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The Forum > Article Comments > Twenty ideas for a Morrison government > Comments

Twenty ideas for a Morrison government : Comments

By Graham Young, published 10/9/2018

Labor populism under Bill Shorten and Sally McManus, if they deliver on their promises, will make the economy inflexible and weak

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Hi there Graham...

Mate; you've put a lot of work and thought into this exhaustive blueprint or template for our new Prime Minister to follow. I'm not the brightest star in the sky, but even I can see the merit of most of what you've suggested herein.

However did you say, we should scrap the Paris accord altogether or otherwise modify it somewhat? Personally, the Paris accord should be shunned by all free thinking conservative Politicians, as it is I'm sure, by all clear thinking conservative voters?

Two points if I may; I don't know whether our new PM is sufficiently adroit enough to take the good advice, and then act upon that advice, you've kindly given him?

The other, and more concerning, is whether our current PM is not just a mere cardboard cut-out of Malcolm TURNBULL'S ideology, and Mr TURNBULL'S hitherto socialist agenda? In my opinion some of the decisions made when Mr TURNBULL was in the chair, will have far reaching (deleterious) ramifications, right down to the next Federal Election.

That Election in my own opinion, is the Labour Party's for the taking. And then we're given the omniscient presence of, Mr Wm. SHORTIN as our new PM - almost like a horror movie, starring the inimitable Mr SHORTIN as the main character and villain at the same time.
Posted by o sung wu, Monday, 10 September 2018 10:55:08 AM
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I read that people in Brisbane had expressed their views
on the shambles that led to Parliament being shut down.
They hoped that Dutton would not become PM and later they
expressed relief that he didn't get up. No other views were
heard. So it wasn't just voters in the Southern States who
saw Dutton as - untrustworthy, lacking empathy and a poor
representative of our country.

However, an amazing thing is beginning to happen. From all
reports it seem that Scott Morrison is having a positive
impact on most people - at least in my neighbourhood.
The sitting in Parliament today should prove interesting and
should give us a glimpse of the direction in which the party
is heading. However so far the moves that Morrison is making
appear to be getting positive results. We can only trust that
this will continue.
Posted by Foxy, Monday, 10 September 2018 11:06:15 AM
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Good ideas, but Morrison has already shown that he he is not much chop by refusing to drop Paris and reduce immigration. On the latter he is still waffling about the 'sorts' of immigrants, and sending them to places where there is no work, and none needed. He is also more interested in what he calls 'temporary' migrants - students, who are just cash cows for universities and potential back door migrants: illegal ones if they can hide themselves in the depths of our overcrowded cities.

The same old same old for Canberra and Australia.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 10 September 2018 11:27:16 AM
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Can agree with most of this Graham. Even so, the Morrison government, a train wreck going somewhere to happen?

And needs first and foremost to secure its majority, with an important Wentworth by-election.

Judging on the Wagga Wagga results. Needs to gets its act together and the rebels quarantined until the main game is concluded.

Electricity prices have to come down even if that means bucking some powerful vested interest and or introducing the spectre of sovereign risk. And coal advocates going ballistic.

The average battler couldn't give two hoots if ching chong or bossy britches incorporated is disadvantaged or loses their shirts. That's the risk every investor faces.

Libs need to grab this game by the short and curlies and make some policy promises that Labor is forced to match.

The very first being investment in, zero emissions, nuclear technology! And potential power prices a low as 2 cents per Kwh retail. DOABLE!

And with that achievable reality, the possibility of also drought proofing this wide brown land. Only needing those power prices to make it our guaranteed reality! No question!

Time to cast aside all the baggage/partnerships/dinosaurs and policies bound to both guarantee defeat and a very long period in the political wilderness.

Nuclear power almost guaranteed to drive a wedge between Labor and the greens? Or make them the brown nosing subservient junior party for a ramshackle socialistic party drawn straight from the pages of "Alice in Wonderland''?

And chained to some of the most self-defeating policies ever dreamed up in cloud cuckoo land.

Religious freedom can be guaranteed by a bill of irrevocable rights. So as to avoid being seen to cherry-pick rights.

Or a right to effectively discriminate dressed up as a right the voting public has already voted against in absolute droves.

If we want to get the 25% of young voters out there and registering to vote just to kill the coalition, allow a right to discriminate dressed up as some kind of foregone, religious freedom.

