Tragedi Lynas

Tragedi Lynas

Lynas sedang hangat diperkatakan kerana ia membuang sisa radioaktif. PM NAJIB Najib telah melakukan satu pengkhianatan dan penghinaan besar kepada pesakit kanser kerana dulu, PM NAJIB beria-ria benar menonjolkan diri beliau sangat baik, kononnya dia amat sensitif serta perihatin dengan penderitaan seorang pesakit kanser tulang yang akhirnya dapat bercakap dengan PM NAJIB lalu pesakit yang masih kanak-kanak itu meninggal dunia. Pengkhianatan ini kerana pencemaran radioaktif lama kelamaan boleh mengakibatkan kanser!

Jika benar PM NAJIB sangat mengambil berat penderitaan serta penanggungan atau kesengsaraan dialami oleh semua pesakit kanser di Malaysia, sepatutnya PM NAJIB mengharamkan walau satu inci tanah pun untuk diberikan kepada kilang memproses sisa radioaktif di Malaysia! Cukuplah dengan sisa radioaktif di Bukit Merah, Ipoh Perak yang dikendali Mitsubishi dahulu. Berapa banyak budak dapat leukemia di kawasan itu? ( bukit-merah-true-story ) Jangan hanya manis mulut berpura-pura baik , prihatin dan empathy di akhbar saja. Tak baik kerana kamu akan dipersoalkan dalam kubur nanti kerana bermuka-muka dan tidak ikhlas dalam memerintah !!!

Jika difikirkan balik, sisa radioaktif ini dihasilkan di Australia. Ia menjadi tanggungjawab Australia sendiri untuk melupuskannya! Australia adalah Negara yang 26 kali ganda lebih luasnya dari Malaysia tetapi Australia sendiri tidak mahu melupuskan sisa itu di negaranya sendiri!! Australia juga memiliki Gurun yang sangat luas tetapi takut melupuskan ke gurun kerana takut air bawah tanahnya tercemar bagi tempoh jangka panjang. Setebal manapun lantai konkrit yang dibina, pada satu masa nanti ia akan tetap bocor dan meloloskan radioaktif ke simpanan air bawah tanah. Anak cucu anda akan memakan air radioaktif! Radioaktif di dalam badan lebih berbahaya dari luar badan kerana half life nya sangat lama.. Partikel radioaktif yang diminum melalui air tercemar akan disimpan dalam tempoh yang amat lama dalam tulang! Ia akan berterusan mengeluarkan pancaran radiasi atau menembak partikel radioaktif dari dalam badan anda sendiri!!! Tempoh jangka panjang merosakkan tisu badan serta menyebabkan kanser!!!  SILA KLIK SINI

Diperhatikan bahawa Negara2 yang lebih mundur dari Malaysia seperti Afrika, Vietnam, Laos, Kemboja masing 2 tidak mahu menerima tawaran bagi melupuskan sisa radioaktif ini di Negara masing-masing… PM mereka sangat sayang kepada rakyat masing2. Pendapat Saintis / Sarjana Barat mengatakan tempat paling sesuai melupuskan sisa radioaktif adalah dengan membuangnya ke Matahari. Ini tidak praktikal dilakukan kerana kos yang amat tinggi. http://pisau-karat.blogspot.com/2012/02/are-rare-earth-minerals-too-costly-for.html

Adakah PM NAJIB 1Malaysia benar2 prihatin kepada nasib Rakyat Malaysia? Pendapat seorang pakar Fizik radiasi yang disiarkan dalam radio Malaysia tidak berupaya melupuskan risiko pencemaran radioaktif!  Pendapat pakar bidang Biochemistry, Chemical Pathologist, Industrial Hygienist, Environmentalist atau Environmental Health Physician, Radiologist amat diperlukan sebelum menandatangani sebarang perjanjian radioaktif!

Cuba and abaca beberapa petikan dibawah…

www.nytimes.com/energy-environment

By KEITH BRADSHER

Published: March 8, 2011

KUANTAN, Malaysia — A colossal construction project here could help determine whether the world can break China’s chokehold on the strategic metals crucial to products as diverse as Apple’s iPhone, Toyota’s Prius and Boeing’s smart bombs.

As many as 2,500 construction workers will soon be racing to finish the world’s largest refinery for so-called rare earth metals — the first rare earth ore processing plant to be built outside China in nearly three decades. For Malaysia and the world’s most advanced technology companies, the plant is a gamble that the processing can be done safely enough to make the local environmental risks worth the promised global rewards.

