BBC Learning English

Words in the News

3rd March 2010
Australia debates nuclear waste

Aboriginal groups are to debate controversial plans to build Australia's first nuclear waste
dump on tribal land in the Northern Territory. Phil Mercer reports from Sydney:

In the next six years nuclear waste that Australia sent to Europe for reprocessing will be
returned but officials in Canberra have yet to decide where to put it.

Muckaty Station, an isolated property 120 kilometres from Tennant Creek in the Northern
Territory, has been chosen as a possible site. Local Aborigines have offered to sell the land
for $11 million, a move that has infuriated other indigenous groups in the area, who worry
about the health and environmental implications.

These conflicting views are expected to collide at a public meeting in Tennant Creek, an old
gold-mining town south of Darwin. Australian Greens Senator Scott Ludlam says the plan to
build a radioactive waste dump in the region has become extremely divisive.

Australia's federal government said that Muckaty Station would be subject to thorough
scientific and environmental assessments. Ministers have indicated that the nuclear dump
won't be built if landowners opposed it.

Critics believe that recent earthquakes in that part of the Northern Territory have raised
questions about the safety of the sites. The Australian Greens have said that radioactive waste
should be stored at the country's only nuclear facility on the outskirts of Sydney.

Phil Mercer, BBC News, Sydney

Words in the News © British Broadcasting Corporation 2010

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Vocabulary and definitions

reprocessing the treatment of waste so that is safer and can be used

again

an isolated property an area of land that is owned which is a long way from
other towns and population centres

infuriated made very angry

indigenous groups the native population of a particular area

to collide to crash into each other

divisive causing strong disagreement within a community

thorough scientific and very detailed studies to find out if the area is suitable and
environmental assessments what the possible damage might be

have indicated have suggested

on the outskirts of in an area that is part of a city or town but is furthest from
the centre

More on this story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8546690.stm

Read and listen to the story and the vocabulary online:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/2010/03/100303_witn_aborigine.shtml

Words in the News © British Broadcasting Corporation 2010

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