Don't want a repeat of the VOLUNTARY postal-survey, or do we?
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Monday, 10 September 2018 11:37:53 AM
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We could make a case for rooftop solar coupled to household battery backup as the most affordable solution for domestic power supply.

Debatable!

If the sun does or doesn't shine, the drought does or doesn't break or subsequent bone dry dams stop generating electricity. Just coal or nuclear power.

If it's coal then we are truly at the mercy of some very powerful unions. Ditto most nuclear power? Given supply lines enrichment and fabrication processes and the sheer paucity of scientific knowledge in our parliaments or modernity in our alleged scientific or medical communities?

Still practising in the 30-50's? And virtually becalmed there but for some migrant success stories, that make "us" look like "we"punch above our weight?

The worst examples, quarantined from modernity, by a degree of intellectual arrogance needing to be seen to be believed? e.g., was moved to tears and honour bound to get in touch with ovarian cancer Australia, when a cancer patient, Press Club speaker, revealed she had relapsed, and as a stage four victim, was going home to die.

I saw as my duty to contact the aforementioned organisation. Only to be advised the speaker, whose husband was a DOCTOR. Wasnt interested in alternative or complementary medicine. And to this day in 2018, remain oblivious to the success trails by conventional western medicine, in Europe, 2006. As day clinic treatment with bismuth 213.

Understandable, given this miracle cure we've had for over half a century would destroy their organisation and fundraising abilities, not to mention some well-paid plum administrative positions?

And so reminiscent of the buried head or Sergeant Schulz syndrome that infects all our parliaments as to not be funny.

When it comes to cost-effective modernity?
What we don't need is steam age bean counters, preventing it on some of the most idiotic, time warp, ideological grounds!

Need to get up to speed with modern science to have a snowflakes chance in upcoming elections. Particularly when the younger voters and a few older one are far better educated and informed!
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Monday, 10 September 2018 12:48:35 PM
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Dear Graham,

Some of this is good, some okay, and some showing the obvious ideological fingerprints of the Australian Institute for Progress from whence it came.

“The AIP promotes the classic rights – freedom of expression, freedom of association, property rights, freedom of worship, and freedom of markets.”

Leaving aside why freedom of markets is a classic right I am assuming it is devotion to the notion which saw no mention of gas within your list.

The USA, one of the most market friendly countries in the world saw fit for decades to reserve its domestic gas production for domestic use by banning exports.

As much gas is used by industry as by its power generators. It meant huge competitive advantages accrued to the country.

Here we allowed huge mainly overseas consortia to plunder our reserves and send the vast bulk of them to other countries forcing us to contemplate endangering our food production and water sources by opening the place up to the frackers.

Australia this year will become the world's largest producer of natural gas yet we are not seeing the benefits of lowered power prices. Labour at least attempts to address this through policy but nothing from the AIP.

I'm wondering why?
Posted by SteeleRedux, Monday, 10 September 2018 1:30:14 PM
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Perhaps the Morrison government could also have a good look a new CIS report that says half of Australian households are receiving more in welfare than they are paying in tax. They call it 'voting for living rather than working for living’.
Posted by ttbn, Monday, 10 September 2018 1:43:15 PM
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Gas, via OCGT's is a load-following enabler of renewables in a transition towards extremely expensive 100% renewables generation. Baseload CCGT's don't change the emissions scenario a great deal. Both do a bit better than HELE. None of these will impact significantly on AGW mitigation, even if the whole planet adopted them.

Graham, I don't see nuclear legalization mentioned in your points. Why not, whether you believe in AGW or not? Mitigating consequences of GW will be inescapable anyway, but why not also advocate the precautionary principle regarding a root cause by lowering emissions through the only tried, true and tested generation solution there is?

Nuclear via SMR's can load follow any existing renewables, when they soon hit the shelves, and we need to be able to hit the ground running by having the nuclear debate settled in their favour.
Posted by Luciferase, Monday, 10 September 2018 1:51:48 PM
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Foxy, Mr Duton could be prevented from standing, by having his eligibility challenged in the High Court and the election called while it was being heard?

Steele. Yes, a mystery indeed that has seen record exports in the last four months?

Lucifer. No mention of nuclear indeed, given that would see coal-fired support funding dry up on both sides of the house.

