Shadow and Pelican,
I we banned export of coal we would have enough to
last hundreds of years and we would cut down the the CO2 by many times
as it would not be burnt overseas.
Then as oil winds down it would reduce CO2 also.
Now that should make the greens happy and we would have cheap power
for a long time and would exceed the 2050 target for co2 if anyone
will be concerned about that by then.

We would not need the expense of nuclear power and by 2050 we may have
managed to rebuild the world economy and have a method to replace growth.
By 2050 thorium reactors might be all the go and available in kit form.

SM
Just because you say something or post a link does not make it the 'truth' and subsequently does not mean the other party is 'lying'.

Bazz
Would we get away with not exporting our resources without international response? Thorium may well provide some options but it is not there yet in terms of the environmental aspects.

Australia certainly has enough gas reserves to replace oil if needed.

I would just hate to see human beings destroy vast areas of the planet making them unliveable for thousands of years through incompetent handling of nuclear options.

Unfortunately my faith is not all that strong in governments or private corporations to handle such a responsibility. Best to leave it alone altogether IMO.

Pelican said;
Would we get away with not exporting our resources without international response?

Well that is a risk of course. It is something the pollies of the time
would have to make the decision. Maybe if we promise to export to the
US they would be prepared to scare off others.

Natural gas should not be exported because from what I have read there
may not be as much gas as many jornalists are saying.
There have been a couple of articles on the Oil Drum about the fast
depletion rate of shale gas wells. Not sure how that would relate to
coal seam gas wells. Gas wells normally have a much shorter life
than oil wells and they deplete very fast once peak is reached.

We have left it too late to make a smooth transition to whatever the
next era's energy supply will be.
I believe it is inevitable that we will now go through an extended
period of winding back to a period like the start of the 20th century.

What would worry me if I was to be here to see it would be the effect
of the systemic collapse that can be a feature of complex societies.
A few of those that study these things are saying that such a complex
society collapse could happen quite soon in the future.

I am not so sure as we have a community memory of how everything
worked a 100 years back. Imagine the groans if the internet went one
day and the telephone system the next day !
Well some believe that would be the end of the world, but I think we
would adapt pretty quick.

Dear Pelly,

I'm 100% with you on this issue. As are many European countries
who have chosen to phase out nuclear power while others are
totally rejecting it.

In the years immediately after World War II nuclear power was seen
as the energy resource of the future - one that would provide
electricity "too cheap to meter." Today, nuclear reactors seem
like monuments to a god that failed. There are over 200 nuclear
plants in some twenty-five countries, but many of them are
managerial, financial, or engineering disasters.

The principal public fear is that a "meltdown" at a nuclear reactor
could release a plume of deadly radiation into the atmosphere,
perhaps before people in surrounding communities could be warned and
evacuated. Despite constant assurances from the industry that
nuclear reactors are safe, opinion polls show that the public is
unconvinced - especially since the serious nuclear accidents in Japan,
Three Mile Island, and Chernobyl.

Actually, a nuclear accident of
much greater magnitude occurred near Kyshtym in Russia in the late
1950s (Google it), spreading radioactive debris over a wide area which
will be uninhabitable for centuries.

The full story of this disaster has never been told, but the names of
about 30 small towns in the region have disappeared from Russian
maps and an elaborate system of canals has been built, to carry
rivers and other water systems around the contaminated area.

Nuclear reactors produce notoriously hazardous wastes. What is needed
is a place that will safely contain the waste for at least 10,000
years, which is long enough for most of it to decay. The location of
such a site is a ticklish political problem, for the obvious reason
that people are generally unenthused about the prospect of having a
radioactive dump in their own neighbourhood.

In Australia we have the added problem of a fresh water supply.
There is large storage of underground water in aquifers
which the rural farming population relies on. Storing toxic
nuclear waste underground could poison our undergound water supplies.

I think, like you - we'd be better off giving nuclear power a miss.

Nuclear reactors were a horse pushing a carriage, it is ok to have a permanent heat rod but what to do with it when it is finished. That should have come before any thing else. And the problem still goes on.
In this country we do not need such things, there is a host of alternatives not yet fully exploited. The legacy of neuk, reactors are going to be around for hundreds of years. The indigenous people knew where the uranium was, they called it sickness mountain, and not to go there.

Pelican,

Having claimed to be widely read on the subject the statement "Even advocates of nuclear understand the finite resource of uranium would mean only (9-30 years depending on who you believe)" can only be a deliberate false hood.

Having read the mineral reserve reports of the big miners, and those summarized by the IAEA there is nothing to indicate that there is anything less than several hundreds of years of uranium supply at present easy extraction, and 10x that at slightly more difficult extraction.

There is only one article published by a post grad student that indicates otherwise, that also did not pass peer review.

Having had access to this information previously, what you posted was a deliberate lie. I believe that you have no interest in the truth and are quite happy to continuously repost the same falsehoods.

France has led the way in reprocessing waste to reduce its volume 10 fold and to reuse spent rods.

Since again no one has provided an alternative to fossil fuels, the choice is nuclear or climate change.