Olympic Dam Mine SA

Olympic Dam Mine in SA. The worlds single largest known uranium orebody! Massive and growing. Over 200 km of underground roads, allowing trucks to drive down from the surface, an unmanned railway,750m below controlled by a computer operator above ground, and in my mind the ideal site to store Australia’s nuclear waste. The Stopes from which the ore is excavated are caverns the size of 20 story buildings, spaced apart so that when the material has been extracted are filled up again by pouring a wet concrete mix down from above and then left for 12 months after which the material between the original Stopes can be safely removed. All the machinery and engineering expertise is already on site to enable vast reinforced concrete bunkers to be constructed in a disused Stope, concrete many metres thick if necessary. The mine security already in place is impressive by any standard, but could very easily be upgraded to a new world standard. BHP Billiton owns all the surrounding Station properties so no problem with the neighbours. Responsible Government, State & Commonwealth, could save taxpayers a huge amount of money by telling BHP Billiton, “If you want to continue mining uranium, you will store Australia’s nuclear waste! Under Government specification and supervision” End of story!