And so it shall remain regardless of the business/economic case anyone can make for nuclear. And Just about the only way either Labor or the coalition could wedge the other by simply proposing to lift the ban imposed by GOVERNMENT CREATED regulations.

Governments created those regulations and cite proliferation any time they're seriously challenged on the subject? Even though every boy and his dog know that the horse has bolted.

Finally, a new government should advocate just dumping previous arrangements and negotiating new ones which should see us buy twelve new nuclear powered nuclear capable subs off of the shelf for the cost analysis cost-benefit case.

With suitably trained technicians etc trained and stationed here to repair, service and upgrade them or even convert them to far safer MSR thorium ASAP Or at the first ideal opportunity.

Albeit, show pony Tony could advocate they be coal powered, given that's almost the outer limits on his thinking, when it comes to modernity.

As long as our alleged representatives continue to resist essential basic and irrefutable common sense solutions, they will continue to suffer in the polls and may have resisted to the last man, change imposed on them?
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Monday, 10 September 2018 3:15:01 PM
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Hi Steele and Lucifer, I didn't put all my thoughts into the piece, just 20.

The gas issue is to do with supply and demand. We wouldn't have much of the gas we currently have if it wasn't for the export market - that was what provided the financial incentive to actually create a lot of the supply that people now complain is going overseas. But we would have a lot more gas, and no problems for domestic supply, if NSW and Vic allowed more gas exploration as well as fracking. Should be noted that the US didn't export gas, but now is into it in a big way. It is not exportation that is the problem.

I'm also a qualified fan of nuclear. It's the least worst option if we are determined to limit emissions. I'm watching the SMR revolution carefully. It seems to have more promise than most, but I've seen new technologies fail to deliver on their promise before, so will need to see some of these units in operation before I get too excited.
Posted by GrahamY, Monday, 10 September 2018 3:18:32 PM
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Graham,
A significant effort, too much for me to digest at once.
Regarding energy, as I see it we have a choice to make.
At some point we can stop export of coal and keep it for our own coal
fired power stations. This will give us a breathing space of as much as
100 years while fusion stations are hopefully perfected.
When they are perfected we could start switching over to them.
If it becomes obvious that fusion will never work or will always be 60
years away then the rest of the world will have changed to nuclear
uranium or thorium. This would mean that we we could take our time to changeover.
Being able to take our time means we would be unlikely to make major errors.
Posted by Bazz, Monday, 10 September 2018 3:39:14 PM
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Dear Graham,

Come on mate, with respect our gas reserves particularly out of the North West Shelf have been mismanaged right from the start.

When John Howard crowed about signing a deal with China back in 2002 for $25 billion he didn't let on that the Chinese had managed to fix the price through to 2031. Yup, right now China is getting gas from that deal at a third what Australians are paying for domestic supplies. It will only get worse.

“The Chinese had got the deal of a lifetime because the consortium of Australia's North West Shelf operators hadn't thought to insert a clause into the contract that would raise the price of gas from what was, in 2002, a historically low level.”
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/how-australia-blew-its-future-gas-supplies-20170928-gyqg0f.html

Most of the consortium were overseas concerns who don't give a toss about this country's future but it certainly is a job of government to do so.

If the North West Shelf had a decent quota set aside for Australian industry and power generation like it should have been there would not be any pressure for the fracking cowboys to come anywhere close to our food production areas. We should have a pipeline shunting gas from the shelf right to our manufacturing powerhouses across the nation. All that has been pissed up against the wall and we are now paying the price.

John Winston Howard and the robber barons in the West have a hell of a lot to answer for.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Monday, 10 September 2018 3:48:34 PM
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I think the precautionary principle demands at least a footnote in your list of points, Graham, unless you are absolutely certain AGW is bunkum.

There's nothing lost in waiting for SMR's to prove themselves while preparing the ground for their acceptance here, or, going with conventional reactors, perhaps built by Koreans who have it down pat.

Building a renewables plus gas bridge towards extremely expensive 100% renewables for the next ten years is pointless. Waiting is more affordable, financially and in international competitiveness, while the difference in emissions between doing something and doing nothing is negligible.
Posted by Luciferase, Monday, 10 September 2018 9:34:19 PM
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With all due respect Steele, the article your comments are based on is one of the stupidest I have read. Apparently because the author's father could barter a chook for a crayfish the author knows more about developing multi-billion dollar gas wells and selling billions of dollars of gas to overseas customers than people whose business it is to do this..

