Yes Fest

The renewable push has its own Billionaire spruikers, Twiggy being the
most ambitious for taxpayers' money to fund his grandiose Green Hydrogen plans. See http://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-07-21/green-hydrogen-forrest-fortescue/104120492 or 21 July 2024

Twiggy's Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) "investors and analysts have long been concerned about the extent and speed to which the company has expanded into renewable energy and the overlapping connections with Forrest's private ventures.

Since late January [2024], when FMG's share price hit a record just shy of $30, it has shed almost one-third its value."

Poor nuclear energy advocate Rob Parker http://www.2gb.com/cancelled-nuclear-power-expert-silenced-at-conference/ Even nuclear advocates shouldn't be cancelled.

As Australia has no experience with nuclear reactor electrical production we should apply Pete's Principle:

ie. with the future Oz reactors taking Double the acquisition time estimate, Triple the cost estimate of reactor and don't forget Decommissioning each reactor will cost more than its construction .

My principle also applies to Snowy 2.0 and major weapons systems like AUKUS submarines.

Cheers Pete

Hi Fester,

If nuk power is such a goer, I ask the simple question; Why is it that private capital is unwilling to invest in Dutton's nuks, yet they invest billions into renewables?

The article makes some decent points about nuclear’s challenges, but pushing the idea that nuclear is on its way out is an exaggeration. Leave the misinformation to the anti-renewables crowd.

Global nuclear capacity in 2024 was about the same as in 2005, but that doesn’t mean nothing’s changed. Reactors are more efficient now, and nuclear is actually expected to hit record-high power generation in 2025. Plus, there are 65 reactors currently being built, with China leading the charge.

Caim that SMRs are "going nowhere" is a stretch, too. Sure, some projects have flopped, but plenty are still moving ahead. Rolls-Royce has a team working on SMRs in the UK, China and Russia already have some running, and countries like Canada, the US, and parts of Europe are investing in them. It’s still early days, but writing them off completely is premature.

Then there’s the renewables comparison. Yeah, wind and solar are growing way faster in terms of capacity, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. Nuclear runs basically all the time, while renewables need storage and backup power when the weather isn’t cooperating. That’s not to say renewables are useless (they’re obviously the future in a lot of ways), but acting like nuclear is irrelevant just isn’t accurate.

France is another case where the article paints a pretty one-sided picture. It has had cost overruns, but it still gets most of its power from nuclear and exports electricity to Germany. Instead of ditching nuclear, they’re extending their current plants and planning to build six new reactors.

This isn’t to that say nuclear is perfect - it’s expensive, takes long time to build, and has the waste issue to deal with - but pretending it’s dead while renewables are flawless is an exaggeration. Nuclear is struggling in some places, growing in others, and isn’t going away anytime soon.

Poland's new Nuclear Project puts Duttons rosy picture in doubt. http://youtu.be/VeN2JfVR8Hg?si=hjchULC_D22ZqJ0X

0:35 "official figures put the cost at 45 Billion Euros" for one large city size Nuclear power station with 3 reactors = 78 Billion Australian Dollars.

4:11 [Like Australia] "Poland has no experience with nuclear energy" Poland had the mere beginnings of an old rusty Soviet era nuclear power station.

4:27 the new Polish project may take more than 20 years. This is a real world number rather than Dutton's hugely optimistic timings.

Note Dutton has gone quiet about nuclear - even though (or because) he is in election campaign mode. Around the country Dutton has found no state governments are speaking out in favour of Dutton's nuclear plans. So he basically stopped talking about them 2 months ago.

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