>...it must include nuclear as the only reliable baseload power source which has zero emissions...
And with that comment Graham displays his lack of understanding of the issue. Baseload is obsolete - we will soon* have so much subbaseload power that we won't need it.

His comments about the capability and cost of renewables confirm his lack of understanding.

Globally we do need nuclear power. But Australia, having an unusually low population density and an unusually high amount of sunshine, does not and it does not make economic sense here.

And we've been waiting for decades to see those small modular reactors. When they were first announced they may well have been suited to Australia's needs, but our needs have changed.

It's highly likely those nuclear submarines aren't a cost effective solution to our defence requirements either, but the fact that the requirements can't be made public means we can't know for sure. I expect the plans to be quietly dropped a few years from now.

The more overbuild of renewables there is, the less their intermittency is a problem, as hydrogen production does not need to be done on a JIT basis.

* Probably by 2040, though if we made a decent effort we could easily reach that stage before 2030.

Australia needs less people and more renewables.
In other words a sustainable society.
Solar IS nuclear and we already have plenty of it.

"Ever since they dropped a nuclear bomb on Hiroshima in 1945 the conservative right has felt all warm and fuzzy about all things nuclear."

The conservatives dropped the bomb?
The US president was a Democrat.
The US Congress (both houses) were Democrat
Australia was run by the ALP
Britain was run by Labour.

Explain again how it was the conservatives who dropped the bomb. Oops...forgot. Paul never explains. Or more exactly Paul never CAN explain.

Re Three Mile Island. How many people died in that 'disaster'? How much contamination was released? Hint: no deaths and the radiation released was equivalent to less than half that of a chest x-ray. But the chicken littles will always see the sky falling.

Its perfectly obvious that we'll never get to net zero CO2 using or relying on so-called renewables only. Or more exactly we won't get there while retaining anything even resembling current standards of living.

Its also perfectly obvious that those myriad nations who promise to get there, won't. They are making promises they can't and won't achieve in the same way they made promises about Paris that they couldn't and didn't keep. Its all smoke and mirrors. By the time it becomes clear that the promises were unachievable the promisers will have long since gone. But for now they can preen themselves on their unachievable virtue.

At the moment the populace has been hoodwinked into thinking net zero is something that can be painlessly achieved or, at the very least, the pain will be borne by someone else.

There will come a time when the decline in the power grid starts to impact the populace. At that time, whoever's holding the hot potato will move to rectify the errors of the past (our present). Will it be coal? or will it be nuclear? Who knows. But we know it won't be wind or solar.

There remains a chance that some new technology will save the day for the co2 fetishists. Something like thorium - the Chinese are promising a demonstration project in the next 24 months.

mhaze, what is "perfectly obvious" to you is UTTERLY RIDICULOUS to anyone with a reasonably good understanding of the situation.

Where do you get the preposterous idea that there will be a decline in the power grid, when in reality the power grid is continually being improved?

Aidan,

Fossil fuels currently provide ~80% of all electricity in Australia, so-called renewables the balance.

To get within the cooee of nett zero, irrespective of what date is chosen, that 80% will need to fall precipitously. One calculation says we have to close 2/3rds of coal stations by 2035.

Now I know those who live in fantasy-land think that renewables will pick up the slack, but those who don't believe in fairy-dust know that the slack won't be picked up by renewables and therefore the supply of power will be reduced and/or rationed.

At that point, the revolt of those who suddenly learn the true cost of co2 fetishism will require decisions to support total output and that'll be either a return to coal/oil/natural-gas and/or nuclear.

Of course, as Lomborg predicted a decade ago, solar will become increasingly efficient. But equally, resource depletion of things like
rare-earths will mean that sufficient back-up battery power will mean that solar will never be a primary power source.

Equally some other technology may yet save the day. But then, they'll happen irrespective of what the co2 averse do now.