This is merely one development on the north-west shelf, with lots of gas being exported to other countries, particularly Japan. And lots more being available for domestic use.

From an east coast perspective, which is where the problem is, the West Coast gas can be used to solve the shortage, at a price - the price of transport. There are two or three projects to transship, or pipe, gas from WA to the east to solve the problem.

But there is plenty of gas on the east coast to meet the need, so why aren't you pointing the finger at the Victorian and NSW governments that are restricting the extraction of this gas and which would be cheaper because it doesn't have as significant a transport element?

Whatever the deal that was done with the Chinese, it wasn't because the developers - a consortium including BHP, Woodside, Chevron and Shell - "forgot" to put a price escalation in.

The Chinesse took equity in this deal, and it was huge for the time. A long term gas contract was probably necessary to get financing; a good price a reward for the equity the Chinese took, and the commitment; and the whole deal strategic to get a foothold into the market. 1/2
Posted by GrahamY, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 10:00:29 AM
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2/2 I'm sure the return to the investors would have been positive at those prices, and Howard was right not to try to impose government control over private negotiations. To see how bad the commonwealth is at commerce you have to look no further than the NBN. It's arrogance to suggest that someone with no skin in the game - a politician - is going to make a better and wiser decision than someone who does.

The article is a good reason why Fairfax is being taken over by Nine - it's devoid of useful information and pushes a self-indulgent idiosyncratic line by the author.
Posted by GrahamY, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 10:01:11 AM
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Hi Luciferase, my judgement on global warming has always been that the arguments about whether it is manmade are an important issue, and the corruption of science and scientific institutions has been massive, but they are essentially a side-show.

Unless we could convince India and China that they should not have the same standard of living as we in the west, emissions were always going to increase, so we are going to discover what a higher CO2 world looks like, whether we like it or not.

In which case we need to protect our standard of living. So I have no problem with nuclear, apart from the issues of disposal, which I think are largely over-stated. But it is not the cheapest form of electricity, which is reflected in the fact that the Chinese are developing far more coal than they are nuclear or intermittents, but they do have nuclear as part of the mix.

We should probably be looking to mimic the spread of energy sources in places like China and Korea, as they are competitors for refining, processing and manufacturing of minerals and goods.

But don't worry too much. If the catastrophists thought the world really was at risk from CO2 they'd be hollering for nuclear too. Instead they are mucking around with technologies that couldn't run Hobbiton to an acceptable level.

In any event, the precautionary principle has nothing much to do with our emissions of CO2, because even if they dropped to zero, it wouldn't buy any meaningful change in emissions, so we've changed nothing. The precautionary principle can only apply where inaction has a consequence.
Posted by GrahamY, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 10:10:42 AM
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Graham, the band members on the Titanic had your fatalistic approach.

In side-stepping the precautionary principle, you fail to directly state AGW to be bunkum. It's a moral argument not relegated to a mere academic question, as you suggest.

That China and India know the truth yet act as they do is no moral template for Oz to follow.

By not championing nuclear and paving the way for it, it leaves me concerned as to what degree the LNP is beholden to Big Coal lobbying. If the projected cost of nuclear approaches coal why wouldn't we follow this path to reduce emissions and wait out a few years while preparing the ground for it? Until then I can't support increasing coal or gas power beyond an immediately interim need.
Posted by Luciferase, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 11:24:33 AM
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Dear GrahamY,

Looks like we are going to disagree on this one completely.

It really is pretty simple, why wasn't our own government locking in gas supplies for the nation at 2002 prices until 2013?

Or even mandating 30% for domestic use as they should have done protecting both our manufacturers and jobs.

Now when the opposition propose a modest pricing trigger for export controls the howls of protest from freemarketeers are deafening.

I sat on a state government implemented committee which looked at the viability and desirability of “unconventional gas” in our section of the state. It included oil company executives and local councils. Experts were flown down to present and there were many long and involved discussions held around the table. In the end the type of extraction (fracking) was deemed unpalatable by many who participated.

