It is interesting how emotional people get over nuclear energy and how dangerous they think it is, yet accept the thousands of miners, particularly in China that are killed every year in their coal mines. Even in the United States after WW 2, coal mining deaths could be numbered in hundreds although in recent years it has dropped to the several tens. We also discount the hundreds of annual deaths from Black Lung Disease, a direct result from getting coal out of the ground.

If we could get nuclear energy into a bit of perspective and realise that it could solve a lot of problems in the area of increased energy demand without the misinformation on safety when compared to current systems, we might go a long way towards solving climate change.

We rightly question new developments but tend to ignore existing practices. It's rather like road deaths which amount to over one million a year world wide, but we have tended to ignore statistics like that. Can you just imagine the dissent if we ever suggested banning the motor car ?

In spite of all the nuclear plants world wide, the amount of deaths resulting from this form of energy are only a small fraction of some of the alternatives, and getting smaller.

Another one wanting to “solve climate change” and telling us that we “…have to stop using coal, oil and gas.”

Mere humans cannot ‘solve’ nature, no matter how much taxpayers’ money panic-stricken politicians put into pathetic attempts to do so.

Naturally occurring climate change of the kind we are now experiencing has been a boon for the rent-seekers in the scientific community and in the so-called alternative energy industry. All of these ‘alternatives’ need full time back up from conventional power sources; and even then, all they are doing is lining the pockets of rent-seeking opportunists and not making a damn of difference to anything.

As for nuclear power: how many times does the current government have to tell these rubes that they will not even entertain the idea of nuclear power before they get the message?

The safety or lack thereof of nuclear power doesn't come into it. The decision not to have it is a political one. The climate change frenzy is also political, and the sooner people get over it and get on with their lives, the better off we will be.

Of course we must have nuclear power but one thing that was forgotten in the original article is who is going to run an maintain it.
.... Inadequate attention by a succession of governments to the manufacturing industry and the engineering education that supports it.....

These governments and their bureaucrats could not see past 'service industries' thus leaving us high and dry and dependent on selling the farm to survive when the service industries, like the emperor, were seen to have no clothes.

No amount of arts graduates, economists or commerce graduates can ever make or maintain anything. The reliance of 'service industries' started in the 1970's and it is going to take as many years to reverse the tend once it is realised that ... 'we have a problem, Canberra'

I don't know who is responsible for the sub-head, but the author tells us that climate is always changing, so solving it is, it seems to me, not on the cards. Similarly, as so many apparently want to engage in, 'fighting' it, or stopping it. Adapting to it, yes.

On the evidence available, whatever warming has occurred through the burning of fossil fuels has had little effect (and it has occurred already). CO2 additions continue happily, but warming has not followed suit for the last ten years.

But what is the evidence for CO2 staying around for a thousand years? The argument and evidence about this is completely unsettled, and on the face of it, much of the additional CO2 has already been absorbed in extra vegetation.

Fascinating to see nuclear power becoming a possibility. I am old enough to have the shivers about that, though when I am in France I don't think that most of the electricity I use has been created that way.

Most people seem to think that Al Gore had a good business idea with
the climate change model, and he certainly makes a lot of money.

However, another possibility is certainly that the nuclear power
industry, which has suffered from bad reputation for decades, came up
with the climate change stuff to create a situation where we MUST go
nuclear to save us from a climate catastrophe.

And maybe after years of brain washing us to believe we would cause
changes to the climate and telling us we are evil even as we breathe
out, they come out now with articles like the above and offering us a
solution.

Australia - and the world - does not need nuclear power.

While I lived in Europe I have done some work for Desertec and
learned there how much energy we could get from just a small part of
the Sahara desert.

Just have a look at the picture on their website. I takes only 10
seconds to understand.

http://www.desertec.org/

I am glad to see they have extended their activities to Australia in
the mean time (which I actually suggested years ago to them) and from
looking at their Australian website you can see clearly that
Australia can not only get all its energy from renewable sources but
even export some to other countries.

http://www.desertec-australia.org/

Australia could well be the new "Saudi Arabia" of renewable energy.