Once little known outside chemistry circles, rare earth metals have become increasingly vital to high-tech manufacturing. But as Malaysia learned the hard way a few decades ago, refining rare earth ore usually leaves thousands of tons of low-level radioactive waste behind. So the world has largely left the dirty work to Chinese refineries — processing factories that are barely regulated and in some cases illegally operated, and have created vast toxic waste sites.

But other countries’ wariness has meant that China now mines and refines at least 95 percent of the global supply of rare earths. And Beijing has aroused international alarm by wielding that virtual monopoly as a global trade weapon. Last September, for example, China imposed a two-month embargo on rare earth shipments to Japan during a territorial dispute, and for a short time even blocked some shipments to the United States and Europe. Beijing’s behavior, which has also included lowering the export limit on its rare earths, has helped propel world prices of the material to record highs — and sent industrial countries scrambling for alternatives. Even now, though, countries with their own rare earth ore deposits are not always eager to play host to the refineries that process them. An American company, Molycorp, plans to reopen an abandoned mine near Death Valley in California; but Molycorp must completely rebuild the adjacent refinery to address environmental concerns.

All of this helps explain why a giant Australian mining company, Lynas, is hurrying to finish a $230 million rare earth refinery here, on the northern outskirts of Malaysia’s industrial port of Kuantan. The plant will refine slightly radioactive ore from the Mount Weld mine deep in the Australian desert, 2,500 miles away. The ore will be trucked to the Australian port of Fremantle and transported by container ship from there.

Within two years, Lynas says, the refinery will be able to meet nearly a third of the world’s demand for rare earth materials — not counting China, which has its own abundant supplies. Nicholas Curtis, Lynas’s executive chairman, said it would cost four times as much to build and operate such a refinery in Australia, which has much higher labor and construction costs. Australia is also home to an environmentally minded and politically powerful Green party.

Despite the potential hazards, the Malaysian government was eager for investment by Lynas, even offering a 12-year tax holiday. If rare earth prices stay at current lofty levels, the refinery will generate $1.7 billion a year in exports starting late next year, equal to nearly 1 percent of the entire Malaysian economy. Raja Dato Abdul Aziz bin Raja Adnan, the director general of the Malaysian Atomic Energy Licensing Board, said his country approved the Lynas project only after an interagency review indicated the imported ore and subsequent waste would have low enough levels of radioactivity to be manageable and safe.

Malaysia had reason to be cautious: Its last rare earth refinery, operated by the Japanese company Mitsubishi Chemical, is now one of Asia’s largest radioactive waste cleanup sites. “We have learned we shouldn’t give anybody a free hand,” Raja Adnan said. Despite such assurances, critics are not convinced that the low-level radioactive materials at the Lynas project will be safe. “The word ‘low’ here is just a matter of perception — it’s a carcinogen,” said Dr. Jayabalan A. Thambyappa, a general practitioner physician and toxicologist. He has treated leukemia victims whose illnesses he and others have attributed to the old Mitsubishi Chemical refinery.

That plant, on the other side of the Malay peninsula, closed in 1992 after years of sometimes violent demonstrations by citizens protesting its polluting effects. Now, in an engineering effort that has largely escaped the outside world’s notice, Mitsubishi is engaged in a $100 million cleanup. Rare earths, a group of 17 elements, are not radioactive themselves. But virtually every rare earth ore deposit around the world contains, in varying concentrations, a slightly radioactive element called thorium.

Radiation concerns — along with low-cost Chinese competition — eventually forced the closing of all rare earth refineries in Japan. It was during this phase-out that Mitsubishi moved its refining operation to Malaysia, where old tin mines had left behind thousands of tons of semiprocessed slag that was rich in rare earth ore. It also had extremely high levels of radioactive thorium. The new Lynas refinery, with nearly two dozen interconnected buildings and 50 acres of floor space, will house the latest in pollution control equipment and radiation sensors. A signature feature will be 12 acres of interim storage pools that will be lined with dense plastic and sit atop nearly impermeable clay, to hold the slightly radioactive byproducts until they can be carted away.

But carted to where? That is still an open question.

Building the lined storage pools was one of the promises Lynas had made to win permission to put the refinery here, in an area already environmentally damaged by the chemical plants that line the narrow, muddy Balok River.

Mr. Curtis, the Lynas chairman, insists that the new factory will be much cleaner and far safer than the old Mitsubishi plant, which “never should have been built,” he said recently, as he led a tour of the sprawling Lynas refinery construction site here.

One big difference, he said, is that the ore being imported from Australia is much less radioactive. It will have only 3 to 5 percent of the thorium per ton found in the tin mine tailings that Mitsubishi had processed. And he said the Lynas factory would also process 10 times as much ore with only twice as many employees — about 450 in all — thanks to automation that will keep workers away from potentially harmful materials.