As the world's largest exporter of natural gas there should be absolutely no need to put primary production and water reserves at risk in this country. Government intervention should have been justified, required and acted on. They are there to temper market excesses and perverse outcomes and both Liberal and Labour failed us.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 11:38:05 AM
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Graham,

I see your list as being in the realms of what's possible rather than a list of unattainable desires. Since Australia going nuclear is something that will never be acceptable to the majority until most of them spend a power interrupted winter, talk of going down the atomic path is wasted. The obstacles that the courts through lawfare and the left through rolling protests, would put before any attempt at such a plant means that no organisation is going to go down that path.

For the same reason, coal is problematic due to lawfare and civil disobedient protest and sabotage. Again no commercial group will stick their hand up to build a new plant unless they were somewhat assured of compensatory profits, which rather defeats the purpose behind such a new plant. Hence the need for government to build the plant. They would also need to put legislation in place to defeat frivolous lawfare and civil disobedience.

This would go a long way to resolving electricity prices. We simply have to get back to where we were in 2005 and that means no subsidies for so-called renewables and encouragement for the most efficient energy systems, coal and gas.

In terms of Paris, I think its no longer possible for a government to just walk away since the scare campaign would write itself and the public have been deceived for too long to recognise that Paris won't save the GBR or do anything worthwhile. I suggest however that we alter our commitment to one that seeks to mirror the efforts of the rest of the world. Develop a weighted basket of our major economic, partners, rivals and peers and then promise to meet the actual results achieved by that weighted average. So we'd agree to cut emissions by the weighted-average of China, India, NZ, Japan, Indonesia, Canada and the EU (for example).

/cont
Posted by mhaze, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 1:54:15 PM
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/cont

I think that could be sold to the public on the basis that we are doing our bit but not more than our bit. Of course, such a weighted-average would actually mean that we'd need to do bugger-all, which would offer cover for us to scrap the NEG (or whatever acronym replaces it) and cease renewable fetishes.

2. Immigration

Just cut it. Call it temporary if you want but its too high and is unsustainable. Good luck trying to enforce policies that try to keep people to their promises to live in Upper Kumbukta West. It'd take about 4.3 nanoseconds for the first such immigrant to tell Four Corners why they simply have to move to inner Sydney and for 'our' ABC to run a campaign to defeat the policy. Take refugees if we must, but only on protection visas which are immediately forfeit if the refugee visits the country he is seeking protection from.

home Affordability.

Cutting the immigration in-take partially resolves this issue. Reduced demand equals lower prices. But the government has a tiger by the tail here. They say that they want to reduce prices which is really a mandatory position. But they know that many people and industries are dependant on prices rising or at least not falling much. Vast numbers are mortgaged to the hilt and a US (2007) style crash would, at the very least, create a massive decline in consumer spending. At the worst it would result in massive numbers of mortgagor sales. Governments don't want prices to fall, they just want to seem like they want it.

Education

Just get the Feds out of the issue. Give it all back to the states. That, or introduce a voucher system which also negates all Federal meddling

/cont
Posted by mhaze, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 1:54:20 PM
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/cont

Health -as regards sugar taxes and the like.

The government should be in the business of advising people about the health issues, not enforcement. The obesity crisis was caused by governments meddling in poorly understood science and thinking they can now solve it is absurd. Tell people that sugars bad (m'kay!) but don't force them to do what experts currently think is right. Also allow others to make the alternate case.

Indigenous rights

Well they already have all the rights they need or will ever get. As to welfare, someone, someday has to just say that people who want to live a 'traditional' life in the middle of the never-never is never going to achieve the same health, welfare and educational outocomes as someone living next door to some inner city world-class hospital. Just say it and then go from there ie we can't achieve parity but we'll do what we can, so long as those we are helping put in some effort as well
Posted by mhaze, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 1:54:23 PM
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mhaze,
have you forgotten where you are ? Your suggestions make way too much sense.
I fully support pushing for everything you stated.
Posted by individual, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 2:33:22 PM
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//Since Australia going nuclear is something that will never be acceptable to the majority until most of them spend a power interrupted winter, talk of going down the atomic path is wasted.//

I don't how true that is, mhaze. I fail to see what is unique about the Australian situation that would stop people accepting nuclear power here when it is acceptable in similar liberal Western democracies. Canada, UK, France, US.... they've all gone nuclear, without any real hassles except for Three Mile Island.

