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The civilian and militaristic applications of nuclear technology—from the legacy remains from nuclear medicine and research (i.e. ANSTO) to the potential leftovers from nuclear-propelled submarines (i.e. AUKUS)—produce radioactive wastes that must be isolated from people and the biosphere for up to 5,000 generations into the future. Working with the First Nations-led Australian Nuclear Free Alliance (est. 1997), the proposed co-designed project will investigate international best practice in siting both low- and high-level nuclear waste repositories to inform Australian policy and activism consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which demands “free, prior and informed consent”.

Principal investigator/s: N.A.J. Taylor with the First Nations-led Australian Nuclear Free Alliance︎Sponsors: The University of Technology Sydney
Funding: $50,000


Australia is both home to the world’s oldest continuous cultures, as well as one third of all the known uranium on Earth. Australia is therefore a critical site for understanding the nuclear fuel cycle as future cultural and environmental heritage.︎

Principal investigator/s: N.A.J. Taylor︎Sponsors: Deakin University, Killam Trusts, and The University of British Columbia
Funding: $350,000 (internal, incl. salary)
Key output/s: a living digital humanities project︎ and a series of scholarly publications 



I began making photographs of Australian uranium mining sites in the early 2000s whilst working as an applied ethicist in the institutional investment industry, although I did not begin exhibiting or publishing my nuclear photography until 2009. The process of making photographic images, and the decision to publish some of them, has increasingly informed how I both comprehend and communicate the spatial and temporal enormity of nuclear harms. To date fieldwork of nuclear sites has been conducted in Australia, Belgium, England, Estonia, France, Germany, Finland, Iran, Israel, Scotland, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States. I am a active member of the Advisory Board of the Atomic Photographers Guild which was established in 1987.︎

Principal investigator: N.A.J. Taylor︎
Institutional partner/s: Atomic Photographers Guild︎
Key output: an award-winning essay︎