Hi Julian, I really admire the work you are doing making Australian's aware of their impending food insecurity. However, this techno-fantasy stuff about us fueling Asia's energy demand with our renewable or nuclear energy is crap that is reducing your credibility. We would have almost insurmountable trouble building the infrastructure to supply Australia's own energy needs with renewable energy so the idea of supplying Asia's is just silly. And if you are thinking about nuclear read Dittmar's stuff on the reality of the world's uranium resources. It is one thing to build a DC cable - but you need to have something to put in it. Read Ted Trainer's pieces to see some numbers that can dispel your illusions on renewable energy. Regards, Michael.

There's some embryonic ideas in this proposal which point to the future. Australia is indeed an energy superpower with ready built coal export facilities, growing LNG exports and large uranium reserves. Therefore we can call the shots and if other countries don't like see how they go elsewhere. That means that we can and should reduce the amount of carbon we send overseas. Putting the carbon tax on export coal and LNG would be a start. Other countries can ask for the money back if they spend it on green programs. Then when we move to an ETS in 2015 carbon-in-exports will have to come under a cap. It means the coal industry must decline after 2015 since domestic and export carbon will be rationed. If not the whole scheme is pointless.

As for underwater cables I'm not so sure. According to Sen. Milne Tasmania gets 50% of its summer power from brown coal via Basslink. That wasn't possible before 2006. Big cables are easily sabotaged which is why I doubt North Africa will ever supply much power to Europe. They moved the Dakar car rally to South America because of terrorism. Forget Aussie coal power being exported after carbon capture. They can't even export humanely slaughtered beef.

I agree that Australia should build a number of nukes and also enrich uranium. The deal could be that other countries get out uranium instead of coal. Perhaps we could even reprocess or bury their nuclear waste in outback mineshafts. Anything that reduces global CO2. So in general terms the intentions of the article are good but not the specifics.

It's great to see someone positive about our future energy, and not all doom and gloom eco activist on us.

michael I'm not sure what the problem is you allude to with our own infrastructure? Is it the infrastructure if we have to change to all renewables, wind and solar, with all the backup coal and nuclear? We have infrastructure now.

Julian has an interesting idea but I suspect he's been carried away by the possibilities of the new comparatively new technology of high voltage direct current transmission (actually an old idea made possible).

Among other problems, the cable he proposes would pose a major security threat to the nations using it. What happens if its damaged? Australia already exports a lot of energy in its conventional form -coal and LNG - and there is no reason to change. As for the renewable energy stuff, the Asian nations can generate their own extremely expensive electricity. They don't need to import it.

What a vision, but a hard sell amongst people without any idea.
We need visionry people to come up with ideas to off set the amount of leather asses we have in this country.

Sorry Michael, but I think it's do-able though let's start with an expanded intra-country grid shall we? I'm convinced by Beyond Zero Emissions that we can supply all of Australia's electricity needs by 2020 with solar thermal and wind. That requires an expanded grid connecting up geothermal on the corner of SA, QLd and NSW, wind from SA and solar thermal from the arid interior somewhere, and then on to the major cities. It's not THAT difficult to envisage taking it to Asia.