At last, a rational discussion re nuclear power production for Australia. But, I think we’re missing the bigger picture here. Australia has over 40% of the world’s uranium reserves. Australia could become the one stop shop for the sale and thence the safe storage of uranium once used. That’s in addition to the ten or so nuclear reactors we need for power production. We should have started 30 years ago - lots of catch up to do.
That is the most one sided discussion ever. In Germany we are already above 50% renewables. Nuclear power does not work well with renewables. Look at energy mixes changing bin the world. They dont do that because of ideology but because its cheaper. The laughing stock is: France has the most enviable nuclear energy program. Not even the french like their own program. Its old, faulty has huge problems and at the moment their energy is more expensive than in germany.
Yes, grid infrastructure is in place there, but what do you do for energy supply in the 10 years between coal shutdown and nuclear coming online? HVDC interconnections is a mature solution available now. Nuclear takes too long to be a viable solution. Tony Abbott should have started a nuclear program in 2013, but he didn't.
As an engineer I never understood the opposition of Nuclear in Australia. Some general population sounds like worried as well as Govt. But that is not from technical expertise. What happened in Germany didn't make sense either, but I will say good for France and other European neighbors there can benefit from Electricity exports. Australia doesn't have that option. Grid sharing with other continent is also not that viable in near future.
I've been investing in uranium since 2020 , I have watched a lot of interviews regarding this energy. For those who haven't herd of Rick Rule his knowledge is second to none and has stated a couple of times now that the world has spent trillions on renewable energy for less than a 2 percent gain , this is what I would call insanity. Because this is such a critical decision moving forward for Australia should we be voting for a separate body of experienced people to over look our mission to achieve the desired outcome . As all I can see by around 2035 the politicians will realise they have stuffed up and then they will play the usual blame game and none of them will have any accountability for there actions. Great talk and I hope a lot of people watch this.
Nuclear is a proven and safe form of energy for major first-world economies used successfully and reliably in practice for over 50 years (e.g. France, Canada, etc.) and we have an abundance of uranium resource which we already export. This should be a bipartisan solution and a sure path to prosperity and higher living standards.
Nuclear would a great solution for the 2040s. Unfortunately, we need a solution for large scale electricity supply now, this decade, so HVDC interconnectors fit our time frame requirements to replace coal, whereas nuclear doesn't fit our time frame. HVDC is proven out in Europe, already paying for itself while in progress to building out the European super grid. HVDC is also perfect for continuing growing needs for electricity supply. HVDC is also a good fit for our duck curve demand/supply, whereas nuclear is a bad fit. Nuclear is a good fit for 24/7 constant power needs in heavy industrial processes, which is part of Victoria's rapidly approaching crisis in running out of gas. For that niche case, nuclear is very much worth considering. For Australia's energy needs in general, nuclear simply doesn't scratch the right itch.
@@naomieyles210 Sadly HVDC no use at all without a huge expansion in wind and solar to feed in as well as lots of $$$s. The labor govt has made it clear that what we will get is COG ie. no progress at all
@@jimgraham6722 Agree, except that adding wind and solar is the easy part of the equation. It's market ready and the free-market is well able to supply the need, provided they can overcome regulatory hurdles and get a high voltage connection to the grid. The missing piece is grid and interconnectors, but that's all doable on short timescales.
@@naomieyles210 Good points but for me it is as much about national strategy as economics. In this regard wind, solar, their storage mechanisms and grid infrastructure have their points of vulnerability, particularly when you look at the needs of industry and transport. In this regard a diversity of energy sources and various ways to connect the system up is very important. Nuclear energy is important because it greatly diversifies and strengthens the energy system, particularly for industry. Having said that, rooftop solar PV with batteries for residential and small business use is an excellent way of achieving a strong diversified system for that sector. We need a lot more of it. This also helps put downwards pressure on domestic energy prices. That is unequivocally a good thing. We just need to ensure as many people as possible have access to the necessary capital. Wind will be mostly useful for those applications with a large tolerance for variability and non criticality of supply, electrolysis, some chemical processes, desalination, some heating/cooling applications, water pumping etc.