But the long-term storage of the Lynas plant’s radioactive thorium waste is still unresolved.

After using sulfuric acid to dissolve the rare earths out of the concentrated ore, Lynas plans to mix the radioactive part of the waste with lime. The aim is to dilute it to a thorium concentration of less than 0.05 percent — the maximum permitted under international standards to allow the material to be disposed with few restrictions.

Lynas wants to turn this mixture into large concrete shapes known as tetrapods that are used to build artificial reefs for fish and as sea walls to prevent beach erosion.

Local residents seem to be of two minds about the sprawling plant being built near the river. The river empties into the ocean several miles away, next to an impoverished fishing village, where on a recent evening a small group of fisherman sat at the end of a wooden dock.

Muhamad Ishmail, age 56, said pollution from the chemical factories that started opening upstream in the 1990s had forced local fishing — a river industry for generations — to move primarily out to sea. Although one of his five children works in the nearby industrial district, Mr. Ishmail said he did not want Lynas or anyone else to open any more factories.

“This river used to be clean, and you could catch fish right here,” he said.

But Muhamad Anuar, 30, said his community needed the reliable paychecks that Lynas might offer. “I have two kids, and I don’t want them to be fishermen,” he said. “It’s a hard job.”

http://stoplynas.org/

The Australian Stop Lynas! campaign started in response to the thousands of Malaysians uniting together to say no to Australian rare earth miner, Lynas Corporation. The Lynas Advanced Materials Plant (LAMP) - a rare earth processing plant being set up in Kuantan, Malaysia, will potentially impose tonnes of toxic waste on their lives and livelihoods. We call on all Australian's to stand in solidarity and to hold Lynas accountable for their corporate impunity. Together we can stop Lynas from exporting a toxic and radioactive legacy that will affect the lives and livelihoods of our brothers and sisters in Malaysia.

www.nytimes.com

Engineers Fear Rare Earth Refinery in Malaysia Is Dangerous ...

By KEITH BRADSHER

Published: June 29, 2011

KUANTAN, Malaysia — A $230 million refinery being built here in an effort to break China’s global chokehold on rare earth metals is plagued by environmentally hazardous construction and design problems, according to internal memos and current and former engineers on the project.

The plant, which would be the world’s biggest refinery for rare earths — metals crucial to the manufacture of a wide range of technologies including smartphones, smart bombs and hybrid cars — has also become the target of protesters who fear that the plant will leak radioactive and toxic materials into the water table.

Weekly demonstrations have drawn crowds since March, and someone recently threw gasoline fire bombs at the gated home of a senior project manager.

Some risks had been expected from the plant, which would refine rare earth ores into manufacturing-grade materials. Although rare earths are not radioactive, in nature they are usually found mixed with thorium — which is.

That is why the Lynas Corporation, an Australian company, promised three years ago to take special precautions when it secured the Malaysian government’s permission to build the sprawling complex here on 250 acres of reclaimed tropical swampland. It would be the first rare earth processing plant in nearly three decades to be finished outside China, where barely regulated factories have left vast toxic and radioactive waste sites.

Lynas has an incentive to finish the refinery quickly. Export restrictions by China in the last year have caused global shortages of rare earths and soaring prices. But other companies are scrambling to open new refineries in the United States, Mongolia, Vietnam and India by the end of 2013, which could cause rare earth prices to tumble.

Lynas officials contend that the refinery being built here is safe and up to industry standards, and say that they are working with its contractors to resolve their concerns.

“All parties are in agreement that it is normal course of business in any construction project for technical construction queries to be raised and then resolved to relevant international standards during the course of project construction,” wrote Matthew James, an executive vice president of Lynas, in an e-mail on Wednesday night.

The International Atomic Energy Agency issued a report Thursday that said the Lynas project’s overall design and planned operations procedures met international standards. The report did not examine construction details or engineering decisions involved in turning the design into a building; a program for the report’s authors showed that they were shown around the big site in an hour.

Nicholas Curtis, the executive chairman of Lynas, strongly denied at a press conference in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday that the refinery had any construction problems. He said that there were no more than routine discussions among engineers about technical questions.

But the construction and design may have serious flaws, according to the engineers, who also provided memos, e-mail messages and photos from Lynas and its contractors. The engineers said they felt a professional duty to voice their safety concerns, but insisted on anonymity to avoid the risk of becoming industry outcasts.