Instead of building huge nuclear power plants near big cities and
close to cooling water like at Jervis Bay, Brisbane Waters, Lake
Macquarie, Port Stephens and so on it would be much better to start
now and do something, and save our environment and future.

Today is a very cold but sunny day in Sydney. Ask yourself how many
electric heaters will be used, and how much electricity could be
saved by using solar supported heating.

It is simple, does not cost much and can be set up very quickly, and
once in place, would run forever without cost and maintenance.

Who needs nuclear power in such a lucky country with an abundance of
renewable energy.

Well then you get yourself into parliament, choose a site for your nuke plant and then Ill watch and laugh as the locals tear you to shreds and destroy your parliamentary career.

No one believes a word that comes from you nuke supporters mouths. Didnt they also say that gen I reactors were safe and the chance of an accident was miniscule? Still happened but didnt it.

Your argument that we need to leave a toxic and dangerous legacy to our children from nuke plants to avoid leaving them a toxic and dangerous legacy from grenhouse is facile and self serving.

Distributed power systems like wind power and solar panels on house roofs would go a long way towards reducing emissions. But then the power companies and the capitalist parasites cant control and gouge their customers. They dont like the idea of us plebs usurping their power over us.

I think the problem of nuclear waste disposal has been over dramatised. Informal groups or criminals would find it difficult to retrieve canisters stored down a deep mine shaft. Remember the economy has to stay cohesive enough for today's kids to even have a future. In my opinion wind and solar power cannot maintain a conventional type of economy with both heavy industry and affordable household electricity supply. I fear that if we all believe that renewables will save us then the economy will weaken to the point that we cannot fund more renewables let alone nuclear.

I think Australia should hold off on any nuclear power stations until they can be built quickly. That could come from either modular design or overseas experience in producing a number of standard plants. Meanwhile Australia's position as the future leading supplier of uranium could ensure material is not diverted to weapons. We could even take used fuel back and bury it in the outback as a condition of sale. After all that's where most of the original radioactive elements came from. Once new design reactors get to 'off the shelf' status then they can take over. That still won't solve the problem of those like North Korea who already have weapon grade material.

Barry, a good article, I don't agree that we are changing, I believe it is doing it all on its own .. with possibly microscopic, and virtually immaterial, additions from us. In 100 years time, our "best science" may be seen as primitive, and heaven forbid, wrong.

I do not believe that we have all the answers today and it is arrogant to state that we know all there is to know about climate, we may never know it is so complex

I do agree with you though on nuclear power and know you've done a lot of work on it, but fear that the people who you dislike for not agreeing with you on Climate Change (I've read your website material) are but mere annoyances when compared to the anti-nuclear lobby for not understanding or not wanting to understand the state of the science.

In a similar way to people questioning the "best science" on climate, do some people question the current science on nuclear power generation. Scientists said in the 1950s that nuclear power was safe and wonderful, "trust us" they said "we know more than you and most importantly we know what's best for you".

A couple of incidents later and most of the reputation is gone. So it is with Climate science, the fact there are dissenting scientists at all is suspiciously “alarming”.

I'd like to have nuclear power, we could get rid of all the coal power stations and all the silly hobby power solutions, wind, waves whatever etc until they were more mature.

I'd go with a Faustian compromise.
If you can come up with a design -or petition, or political will- that requires all the existing nuclear warheads be converted to power stations...
Where do I sign?

[quote]I'd like to have nuclear power, we could get rid of all the coal power stations and all the silly hobby power solutions, wind, waves whatever etc until they were more mature.[/quote]

Coal powered steam turbines were also hobby technology 200 years ago, as were gas fired turbines. Should we have abandoned them as well at the time?

