A former Liberal senator who co-owns the preferred site for a national nuclear waste dump won't get a massive pay-off, the federal government insists.
Grant Chapman owns the long-term lease to a property near Barndioota, 500km north of Adelaide near the Flinders Ranges, which has been pinpointed ahead of five other sites for the dump.
The cattle station has been short-listed to store nuclear medical and laboratory waste, but a final decision is pending a full design, safety, technical, environmental and indigenous heritage assessment.
Federal Resources Minister Josh Frydenberg says Mr Chapman had no say in the outcome and he would not get a windfall with rising land values.
"You're only talking a few thousand extra dollars that could be in his pocket, which is not what someone like Grant Chapman ... put their hands forward for this process," he told ABC radio on Friday.
The minister has also played down the impact of the low-level waste to communities nearby any dump site, saying it was the "gloves, goggles and test tubes" that came in contact with nuclear medicine.
Two Olympic pool-sized waste stockpiles were already being stored around Australia.
"The whole purpose of building a single repository is to make it safer and it make it a long-term solution," Mr Frydenberg said.
Mr Chapman was surprised to hear that his property had been pinpointed to host the dump.
"It was a bit of a surprise to me that they've narrowed it down to one site," he said after ABC radio phoned to tell him on Friday morning.
Mr Chapman chaired a select committee in the 1990s that recommended the country's low-level nuclear waste be stored in a single facility.
"So it's taken some 20 years to get to this stage and they're still considering a decision," he said.
