Martin, you've missed the entire point: like all good Marxists, what is important for BZE and the Greens is not that something is true, only that we *believe* that it's true, because believing will make us more virtuous. Not believing is merely bourgeois and counter-revolutionary.

Er, no Clownfish. What is important is that climate change is real, peak oil is coming, we NEED energy security but fortunately we've got all the energy we need in our own back yard!

Today's GenIII reactors such as the AP-1000 could give us all the energy we need, especially if we start to move our transport off oil and onto electricity. Move trucks onto trains, cars onto electric, and more public transport like trolley buses.

And then when GenIV reactors are finally commercialised, they'll be able to eat all that valuable nuclear waste. We know breeder reactors work because we've had 300 reactor years of experience with them. China and Russia are building a few GenIV reactors, the first commercial versions in the world. We'll soon know how to commercialise them cheaply.

Today's 'waste' could run the world for 500 years!
http://bravenewclimate.com/integral-fast-reactor-ifr-nuclear-power/

So if we build out some AP-1000's, Australia will have lots of fantastic nuclear 'waste' which is really FUEL for GenIV reactors.

We should be importing the world's waste for 'storage' now, and then burn it all in the GenIV reactors when they arrive. Nuclear waste, it's not the problem, it's the SOLUTION!

ABARE is the most notoriously conservative, pro-big-business, status quo agency, so you can be sure they maximise our supposed energy needs.

In fact the quickest and most cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse emissions and oil dependence is by dramatically improving the efficiency of our extremely wasteful energy use. After that, the renewable sources are much more adequate.
See http://betternature.wordpress.com/2010/07/13/real-obstacles-to-greenhouse-action/

Eclipse Now, I said nothing about nuclear reactors, nor did the ZCA report.

What I was referring to was the fanciful assumptions and dubious figures in the ZCA report. Not unlike Lysenko's 'dialectic' science that was going to gloriously transform Soviet agriculture.

As for nuclear, after long opposing it, I've conceded that it looks like our best option 'going forward' (heh heh, couldn't resist it), especially Thorium reactors.

Political pundits tell us that Greens will soon have the balance of power in the Senate. Now that is a worry if it means Australia will be forced into a costly and ultimately futile search for 100% renewable energy. I suspect the practical outcome will reflect the German experience; power prices keep climbing to pay for modest amounts of unreliable power that is really underwritten by coal, nuclear and gas. There may be ways to increase the penetration of wind and solar without expensive and unfair subsidies but they will take decades to develop.

To put it another way we will pay a lot for very little and find that we still can't get the coal monkey off our back. Think of an obese person taking pricey diet pills while eating as much food as ever. In my opinion there is only one affordable long term alternative to coal and we should start implementing it now. If people do indeed give Greens the balance of power they may just be delaying the inevitable.

No Geoff, that just won't do. Who's going to cut our energy use? When? Under what vote, referendum, or enforcement agency?

Don't get me wrong, I love energy efficiency. I love energy efficient CITIES! I hate suburbia with a passion! I wish we could enforce New Urbanism! It would save oil, save ecosystems, create farmland around our cities where we once had good soil and good rainfall.

But these things take time.

The ONLY answer to get ourselves ready for peak oil and climate change is steady, reliable, baseload power from nukes. I really hope in 50 years or so renewables come up with some good cheap baseload energy supply, but right now they're too limited, too unreliable, and far too expensive! We should not gamble our civilisation on the *vague hope* that renewables *might* one day be able to overcome all their limits. We need reliable power despite the weather, time of day or night, or season! As peak oil hits we are going to need far MORE electricity to run our transport systems.

Try this: after 20 years of wind power, Denmark is 'down' to 650 grams Co2 / kWh. After 10 years of nuclear power deployment, France got down to 90grams! Go figure. Most countries with high renewables mixes in their grids hide the fact that they buy heaps of power from France's nukes.

Again, go figure.

Professor Barry Brook just won the Science Educator award. There's a reason for that!

http://bravenewclimate.com/renewable-limits/