Solar is the future and the more we learn and invest in it now, the sooner it will be improved. Granted, it seems like some of it is junk technology at the moment, but given time and funding, just like steam was earlier, solar will come through and in some cases is already a viable reality!

As someone here posted a while ago. "We based our society on a finite resource that's running out and these nuclear fools want us to move to another finite resource to save us". Makes sense doesn't it?

It Imazes me that the extreme environmental lobby is so agro over the Nuclear issue.

When I listen to the deep green puritans they seem so sure,that the way to future energy sustainability is wind, solar and wave etc and electric cars, push bikes and community travel systems.

All we know is, that what ever we believe now is wrong. Us, economics and technology is Darwinian in it's nature and they must be allowed to evolve and prove themselves over time. Solar etc show promise, but if you want to secure supply from a decision now, then nuclear has to be a high order option

If you except that we (Humans) are causing/contributing to massive climate shift (I do) and we only have a short window of opportunity to shift then Nuclear should be part of the interim mix to secure immediate supply.

Each one of the so called green technologies may be low carbon foot prints, however each comes with their own environmental costs and baggage, as well as being unproven to supply base power so far.

I believe a real rational energy strategy needs to be formulated and when you way up potential technology advances etc in all fields, your right to suggest Nuclear shouldn't be ruled off the table. At least as an interim fuel.

If all the extreme Greens would start a company that produced low emmission energy, I would buy the output and some shares. But unfortunatly they want other people to fund their so cock sure ideas and be abusive to anyone who disagrees.

They need to realise that their not saving the planet, its been wiped out before and will be wiped out again, they are being selfish and just trying to prolong the biosphere that supports us for longer.

The earth has been a radioactive dust ball before and that was its natural state, where not saving anything the earth has allways been in flux, we just happened not to be on it.

I liked your article and its food for thought
Thanks

While Professor Brook presents a case for nuclear energy it remains futuristic. Currently there is not one commercial Generation 1V reactor operating anywhere.

Key findings in the Australian government’s nuclear energy review suggested that one scenario would see deployment of nuclear power starting in 2020 which could see 25 reactors producing about one third of the nation’s electricity by 2050.

Meanwhile, Australia’s obsession with unsustainable growth will see regional, national and multi-national pollutant corporations pollute with impunity for the next forty years and beyond while additional contaminated river systems fail and salinity and desertification further engulfs what’s left of our arable lands. Motor vehicle emissions of carcinogenic, carbon based chemicals will continue to impact on ecosystems and human health; the livestock industry will continue on rampage, consuming massive amounts of Australia's resources and the shoddy uranium industry will be tying up precious lands in perpetuity on radioactive, abandoned mine sites.

However, the Australian reviewers claimed that: “ Countries with successful nuclear power generation programmes have a strong and transparent regulatory environment.” This claim is misleading – particularly since the US has the most reactors in the world (103) yet remains the largest polluter of CO2 emissions on the planet and has a poor history of nuclear obfuscation and downright cover-ups.

The IAEA, which opens its database to regulators so they can learn from others' mistakes, has seen fewer reports in recent years -- 89 in 2006, down from 231 in 1985. It says this doesn't reflect improved safety, but regulators' failure to contribute reports to the voluntary system. "We know about many more events that we think should be reported," says Christer Viktorsson, an official in the IAEA's department of nuclear installation safety.

The report revealed that the French nuclear operator, Electricité de France SA, has reported since 2003 around 700 "significant" safety-related events each year at its 59 reactors to the Institute of Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety, a government-funded body. But the institute passes on only about 10 incident reports each year to the IAEA.

"Promethean environmentalism?" Sounds familiar to me.

I read Barry’s article in Tuesdays “The Australian”, I’m pleased to see this more expansive article appear here. The challenge facing us in relation to nuclear energy is the same as with climate change, that of opening closed minds.

