A desert plateau north-west of Woomera in SA is the Federal Government's preferred location for a low-level nuclear dump.
Industry Minister Nick Minchin said site 52a, known as Evetts Field West, was located within the Woomera Prohibited Area, and was chosen after rigorous scientific evaluation.
It will now be subject to environmental assessment, along with two alternative sites, both located to the north-east of Woomera.
All three sites are more than 400km north of Adelaide.
SA Opposition environment spokesman John Hill said the state was now effectively one step closer to also being chosen as the site for medium-level nuclear waste.
"There is no other reason to create a single national dump for low-level waste," Mr Hill said.
"At present each state stores its own low-level waste.
"There is no reason why each state cannot create its own low-level dump for its own waste and continue to keep its own waste.
"But by creating a national dump hub in South Australia, this location announced today will become the obvious place to dump medium-level waste from the new [Sydneyl Lucas Heights reactor in the future."
The decision also prompted dread from conservationists, who condemned Senator Minchin's plan as a secret push to make the Woomera area a radioactive waste-dumping ground.
"If the Federal Government gets its way South Australia will become home to dll the radioactive rubbish in Australia, with plans to co-locate wastes from the Lucas Heights reactor adjacent to the burial site," Australian Conservation Foundation campaigner David Noonan said.
Plans for a dump were opposed by pastoral, Aboriginal and local community interests, he said.
"The Federal Government is trying to push an out-of-sightout-of-mind solution to a very real problem," Mr Noonan said.
"Long-term environmental threats cannot be safely dealt with by short-term politically driven answers."
Environmental assessment of the sites are expected to take about a year.
published in the Canberra Times 25 January 2001 p3. -- AAP