Global primary uranium production appears to have peaked in 2005 as it fell 5% in 2006, due to a 15% drop in Canada and 20% down in Australia. Continuation of uranium mining in Australia depends on the results of the BHP Billiton feasibility study ending in 2009 into the Olympic Dam expansion. This may well be turned down as the initial four-year excavation will rely on imported supplies of diesel, the price of which in 2010 to 2014 can only be guessed. Also the farmers may take priority over water supplies if the current drought continues.

In any case the prospective output of the project has been committed to the Chinese, Indians and Russians, leaving nothing for the birth of an Australian nuclear sector.

Meanwhile the so-called secondary supplies of nuclear fuel are running out, which together with the decrease in mining production will lead to a reduction of nuclear generation in the US and France. The situation will come clear in a year or two's time if or as the current trend continues.

And of course, these renewable energy techniques are out there already proven and commercially viable, able to produce the unlimited cheap energy that modern day society needs to function in its present profligate way.

David

Wind farming IS now a proven, commercial industry. Several are operating very satisfactorily and in Western Australia, the Emu Downs project is contributing largely to fuelling the Kwinana desalination plant. At least in calm conditions, wind is replaced with gas fired plants which are considerably less polluting than coal.

I occasionally access threads pertaining to the hybrid wind/solar plants where in the case of diminished wind, solar takes over. Research continues and the potential here could be realised in the not too distant future and hopefully, costs will become more affordable.

Sceptics continue to spread their propaganda that climate change is not human induced, however, only a drongo would deny that mankind's contribution to pollution is enormous.

Only a drongo would deny that the world's eco systems are now drastically contaminated from anthropogenic pollution.

Already thousands of people are dying from polluted water, polluted crops and polluted air and the overriding fact is that the pollution stems from hydrocarbons, though governments (particularly Howard's government) remain mute on the true number of deaths resulting from radiation-related diseases including those exposed to depleted uranium and occupational hazards.

In addition, medical tests on the Arctic Inuits reveal that these people have the highest rates in the world of man-made dioxins, PCBs and other industrial chemicals. This is a result of the transboundary nature of these bio-accumulative chemicals and the ingestion by marine life, the staple diet of the Arctic people. Yet any outsider would consider the Arctic to be the most pristine area in the world.

http://muse.jhu.edu/login?uri=/journals/american_indian_quarterly/v026/26.3johansen.html

And while China is now polluting in similar fashion to the West, it is comforting to learn that they are in fact addressing the issue of climate altering pollution very seriously.

http://www.motherjones.com/blue_marble_blog/archives/2007/11/6274_china_surges_ah.html

It is an ignominious fact that the Federal government in our country has resisted all pressure to also act responsibly and Hiroshima John (if returned to office) will quickly find his tongue to again elaborate his grand plans for a more radioactive planet.

Why Australia should go Total-Nuclear-Industries now.

Its like the Australian populace has been wading out 100's of mtrs into crocodile infested waters up to their armpits. Everything is safe as there are satisfactory crocodile safeguards. The rest of the world is crocodile crazy so business is brisk.

Even if Australia hadn't blindly followed their leaders (both parties) into these crocodile-waters the rest of the world would still find crocodiles for sale elsewhwere and after PEAKOIL they knew they could just come and take our undeveloped crocodiles anyway, amidst-the-PEAKOIL-chaos.

But the Australian people, like little children, up to their armpits in crocodiles, put their fingers to their noses and said to each other "no one can see we have crocodiles, we're hiding. And we will just tell everyone who asks that we are pure. We are a CROCODILE FREE NATION"

Well petrol hit $5/litre and the Australian people let their outdated yellowcakodile industry flummox along while the rest of the world went safer and cleaner Pebblebedodile value-added industries.

The rest of the world prospered. The crocodile business was good. But the $A collapsed to the same value as the paper-it-was-written-on as it was secretly tied to OIL-futures which of course collapsed.

So here we have all the Australian people, up to their necks in crocodiles with increasingly fearsome foreigners plotting to invade and take our crocodile wealth. They have Crocodile powered ships and we can't even find the fuel to get a single F-111C off the tarmac. Presently, Australians everywhere started crying like John Howard when he lost the 2007 election and saying, "Why didn't we value-add our crocodiles to pebblebedodiles as a $currency-bridge-over-PEAKOIL when we had the chance? Why oh why didn't we build Hot-Rock-Geothermal power plants in every capital city? All we have now is puss-box-green-power, which is so widespread. We can't afford the oil to send people out to great distances to maintain them. Oh Woe is us! We were the most prosperous of all OECD nations. Why has it come to this?"

Then some smart alec from up the back yelled out "Because it's-all-THERMODYNAMICS and you're all-too-F#*@ing-stupid!"

Kaep, the problem is that the unwashed have no knowledge of such things as thermodynamics and they all believe in perpetual motion. Fortunately, or even perhaps unfortunately, JWH will no longer be there to guide the ship of state, so we might, just might, see a change in direction, but I am not holding my breath.

David

Now that it is apparent that Labor have won this election, it will be interesting to see how long it takes before they come to realise that for all they've been saying about non-nuclear solutions to CO2 output, nuclear is the only one that can be made to work on a useful scale.

Sylvia.