Some of us feel that the need for nuclear power generation stands up well in its own right, unfortunately we need to undo the negative hype that has indoctrinated so many since the “ban the bomb” days in the 1960’s.

Likewise, no amount of contrary scientific evidence on AGW will dislodge the indoctrination of so many.

The 880 page report produced by scientists www.nipccreport.org/index.html and published by the Heartland Institute, not only offers a contrary scientific view of AGW, it offers some insight as to the origins of the IPCC.

Whilst this report is a serious peer review of the IPCC’s conclusions, the NIPCC report will fail to open the minds of AGW’ers in the same way that the “hard science” related to nuclear energy will fail to sway the nay sayers.

I suspect the main reason for this is the fear of ridicule. For those who have taken a strong position on AGW and nuclear energy, there is no way that facts will be allowed to replace stubborn ideology.

Barry Brook is stuck in his own dichotomy, that of accepting AGW in the face of growing scientific contradiction, whilst promoting a solution which suffers the same ideological opposition.

I guess we can expect the next round of comments to attempt to trash the NIPCC report rather than use it to open the debate further.

I have a former colleague who is still working in the nuclear industry after 40 years. I’ve asked him to source some of the nuclear energy “myth buster” research that is available. As soon as I have it I’ll post it on OLO.

<< there is no way that facts will be allowed to replace stubborn ideology. >>

Yep.

Gen IV reactors, like clean coal and flying pigs, can't help us in the short few years that scientists warn us are vital for making deep cuts in global carbon emissions : they are simply not here.

But if they were, we'd be right to be just as concerned about the weapons, waste and safety issues that have always tainted the nuclear industry's bold (and unfulfilled) promises.

existing reactor designs were sold as inherently safe, and the chance of meltdown was laughed off. until it happened. and happened again. So you'll have to forgive me for refusing to swallow the same promise for these 'over the horizon' designs.

the potential for production and proliferation of nuclear weapons materials from integrated fuel reactors has been understated at best, and too often misrepresented.

And while it's easier to get your head around 300 years of nuclear waste, I suspect we'd be back with the same problem of convincing (or coercing) vulnerable and disempowered communities into taking that hit.

Instead of fantasising about solutions that have yet to take shape, while carrying such baggage, let's instead look to the inevitable renewable energy industries that are already emerging around us. Up my way, a number of smaller towns already run off solar dishes with battery storage. The world's largest solar concentrator plant is being built in Mildura, promising 270 GWh per year, while the world's largest solar thermal plant is being built in Whyalla, providing continuous power thanks to an ammonia-based storage system. These, along with a myriad of opportunities presented by existing technologies to make use of Australia's abundant renewable resources, are the real good news stories of Australia's energy future.

Hey Q&A, you're back. We have some unfinished business on that other thread?

I take it you will have more to say on the NIPPC report when you've had time to go through at least some of the 880 pages?

<< there is no way that facts will be allowed to replace stubborn ideology. >> This comment can't possibly be your sum contribution?

Have you visited this report?

http.www.nipccreport.org/index.html

Spindoc

Nothing new in your post as is evident by the link you provided since it's well known that the NIPCC and the Heartland Institute’s use of flawed material to dupe the public has been previously exposed:

http://www.realclimate.org/docs/santer_etal_IJoC_08_fact_sheet.pdf

https://publicaffairs.llnl.gov/news/news_releases/2008/NR-08-10-05-article.pdf

Here's some of the "contributors" to the NIPCC/Heartland rave: “Nature not human activity rules the climate:”

1. S. Fred Singer (Author): physicist who has also argued that secondhand smoke doesn't have adverse health effects.
2. R Warren Anderson - "research analyst"
3. Dennis Avery - food policy analyst

4. Robert Carter - marine biologist (correction: should read marine geologist.") Carter's bio advises: 'His more general stratigraphic work contributes towards the research base which underpins the exploration for and development of sedimentary mineral deposits, including the important energy resources of coal, oil, gas and uranium’

5. Richard Courtney - Technical Editor for CoalTrans International (journal of the international coal trading industry)
6. Vincent Gray - coal chemist
7. Craig Idso - geographer
8. Hans Labohm - economist
9. Christopher Monckton - politician, business consultant
10. Tom Segalstad - geologist
11. Gerd Weber - meteorologist who works for the Association of German coal producers

There will always be a few sycophantic parasites to afflict the unwary with the pathogenic swill provided by the oil and coal shills, Spindoc.