It seems to me that the only thing standing in the way of most people accepting nuclear power is a lack of education. For people outside of STEM fields, the most rigorous education on the nuclear power industry that they receive probably comes courtesy of the Simpsons. A lot of people really think that nuclear waste is green glowing ooze. I suspect that many of them don't really understand that a nuclear power reactor works by producing heat to run steam turbines; I think they imagine that nuclear reactors are like the engine room of the Starship Enterprise whereby useful work can be extracted by having a sufficient density of flashing LEDs, machines that go ping and boffins to operate them, and then the rest sort of just happens by magic.

What's required to combat such widespread scientific ignorance is a comprehensive public education campaign. Ideally this could be included in the junior high school science curriculum, but it's already pretty jam-packed. But a decent fact-based advertisement campaign could go a decent way to shifting public opinion.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 5:24:43 PM
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Did you know that nuclear power stations actually emit more ionizing radiation to the surrounding environment than coal fired power stations of the same output? True story: all coal contains trace levels of a variety of radioisotopes - minute concentrations, but they can add up to a fair bit when you consider the staggering amount of coal that power stations go through. When the coal gets burnt, some of those isotopes go up the chimney and then fall out on the surrounding environment. Nuclear power plants typically keep their radioisotopes better contained.

If I had a house that was close enough to a coal fired power station and a nuclear power station that their radiation output was measurably above background radiation, equidistant from both and both of the same power output.... I'd be receiving a higher radiation dose from the coal fired power station than the nuclear one unless something went mushroom shaped. Which is staggeringly improbable; it's like being attacked by a shark, getting struck by lightning and winning lotto simultaneously.

I think if more people had a slightly better education about the actual facts around nuclear power, they might get on board... after all, if an ardent lefty like myself is in favour, it seems it couldn't be that hard to win over all but the rusted on hippies.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 5:24:59 PM
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Oy vey, what a shemozzle...

I don't usually bother correcting errors because to err is human, but this:

//Did you know that nuclear power stations actually emit more ionizing radiation to the surrounding environment than coal fired power stations of the same output?//

should have been this:

//Did you know that nuclear power stations actually emit LESS ionizing radiation to the surrounding environment than coal fired power stations of the same output?//

Somebody's in for some flagellation this evening...
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 5:33:30 PM
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Steely, part of the answer may be that the gas link to load-following renewables was not grasped and the notion that coal-burning would happily go on for centuries was current.

Gas was not valued because everything was in place for transporting and burning coal and keeping the coal industry going for power generation and export, with thousands of associated jobs.

The imperative to burn cleaner fuel domestically wasn't as strong as it has become
Posted by Luciferase, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 5:37:57 PM
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Toni,

I'm well aware of the fact that nuclear is spectacularly safe and am not personally opposed to having them in Oz. Economically I think we're better off selling all the yellow cake we dig up and using coal to met our needs. But if there's any left over, then I'm all for sticking it in a reactor and spinning a few turbines.

My point however was that getting a majority to go along with that is well neigh impossible. As soon as such a proposal was made, even allowing for appropriate 'education', we'd be inundated with scary stories about the multitudes who almost died at Fukushima, and the multitudes that almost died at Chernobyl. The Greens, ALP, Fairfax and ABC would be shrieking at every opportunity. Bart's three-eyed fish would be the least of the campaign falsehoods. "The China Syndrome" would be on permanent rotation on SBS.

And even if, by some miracle, the proposal got up, the lawyers would have a field-day objecting to and filing suit against every word and comma in the contract. NIMBY's from 300 miles around would be demanding that it be located elsewhere and all sitting members in the affected electorates would be threatening to cross the floor at every opportunity. Rare species of frogs and parrots would be discovered daily. Unless they decided to locate it in the Simpson desert in which case 14.7 nanoseconds after the announcement, we'd find out that there were previously undiscovered sacred sites in that location (what are the chances, eh?) and that women used to go there over the millennia to whinge about their elders and give thanks that the Rainbow Serpent had forbidden the building of nuclear plants at the site.

Even places like Canada and the US, which have had nuclear since the 50's are opposed to new plants and none have been built or even proposed for decades.

"what a shemozzle..."

I think we understood your point from the context.

"Somebody's in for some flagellation this evening..."

