Australian anti-nuclear activists greet vessel carrying waste

Australian anti-nuclear activists in rubber dinghy's greeted a ship carrying 25 tonnes of nuclear waste as it docked at an Australian port at the weekend following a two-month voyage from France.

Environmental activist group Greenpeace called into question the safety of transporting the reprocessed nuclear cargo which docked at Port Kembla south of Sydney on Saturday, deemed intermediate waste by Australian authorities, though their French counterparts classified it as "high level" because it still contains plutonium.

"The US government has put this ship on a list of banned vessels carrying any kind of government cargo, yet the Australian government has allowed it to carry this," Greenpeace spokeswoman Emma Gibson said, noting the vessel had been detained by Australian authorities over safety concerns in the past two years.

Australian authorities have rejected Greenpeace's criticism, claiming there was "no credible chance of any incident" during shipment, and the fact Australia had produced the waste, it is now their responsibility to take it back.

"It is inline with international best practices that the countries that benefit have the responsibility to deal with the waste," Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) spokesman Phil McCall said in a statement.

The waste originally came from Australia's Lucas Heights reactor which is used for medical and industrial radioisotope production and sent to France for treatment as Australia has no capacity to reprocess nuclear waste.

The shipment is embedded in glass inside a reinforced protective container and now housed in an unknown facility at Lucas Heights, until a permanent storage site for spent nuclear fuel has been selected. Currently six sites have been shortlisted by the Australian government. Endit