The authors of the $154 "scientific" manual to which you refer, are Fred Singer and Craig Idso. I’d be careful of the company I keep if I were you Spindoc. And is there the remotest chance now of returning to the topic at hand?

http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Corrupt_Idsos.html

<< I guess we can expect the next round of comments to attempt to trash the NIPCC report rather than use it to open the debate further.>> You are so predictable Protagoras, you just jumped in and trashed the report and the people.

I did not say they were right Protagoras, just that they had an opposite scientific opinion and that it might be worth discussion. If on the other hand, you don’t want a debate because you have already made up your mind, that’s fine. All I can suggest is that as the scrambled egg approaches, DUCK!

"I did not say they were right Protagoras, just that they had an opposite scientific opinion and that it might be worth discussion. If on the other hand, you don’t want a debate because you have already made up your mind, that’s fine. All I can suggest is that as the scrambled egg approaches, DUCK!"

Spindoc

Has it escaped your attention that I am the only one so far to debate your post regarding the "opposite scientific opinion" of the NIPCC and the Heartland Institute?

Could that be because it has nothing to do with the topic, the topic being the pros and cons of nuclear energy for Australia, which to my knowledge is not mentioned in the report you provided so how can the report be of an "opposite" "scientific" opinion?

Since you give the impression that you have read the entire but irrelevant and off-topic 880 page report, authored by Singer and Idso, why not start your own thread rather than corrupt the threads of others by throwing in red herrings to benefit your own agenda?

Not a corruption of the thread at all Protagoras. Barry Brook states specifically that the need for nuclear energy is to solve climate change. I suggested that nuclear energy should stand on its own merits and that the case for AGW is not conclusive, citing the NIPCC report as another reason for opening the debate further.

You said you were << the only one so far to debate your post regarding the "opposite scientific opinion" of the NIPCC and the Heartland Institute >>. Try as I might, I have failed to see anything close to a “debate” in your post. You simply attacked anything and everything about that report, then got stuck into the authors. Your post is angry, vindictive, abusive and insulting. A debate? I don’t think so.

Some might describe your post as a definitive description of whom and what you are. When you flare like that, and you are getting worse, you are telling me that you lack the capacity to debate anything, a closed mind. I picture you with hands over ears shouting la, la, la, la, la.

Spindoc

Yes, I have read the report. But as you say, “there is no way that facts will be allowed to replace stubborn ideology.”

I do have a lot I could say about Singer’s and Idso’s Heartland publication (and their peer’s review of it), but here is not the place – I am with Protagoras on that.

I feel we may agree on nuclear power (I don't share Protagoras' view, I think) like Barry Brook. However, I have my doubts as to whether Australia needs to go down that track, just yet. Other countries yes, and they are.

Oz has a lot more to do (because it can) in other forms of energy generation. Fwiw, coal will be around for a long time (we can’t shut it down overnight) but there is no such thing as “clean coal”, despite what the industry’s (and government/opposition) lobbyists claim.

As I have said in another lost thread, it is not about right/wrong, yes/know, black/white, etc. It is NOT a binary system ... I can only suggest you read those comments again.

Cheers

The problem with the effort to fight climate change is that the only people emotionally motivated to give a damn are those fruity enough to believe that it can be done without a realistic alternative to coal.

Sadly, when in 2020 we have had an increase in CO2 the public will wake up to reality of stark choices.

Mean whilst, after all that is said and done, more is said than done.