The problems they detail include structural cracks, air pockets and leaks in many of the concrete shells for 70 containment tanks, some of which are larger than double-decker buses. Ore mined deep in the Australian desert and shipped to Malaysia would be mixed with powerful acids to make a slightly radioactive slurry that would be pumped through the tanks, with operating temperatures of about 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

The engineers also say that almost all of the steel piping ordered for the plant is made from standard steel, which they describe as not suited for the corrosive, abrasive slurry. Rare earth refineries in other countries make heavy use of costlier stainless steel or steel piping with ceramic or rubber liners.

The engineers also say that the concrete tanks were built using conventional concrete, not the much costlier polymer concrete mixed with plastic that is widely used in refineries in the West to reduce the chance of cracks.

Documents show that Lynas and its construction management contractor, UGL Ltd. of Australia, have argued with their contractors that the cracks and moisture in the concrete containment walls are not a critical problem.

Memos also show that Lynas and UGL have pressed a Malaysian contractor, Cradotex, to proceed with the installation of watertight fiberglass liners designed for the containment tanks without fixing the moisture problem and with limited fixes to the walls. But Cradotex has resisted.

“These issues have the potential to cause the plants critical failure in operation,” Peter Wan, the general manager of Cradotex, said in a June 20 memo. “More critically the toxic, corrosive and radioactive nature of the materials being leached in these tanks, should they leak, will most definitely create a contamination issue.”

Mr. Wan said in a telephone interview Tuesday that he believed Lynas and UGL would be able to fix the moisture problem but that he did not know what method the companies might choose to accomplish this.

The fiberglass liners are made by AkzoNobel of Amsterdam, one of the world’s largest chemical companies. AkzoNobel says it, too, worries about the rising moisture.

“We will not certify or even consider the use of our coatings if this problem can’t be fixed,” Tim van der Zanden, AkzoNobel’s top spokesman in Amsterdam, wrote on Monday night in an e-mail reply to questions.

Memos show that the refinery’s concrete foundations were built without a thin layer of plastic that might prevent the concrete pilings from drawing moisture from the reclaimed swampland underneath. The site is located just inland from a coastal mangrove forest, and several miles up a river that flows out to the sea past an impoverished fishing village.

An engineer involved in the project said that the blueprints called for the plastic waterproofing but that he was ordered to omit it, to save money. The plastic costs $1.60 a square foot, he said.

Lynas disputes that the design ever called for using the plastic.

Nicholas Curtis, the executive chairman of Lynas, said in a telephone interview from Sydney on Monday that the project here met local environmental standards and that he believed those were consistent with international standards. “I have complete confidence in the Malaysian environmental standards and our ability to meet the requirements,” he said.

Mr. James, the Lynas executive vice president, said in a separate telephone interview from Sydney on Monday that the steel piping used in the plant was carefully engineered and would not pose problems. On the record, he declined to discuss issues with the concrete except to deny that rising moisture was a problem and to say that the tanks had been engineered to meet all safety standards.

In a second interview, on Tuesday, Mr. James said the company had not cut corners. “Lynas is well funded,” he said. “We would never compromise our standards for a cost savings.”

UGL declined to comment, citing a corporate policy of not discussing its customers’ construction projects.

Lynas started the project here three years ago, but had barely begun when it ran short of money during the global financial crisis. The company resumed the project last year after Chinese export restrictions on rare earths prompted banks and multinational users of the materials to offer generous financing.

Malaysia had reason to be cautious in allowing Lynas to build the plant. Its last rare earth refinery, operated by the Japanese company Mitsubishi Chemical, is now one of Asia’s largest radioactive waste cleanup sites. That plant, on the other side of the Malay peninsula, closed in 1992 after years of sometimes violent demonstrations by citizens. (Di Bukit Merah Ipoh, Perak!!!)

Despite the potential hazards, the Malaysian government was eager for investment by Lynas, even offering a 12-year tax holiday. The project is Australia’s largest investment in Malaysia, intended to produce $1.7 billion a year in rare earths, or nearly 1 percent of Malaysia’s entire economic output. Lynas agreed to pay 0.05 percent of the plant’s revenue each year to the Malaysian Atomic Energy Licensing Board for radiation research.

Protests against the plant started in Malaysia after an article on Lynas’s project was published in The New York Times in early March.

Although Lynas has forecast repeatedly in recent months that it will start feeding ore into kilns by the end of September, engineers here said that it would take nine more months to install electrical wiring. They also said that pipe shiPM Najibents were far behind schedule because of a six-month delay in ordering.

Mr. James insisted on Monday that the project remained on schedule, but he cautioned that Lynas was waiting to see whether the I.A.E.A. panel recommended any changes.