Dialogue: Why we should extend nuclear exclusion zone

By JEANETTE FITZSIMONS*

All New Zealanders should be concerned about the shipment of plutonium and uranium oxide fuel which is scheduled to pass through the Tasman Sea, past New Zealand, in March.

This highly dangerous material, which is produced by the reprocessing of nuclear power station waste, is being shipped by British Nuclear Fuels from France back to Japan.

Let's make it clear from the start - this is not benign recycling. The whole process creates more waste, some 160 times more than the original material.

The Government has asked Japan and France to take all possible safety precautions and to avoid our 200-mile (320km) exclusive economic zone. However, British Nuclear Fuels has given no such assurances and has said this will be at the discretion of the ship's captain.

The 1987 New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament and Arms Control Act was a landmark piece of legislation that sent shockwaves around the world's nuclear powers and made New Zealand the world leader on the issue of nuclear disarmament.

While New Zealanders are rightly proud of this law, most people don't realise how little it really does. It controls the siting and testing of nuclear weapons only up to 19km from our coast and prevents nuclear-powered or armed ships from entering our harbours.

The act does not prevent nuclear-powered or armed ships from cruising our coast and there is no recognition of the need to protect our 200-mile zone from nuclear material.

There is no mention of shipments of nuclear waste or reprocessed fuel because in 1987 the reprocessing industry had not gone global.

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, shipping is entitled to pass through any country's waters under the right of innocent passage. However, this same treaty both empowers and requires us to protect the environment and the fisheries within our 200-mile economic zone. How can we have both?

New Zealand should take a strong lead at the United Nations to have innocent passage redefined to exclude any cargo capable of serious and long-term damage to human health, fisheries and the environment.

New Zealanders should have no illusions that an accident on this ship, and the others like it, is capable of that.

Much has been made of strong containers, double skins and the ability of these ships to withstand impact. Also, the nuclear material is solid and will not leak out. However, these are red herrings. The real risk is an intense fire.

The probability of such a fire is not high, but fires at sea do happen - from electrical fault, collision or sabotage - and are often more intense and longer-lasting than the limits these containers are designed to withstand.

A fire that burned hotter and longer than the design standards of these containers would see a plume of radioactive material shot high into the air. This plume would then travel on the prevailing winds, the heavier particles falling into the sea and the rest contaminating any land in its path.

Plutonium remains highly radioactive and toxic for thousands of years. If New Zealand were ever in the path of such a plume, there would be deaths and illnesses over generations.

New Zealand trades heavily on its clean, green, nuclear-free image and a nuclear accident in or near our waters would devastate our economy. Our fish, animals and produce would be unsafe to eat, and nobody would buy them.

Some organisations calculate there could be up to another 80 shipments such as this one over the next 10 years. With the increase in shipments comes the inevitable increase in risk.

When we talk of risk, we should also take a closer look at the company responsible for these shipments, British Nuclear Fuels. Although last weekend the company sent a team of spin-doctors to Wellington to convince us of the safety of these shipments, a look at British Nuclear Fuels' history should raise more than eyebrows.

In a major international scandal late last year, the company admitted it had falsified safety inspection data for three lots of mixed plutonium-uranium pellets which were shipped to Japan in September. It skipped some inspection procedures and tried to cover this up with false data.

Reports from British nuclear oversight authorities early last year pointed to more irregularities in safety data accompanying fuels made for reactors in Switzerland and Germany. Orders were cancelled.

In a number of other incidents across Europe, British Nuclear Fuels workers have suffered radiation contamination, there have been radioactive spills and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency has ordered the company to improve its procedures.

The company's own reprocessing facility, Sellafield, has been threatened with shutdown unless it rectifies 28 safety problems resulting from serious management failures. This company is now telling us to trust it and place the future of our country in its hands.

In February 1997, as I first took my seat in Parliament, an even more dangerous shipment of high-level nuclear waste for reprocessing was passing through the Tasman Sea.

That motivated me to draft the Nuclear Free Zone Extension Bill, an amendment to our landmark 1987 law which both extends our nuclear-free zone to the edge of our 200-mile exclusive economic zone and excludes high-level waste and reprocessed fuel. It took three years for this bill to come before Parliament but now it is being considered by a select committee.

It is disappointing that despite the strong words from the Government on this issue, Phil Goff says it is unlikely the Government will support this bill through to the next stage.

Solidarity among the Caribbean nations has made the Panama route too uncomfortable for this shipment and staunch, coordinated opposition from Latin American states has left the South Pacific and the Tasman Sea the route of least resistance. That is to our shame.

I urge New Zealanders to get behind this bill and I urge the Government to regain its position as leader of the worldwide movement against highly dangerous nuclear technologies by initiating amendments to the Law of the Sea.

This would send the strongest possible signal to the world that these shipments are not right. The people of the world do not want them and do not have to accept them.

* Jeanette Fitzsimons is co-leader of the Green Party.