Yes, the juvenile fear and hatred of nuclear power represents a major deficiency in global energy political thinking. But there's worse to come, as the present crisis crippling global oil supply is clearly demonstrating. Our massive dependence on fossil fuels for a far wider range of products than merely electricity is the real threat, simply because electricity generation without fossil fuels is a piece of cake. The much bigger problem is the 60% of oil and gas NOT used to generate electricity. And most of those other uses have no known substitutes. Now the crippling effects we face of shortages of fertilizers, plastics, explosives and literally thousands of other essential products are getting the publicity they deserve. (And the authors of this article know it.)

While these three nuclear obsessives claim the 'elephant in the room' is the huge cost of transitioning to renewables, the real elephant when it comes to energy, which they've completely ignored, is the thorny issue of how to safely and cost-effectively dispose of nuclear waste. After many decades of throwing endless amounts of money at the problem, no-one anywhere has ever come up with a satisfactory solution.

And yes, it is France which 'offers the clearest answer' to this problem. Their answer is that they have no answers. France releases low-level radioactive effluents containing iodine-129 and other radionuclides into the ocean. This carcinogenic and thyroid-damaging Iodine-129 accumulates and stays radioactive for millions of years. France’s reprocessing of nuclear waste releases about 90 percent of the waste’s I-129 into the biosphere. Its most hazardous nuclear waste which it can't reprocess is buried deeply underground, with ever-spiralling cost blowouts and complete lack of conscience in leaving these ticking time bombs of radiation risk for future generations to deal with. France's nuclear experiment is nowhere near a shining beacon of what a clean energy future can look like. It's actually a cautionary tale we should all learn from. Its nuclear dream has turned into a financial, technical and political nightmare.

Nuclear energy is not the answer. Australia is one of the best placed countries in the world to transition to renewable energy. And the only good thing to come out of Trump and Netanyahu's illegal attack on Iran is that it will accelerate this transition all around the world.

And as for water and energy guzzling data centres, they must be legislated to provide their own renewable energy and desalinated/recycled water. Australia cannot afford to give these power and water hungry monstrosities a free ride!