So business-as-usual tonight at the Lavis household?
Posted by mhaze, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 6:50:14 PM
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mhaze, another avenue is to establish the shortcomings of renewables. Presently the public has little idea of these, thinking the achievement of 100% renewables is simply a matter of will.

Watching young people on Q&A speak so uninformed about them, parroting what they hear from Greens and what is indoctrinated into them through the slanted school science curriculum, highlights the difficulty. The wow factor of renewables, something apparently for nothing, must be negated. The storage issue needs highlighting with the scale and cost of achieving reliable, 100% renewables made fully understood, perhaps expressed in terms the community values, such as hospital or public housing beds, or university places, for example.

The renewables solution to AGW must be loudly and publicly challenged, while spruiking nuclear's advantages.
Posted by Luciferase, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 8:49:38 PM
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//As soon as such a proposal was made, even allowing for appropriate 'education', we'd be inundated with scary stories about the multitudes who almost died at Fukushima//

Dude, they built a nuclear power reactor on the coast of a country known for it's geological instability and from whose language we have appropriated the word 'tsunami'. I mean, you don't have to be a genius to figure out that's all going to end in tears one way or another.

Pretty sure we can find better places to stick the odd reactor. It's a big country.

-10 points for Hufflepuff.

//and the multitudes that almost died at Chernobyl.//

And no mention of the people that died at Chernobyl? Seems a tad remiss...

Anyway, it's another failure of hippy logic: Chernobyl wasn't an accident. At least not in the conventional sense of the word accident. What happened at Chernobyl was that a bunch of idiots decided it would be a terrific idea to intentionally override half a dozen different safety systems - any one of which could have prevented the 'accident' - in order to play silly buggers.

In Soviet Russia, WH&S trains you.

The result was a steam explosion which blew a hole in the side of their secondary containment. They had no tertiary containment, because they were using a crappy reactor design. In the interests of Soviet efficiency, the Chernobyl reactor was designed for military and civilian purposes. In order to leave room for a crane to extract the weapons grade stuff, they left out the tertiary containment... the 'sarcophagus' they hastily erected afterwards was essentially the tertiary containment they should have had in the first place.

Two reasons it wouldn't happen in Australia:
1) We'd build reactors with proper containment.
2) Less vodka on the job. Sorry, that's probably racist or something. Still... six different safety systems?
Posted by Toni Lavis, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 9:01:46 PM
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Dear Lucifrase,

100% renewables is of course doable but we are certainly going to have to endure a transitioning period.

California now only has one small coal fired power station producing electricity in the state and a single remaining nuclear power station. Gas represents 34% of the energy source but even that is down from 44% in 2009 and renewables are at 30% and climbing.

It just requires acceptance of the threat of GW and the willingness to have a crack at reducing its impacts.

For Australia as the world's largest producer of natural gas not to have it as a major part of our power generation is a blight on federal governments who it seems have sold our future to the lowest bidder.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Tuesday, 11 September 2018 9:34:40 PM
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California imports about 30% of its electricity. It can feel smug about its green credentials because, like Germany, it has extension cords to other jurisdictions to offset intermittency caused through its focus on renewables. Reliability is still an issue and power prices are rising faster than other states'.

What is feasible within the laws of physics is distinct from economic viability. Even if theoretically feasible, reliable 100% renewables is a considerably more expensive proposition than conventional nuclear, and SMR's will only widen the difference without a major, mitigating storage technology breakthrough. It takes considerable faith to live in anticipation of this transpiring.

The following assesses different energy mixes, https://epc.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/ReliableAffordableElectricPowerGeneration_Booklet.pdf
Posted by Luciferase, Wednesday, 12 September 2018 12:21:27 AM
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Further too.. https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11/had-they-bet-on-nuclear-not-renewables-germany-california-would-already-have-100-clean-power/#239fcdcce0d4
Posted by Luciferase, Wednesday, 12 September 2018 1:16:22 PM
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Toni,

I'm not sure why (or if?) you're not getting this, but I'm not saying that Fukushima/Chernobyl are reasons against us getting nuclear, only that they would be used by some to terrify those who want to be terrified.

I know that Fukushima was, in retrospect, poorly located and that we wouldn't make that error. I also know that the death toll was, at most, in single figures.

