's Representative from 1993 until January 1998, I oversaw the whole project. When the contaminated soil was removed in 1997 from around 21 pits, we found huge quantities of plutonium-contaminated debris only a few centimetres beneath the surface. There was some three times more debris than Britain had reported, so it would cost more to treat the pits by in situ vitrification (ISV). Towards the end of 1997, the department started to seek ways to reduce this cost.

At this time I was removed from the project for voicing my opposition to the way that the department proposed to manage the final phase. On my removal from the project I became an adviser to the Maralinga Tjarutja until I collaborated in the ABC Radio program Background Briefing in April 2000 exposing the shortcomings of the project.

Long before the ISV treatment started at site in May 1998, the department had asked their recently appointed project manager, GHD, a company which had no knowledge at all of the ISV process or equipment, to look at various options, which all included some simple burial of the debris. The project documents of the time show a distinct relationship between the options and cost. For example, one document states: "The recent consideration of alternative treatments for ISV for these outer pits has arisen as a result of the revised estimate for ISV being considerably above the project budget." And this is not an isolated statement.

The Minister also echoes the so-called independent chief nuclear regulator with the ridiculous claim that the shallow burial of this plutonium-contaminated debris is "world’s best practice." A discussion paper issued by McGauran’s own department says that such long-lived waste is not suitable for near-surface disposal, but that is exactly what has been done.

Alan Parkinson
Weetangera ACT

Science minister Peter McGauran makes some odd claims about the Maralinga ‘clean-up’ (AFR letters, August 19). He says the government relied on the advice of the Maralinga Rehabilitation Technical Advisory Committee (MARTAC) - but that committee unanimously recommended vitrification of plutonium-contaminated debris, not shallow burial.

Worse still, the shallow burial took place in unlined trenches in totally unsuitable geology. MARTAC member Dr. Mike Costello said at a MARTAC meeting in August 1999: “I have experience with plutonium at Sellafield in the UK, there are much smaller quantities of plutonium there. The amounts varied, yet whilst minuscule, it had to be enclosed in concrete.”

The minister denies that vitrification was abandoned as a cost-cutting measure, but a written statement from MARTAC openly acknowledged that alternative treatments were considered because the debris pits were larger than expected and the cost of vitrification would therefore increase.

Shallow burial was not a superior option, or even an acceptable one, but it was cheaper.

As nuclear engineer Alan Parkinson said recently on ABC radio, "What was done at Maralinga was a cheap and nasty solution that wouldn't be adopted on white-fellas land.”

The minister should stop revising history and organise another clean-up of Maralinga instead. His dissembling is an insult to all South Australians.

Jim Green
Sydney NSW

No doubt nuclear engineer Alan Parkinson's critique of the 'independent' regulator's role in the Maralinga debacle will draw a response from the 'independent' regulator himself, namely the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency's John Loy (Marlainga claims a fiction, AFR Letters, August 20).

It is a matter of public record that Helen Garnett, head of the Lucas Heights nuclear agency, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO), sat on the panel which interviewed applicants for the top job at ARPANSA. Moreover, six ex-ANSTO staff now work for the 'independent' regulator.

ARPANSA is also too close to government. For example, Loy said a new reactor would not be approved until “progress” was made on establishing a store for intermediate-level waste. The government's one and only plan for this waste - co-location with a planned waste dump at Woomera - was abandoned in the face of public opposition, but Loy still approved a new reactor.

Bruce Thompson
Fitzroy Vic

Nuclear engineer Alan Parkinson was the Commonwealth's representative on the Maralinga project until January 1998 and has limited knowledge of the later stages of the project ("Maralinga claims a fiction", AFR Letters, August 20).

His insistence that he oversaw the whole project and was thus privy to current views and opinions of the expert advisory committee is inaccurate.

It is outrageous to suggest that the in-situ vitrification (ISV) was dropped due to cost considerations, as Parkinson repeatedly insists. More than $108 million was spent on the remediation work and the technique was abandoned because of safety concerns.

The Government considered every option to ensure the safety of the Australian public and followed the advice of scientific experts who, unlike Parkinson, were monitoring the progress of the rehabilitation work and were involved with the project from start to finish.

The independent authority, ARPANSA, has confirmed that the clean-up met the standards agreed to at the start of the project by the Commonwealth, South Australia and the traditional owners.

Moreover, in 2000 they further advised the Government that the amount of plutonium buried at Maralinga was less than what was allowed for by the National Health and Medical Research Council's "code of practice for the near-surface disposal of radioactive waste in Australia (1992)".

The facts are that not only has the Government achieved all the objectives of the remediation work but that the end result exceeded the standards required."

Peter McGauran, Federal Minister for Science
Canberra, ACT.

Science minister Peter McGauran resorts to ad hominem attacks regarding the clean-up of the Maralinga nuclear test site (“Maralinga clean-up exceeded the standards required”, AFR Letters, August 22). He falsely accuses nuclear engineer Alan Parkinson of misrepresenting his involvement in the project, but Parkinson accurately stated in his August 20 letter that: “As the Commonwealth's Representative from 1993 until January 1998, I oversaw the whole project.”

A retraction and apology from the minister is in order.

The minister says it is “outrageous” to suggest that vitrification of plutonium-contaminated debris was abandoned in favour of shallow burial due to cost considerations. But project documentation repeatedly states otherwise, and both Parkinson and myself cited specific examples from the documentation in letters published in the Financial Review on August 20.

The minister’s claim that vitrification was abandoned because of safety concerns is a furphy - demonstrably so. See for example Parkinson’s article in the February edition of the journal Medicine and Global Survival.

The minister says the government followed expert advice. But who was following and who leading? ABC radio’s Background Briefing exposé (16/4/00) revealed that the head of the Maralinga Rehabilitation Technical Advisory Committee e-mailed a senior government official in late 1998 asking if the latter would “welcome” advice to abandon vitrification in favour of shallow burial. That is inconsistent with the role usually ascribed to independent expert committees - namely issuing advice on scientific criteria.

The minister refers to the 1992 NH&MRC Code of Practice, but this Code was of no relevance to Maralinga as its authors have indicated. Indeed McGauran’s predecessor Nick Minchin said in a 17/4/00 media release that: "The Government has always made clear that the Code of Practice for the near-surface disposal of radioactive waste in Australia (1992) does not formally apply to this clean up."

Jim Green
Sydney NSW

The Science Minister, Peter McGauran is again quite wrong in his statements concerning the decisions to abandon in situ vitrification (ISV) of debris pits at Maralinga (Maralinga clean-up exceeded the standards required, AFR 22 August 2002). He asserts that I was not privy to views and opinions concerning the later stages of the project.

I was fully involved in the project until January 1998, and by then the government was seeking ways to minimise the cost of treating the debris pits. From then until April 2000 I was an adviser to the Maralinga Tjarutja and so received all of the information provided to the South Australian government and the traditional owners. When I severed my connection with the project, the decisions first of all to limit the application of the ISV technology and then to abandon it had already been made.

So if I did not have all of the information which led to these awful decisions, then neither did the South Australian government nor the Maralinga Tjarutja.

The latter part of the Minister's letter is so ridiculous that it beggars belief. When will the government stop referring to the "independent" regulator? When will they stop hiding behind a code that even they admit was not applicable? And when will they stop claiming that the project exceeded the standards, when they know that the regulator granted concessions because some parts of the clean-up did not meet the criteria?

Alan Parkinson
Weetangera ACT