Nuclear Power

The economics of nuclear power just don't stack up. The real cost of nuclear electricity is certainly more than for wind power, energy from bio-wastes and some forms of solar energy. Geothermal energy from hot dry rocks also promises to be less costly than nuclear. That is without including the huge costs of decommissioning power reactors and storing the radioactive waste. So there is no economic case for nuclear power. As energy markets have liberalised around the world, investors have turned their backs on nuclear energy. The number of reactors in western Europe and the United States peaked 15 years ago and has been declining since. By contrast, the amount of wind power and solar energy is rising at rates of 20 to 30 per cent a year.

Nuclear power is expensive, slow and dangerous, and it won't stop climate change.

Reducing energy waste is the cheapest way to reduce greenhouse pollution. For instance, more than 10 per cent of household electricity is used by keeping appliances such as TVs and videos on standby.

Nuclear power is too dangerous - not just the risk of accidents such as Chernobyl, but the increased risk of nuclear weapons or nuclear terrorism. The recent United Nations conference on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty ended in disarray. Most countries holding weapons and some others aspiring to join the nuclear "club" are in breach of the treaty.

It's possible this debate will do little more than provide a smokescreen for proponents of increased uranium mining in Australia. Uranium mining should not be expanded. It remains the case, as the Ranger Inquiry found nearly 30 years ago, that increased export of Australian uranium would contribute to the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Nuclear power also inevitably produces radioactive waste that will have to be stored safely for hundreds of thousands of years. After nearly 50 years of the nuclear power experiment, nobody has yet demonstrated a solution to this problem. In the absence of a viable solution, expanding the rate of waste production is just irresponsible.

Nuclear power is too slow and too limited in its capacity to make a difference. Even if all government approvals were granted, it would still take about 10 more years and several billion dollars to construct a power station and deliver the first electricity.

Nuclear power won't stop climate change. The argument that it would reduce greenhouse pollution presumes high-grade uranium ores are available. Even with such high-grade ores, there is a massive increase in greenhouse pollution from mining, processing and reactor construction before any electricity is generated. The known resources of high-grade uranium ores only amount to a few decades' use at the present rate, so an expansion of nuclear power would see those resources rapidly depleted.

To avoid dangerous further changes to our climate, we need to act now. We should make a commitment to the sensible alternatives that produce sustainable cost-effective reductions in greenhouse pollution: wind power, solar water-heating, energy efficiency, gas and energy from organic matter such as sewage and waste.

Nuclear power is expensive, slow and dangerous, and it won't stop climate change. If nuclear power is the answer, it must have been a pretty stupid question.