I know that Chrenobyl was caused by the disastrous Soviet system(for want of a better word) and that those who died suffered from the explosion rather than the radiation and that the death toll, depending on your counting was somewhere between 0 and 50. Although I'm open to the argument that the deathtoll was in the 10000's if you count the abortions that occurred due to western women being misinformed about the risk of the radiation cloud to their unborn child.

Again I'm aware that nuclear is safe and would be safe here. But I'm also aware that those who oppose it would use these overseas problems as evidence that the technology is a killer, that a portion of the press would amplify their claims and that enough people would be fooled by the scare campaign such that proposal would be DOA.
Posted by mhaze, Wednesday, 12 September 2018 2:48:25 PM
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//I'm not sure why (or if?) you're not getting this//

For exactly the same reason you don't get the fact that reading the SMH, watching/listening to the ABC (more the BBC in my case, but they're basically the same thing, right?) and voting for the ALP don't make me a hippy. Because we perceive the world dimly, through the distorting lenses of prejudice and stereotype.

It's weird, man. Here I am standing in front of you, a proud self-affirming lefty publicly attesting my support for nuclear power... and you're trying to convince me that lefties can't learn to stop worrying and love the controlled fission. That's what I don't get.

//only that they would be used by some to terrify those who want to be terrified.//

Yes, of course they would. Those in power will always look for something to terrify those who want to be terrified; see 'Muslims'.

Those of who are naturally timorous wee beasties find day-to-day life quite daunting enough, and look to statistics to find out what we should be really worried about. As it turns out, it's neither Muslims nor meltdowns any more than it is shark attacks and lightning bolts. It's good old-fashioned things like cancer and car accidents.

//But I'm also aware that those who oppose it would use these overseas problems as evidence that the technology is a killer, that a portion of the press would amplify their claims and that enough people would be fooled by the scare campaign such that proposal would be DOA.//

I was going to say something about how this scare campaign might be defeated through empirically based arguments... and then I remembered some of the conversations I've had with Tories around here concerning Islam.

I concede. A well orchestrated scare campaign beats evidence hands down.
Posted by Toni Lavis, Wednesday, 12 September 2018 8:12:38 PM
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Oh I see.....

You think this is a left/right issue! But I haven't referred to that divide at all in this thread.

While those perpetrating the slander against nuclear are primarily of the left, or of the green variety (not necessarily the same), those who succumb to the scare come in all flavours. The most recent figures I saw were that opposition to nukes was about 65% and support 25%. Clearly there are at least some on the right who are also anti-nuke.

These scare campaigns often win not because of politics but because of ignorance.

Australia can't even agree to having a nuclear waste dump which would take low level waste that is entirely safe under any circumstances. Waste that is currently housed in our major cities. Every time that comes up the anti's barely have to raise a sweat to get the idea killed.

Maybe, when things get really bad in terms of power generation and economic circumstances, a majority may be open to arguments in favour of nukes. But that's a long way off and Graham's thread is about the here and now
Posted by mhaze, Thursday, 13 September 2018 1:01:19 PM
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Yes, of course they would. Those in power will always look for something to terrify those who want to be terrified; see 'Muslims'.
Toni lavis,
Well, aren't statements such as get rid of all infidels etc. put out by those in power ?
So, it's up to those in power elsewhere to warn of this very real threat. No need to want to feel terrified.
Posted by individual, Thursday, 13 September 2018 7:40:42 PM
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As to the 20 ideas for the Morrison Govt I can only repeat what 99% of wage earning Australians are saying. Create an economy that makes it worthwhile for people to sacrifice 50+ years of their life in return for their wage. Scott Morrison should tell his lose assembly of barely capable
ministers & bureaucrats to display some competence & start working on reward for effort instead of fleecing the productive & rewarding the (largely) academic background hangers-on bureaucrats.
Sort out the immoral mess that is Centrelink & ATO.
A much improved economy & quality of life in Australia would be the outcome.
Posted by individual, Thursday, 13 September 2018 7:50:07 PM
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Toni said;
Yes, of course they would. Those in power will always look for
something to terrify those who want to be terrified; see 'Muslims'.

Know something, Muslims have killed million times more than nuclear !

I also think that there will be no change in the public opinion till
blackouts become a daily event, major shopping centres lose power for
an hour or two and employees are stood down when the power fails.
Being faced with a 10 or 20 floor walk up or down will convince many.
Posted by Bazz, Thursday, 13 September 2018 11:17:32 PM
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