Albo was elected on a promise of power bills reducing by $275 instead they've since gone up 40%. Next I predict will be draconian demand management when the coal stations that provide 60% of our power shut down. For example demands to turn off aircon on 43C days.

I'd rather look at a nuke near an old coal station than spoiling rural vistas with wind farms and new power lines. As to the inflexibility of nuclear they can do desalination or make hydrogen when solar is going well. Funny how there is no reproach when the sun goes down but in the military going AWOL is a serious offence. Batteries themselves expensive and fast depreciating can only help a bit around dinner time. They won't keep aluminium smelters going.

As to the Rolls-Royce SMR I'm getting the impression that SA is cooking up some sort of tie-in with their future domestic power needs and the submarines. One big project is a west coast desalination plant and pipeline coupled with expansion of copper refining. 470 MW round the clock should do it.

The old “suicide note” gets a hammering these days. With both sides using it, there won't be anyone left.

But, why contemplate suicide, when Morrison started to kill us off by signing up to Net Zero, and Albanese is suffocating us by trashing cheap electricity, exporting jobs, and importing more people to ensure that we will have no shelter, no health services for the hordes.

To hell with Dutton and his nuclear power. By the time that was up and running it would be too late to save us from the slow death his party and now Labor has inflicted on us.

By that time, renewables or nuclear, without coal and gas we will be burning wood and cow dung trying to survive. That's if we are still allowed cows to blow out the dung with all that dangerous methane.

A big deal is being made of cost.
There is no doubt that renewables are very expensive because of the
duplication needed. Some calculations show five times, some believe
that it can be as high as twelve times.
Has anyone calculated the cost of one times renewables ?
Multiply that by 5 or 12 and you will have some idea of what you are
up for in a renewables paradise.
Oh yes as they have a 20 to 25 year lifespan by the time it is
complete they can start again. Does painting the Harbour Bridge ring a bell ?

Batteries I hear them say !
If they say that they have not thought just when they will recharge
them and where will the power to recharge come from ?
Actually you need another renewable system as you cannot use the grid
to recharge them. It is already loaded.
Also have they heard of a wind drought ? Ask Europe about that.

The main question being used is cost.
That is easy, call for tenders !

Seriously disagree! This article was written by a known anti-nuclear advocate. Moreover, I suggest that his stats were cherry picked for the most part.

Furthermore, I believe he knows SFA about current nuclear reactors and nothing whatsoever about safe, carbon free, MSRs that burn thorium>/U233 and or nuclear waste and in complete safety! With price PKWH at less than 3 cents!

Battery or pumped hydro backed renewables cannot ever get anywhere near that, without humungous taxpayer funded subsidies.

As for nuclear power being a suicide note, BS writ large. Conversely, could win the coalition the very next election.
Alan B.

Yes Bazza, ask for tenders and take nothing off the table.
Alan B.

Subsume:

The guts of this article subsumes the Democratic process is alive and well in Australia: it isn’t.

I thought (hoped) that Friends of the Earth had ceased to exist. They've been irrelevant for several years now and this diatribe confirms that they still have their anti-development, anti-nuclear and anti-human blinkers on. There is no way they can produce a balanced, considered commentary on the possible role of nuclear in the Australian economy, so best to ignore them.

Australians much prefer renewables

Can anyone actually provide just a single (1) example of a renewed item of previously used Green power ?

Australia the innovative nation and clever country, not.

Flogging a dead horse in the cause of delaying transition from fossil fuels to renewables (ditto faux environmental 'degrowth' & 'sustainable population'), but too late.... Anglosphere lags, but the rest of the developed world does not.

FT:

'Opinion Data Points Economics may take us to net zero all on its own. The plummeting cost of low-carbon energy has already allowed many countries to decouple economic growth from emissions'

https://www.ft.com/content/967e1d77-8d3c-4256-9339-6ea7025cd5d3

'Australia' the 'clever' country
Australian definition of clever is how to create a flurry of activity to indicate positive movement toward in establishing some insight into self determination designed to fooling the general populace who have little interest other that the next sporting event being touted at that point in time.
Advance Australia...to where you my ask!

The Dutton nuclear promotion policy is unviable, but that's not the point in defeating Labor. Dutton realises the timelines for nuclear, only be operational in the 2040s, are not, in themselves, a Next Election winner.

Albo, with a one seat majority in the House of Reps [1] to retain power in Government, will be white anted by the Greens, independents and Teals, to become an ineffectual minority Government.

This happened to the final Rudd Government with Negative Abbott (just like "No" Dutton) winning over Labor's shaky hold rather than the Coalition having attractive policies.

[1] see the right sidebar here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Australian_federal_election . If Labor drops from its current 77 House of Reps seats to 76 in the coming 2025 Election Labor can only form a Minority Government "assisted" by the unreliable support of the Crossbench (Greens, independents and Teals). This will make a Labor minority government easy meat for Dutton.

CORRECTION

Labor needs to lose 2 seats, from 77 down to 75, to become a weak minority Government.

Dutton's nuclear policy may also have value in driving a Wedge between some in Labor (who are quietly pro-nuclear) against the cross benchers who a generally and strongly anti-nuclear.

Most arguments on this subject miss the point.
Nuclear cannot be up and running in time.
Renewables cannot be up and running in time (if ever).
If we are to have 100% power 100% of the time then gas and coal are
the only answers.

Contracts for gas power stations must be let NOW.
The life of the surviving coal fired stations must be extended.

Renewables are running very late and it looks like the existing
projects are in danger of being cancelled because of uncertain
government policies.
The government to try and stop the flight of capital from renewables
has increased subsidies promised.

The whole project has become a disaster, running very late and the
cost is just about uncalculatable.

Who let the government get involved in electricity generation ?
I don't think the Libs can avoid blame but Chris Bowen should never
have been let near it.
It looks like a disaster is unavoidable, even if Lidell can be resurrected.

Nuclear cannot be up and running in time.
Bezza,
None of the future infrastructure can nor should it be rushed through all at once. Nuclear, just like irrigation & the many other projects are & should be long-term. All this impatience is why nothing worthwhile is being achieved. People forget that these are future projects that must be started now not the other way round. Only gradual development will provide the answers needed which in turn provide the eventual hands-on practical i.e. workable & useable infrastructure. The wild money-spending on unsustainable hare-brained schemes of recent past & present is nothing more than a costly postponing of good ideas not realised by the "experts".

Dud Dutton and his NOALITION are looking for a short term "winner", and they think they have found it in trumpeting nuclear power. The advantage being they themselves, the present "team" of loopies, would never have to implement such a policy. Australia and indeed the world, requires action now on climate change brought about by the burning of fossil fuels, not something proposed for the distant future.

Paul, I suggest you go back and read Dutton's statement again.
I would take Rolls Royce's estimate as the best anyone can get.
The next then will be to get Tenders, Provided we can shut the Labour Party up !
That will shut them all up !