@@naomieyles210 the world has shown it can build NPPs in about 5 years. This is not some insurmountable hurdle; it is a matter of planning, scheduling, and project management. Presenting a long time-to-operation as a inherent feature of nuclear is just factually incorrect. Hire the proper contracting firms, and you'll get it done properly. Hire EDF or Westinghouse - maybe you won't.
Build a nuclear power station or 3, put a cafe and tours in the plant, public opposing mitigated. I can see nuclear as technology, industry, jobs and future for our kids as well as power security. Yes, the nuclear moratorium for nuclear power should be removed so we can start planning to get it right. We MUST start now. I drive a Tesla, I have a roof solar array and home battery but I'm also a nuclear advocate.
I'm a nuclear advocate, too, and nuclear would have been a good solution for Australia in 2013 under Tony Abbott. Nuclear is a bad solution in 2024 because we have a coal power fleet at end of life and need a nuclear fleet now, not in 10 years time. We cannot magic up a nuclear fleet in a few short years, but we can build out HVDC interconnectors in that time frame. I hear the new grid infrastructure is running late, but running late doesn't stop it from being a good option in our circumstances. Nuclear probably fits some niche use cases in Australia, but it doesn't solve replacing coal power in the required time frame.
When all of the 1000s of off river pumped hydro sites have been built to support renewables and their communities, we can have a discussion about 7 nuclear sites being built (or just not needed).
@@hitreset0291 The trouble is corruption. A hydro electricity plant near me has been closed down and replaced by solar. Too much money to be made from tax payer subsidies to use existing hydro. Plenty of native animals killed for solar instead, and this far south, six hours of daylight in winter. Nuclear will cost billions, but renewables will cost trillions, according to the CSIRO.
Aidan Morrison argument that if "free" renewable electricity was true then the grid costs added into the customers electricity bills would still be substantial. He is right. Grid costs are a huge majority part of the costs. Grid maintenance costs add to total grid costs. 24/7 servicing capacity. Other nuclear promoters have said $1million per km new grid construction costs. Government publications refer to 1million km of grid total length to 20million buildings. $TRILLIONS construction costs in a 1TRILLION GDP economy. I am an old Construction Civil Engineer contractor who has worked on coal fired and gas turbine generation electric plant new construction. $$$$$$$$ I have worked on new transmission lines construction 1,700 tower transmission line. $$$$$$$$ I have worked in busy street construction with their access restrictions and daily time frames. $$$$$$$$$ I have grandchildren and their future is more important than the chaotic thinking about the wrong problem that comes from ignorant understanding. Experts laugh at the non experts speaking about the experts area of knowledge. Sadly experts outside their own expertise remain embarrassingly confident. Confident and foolish. Solve the right problem.
@@mikehitch7799 thanks for your comment. Gas is cleaner and can be turned on and off. Coal CO2 clean up would be twice the gas CO2, and technically and economically extremely expensive. The rooftop PV, and EV with V2G and big battery have a major problem in that only China is supplying EV and big batteries. China has been an unreliable trading partner to Australia and has threatened Australia. The weakest part of my post is enough reliable economic supply. Robotic factories could make a difference sometime soon I hope. Just my thoughts.
This was a highly enjoyable discussion on nuclear. This was largely down to our guest speakers being able to say what they had to say in a way that we could all understand. I do wonder if location of nuclear plants will be the biggest hurdle we face. But I agree with the speakers that once the ball gets rolling on this, it will gain momentum quickly. It just needs to get off to a good start with Facts, Facts and more Facts leading the charge. And I do like that point about Ecology rather than Environment. I am astounded at the potential damage being caused to flora & fauna in the interest of saving the planet.
It's so refreshing to hear someone who clearly knows what they're talking about! The renewable "rubber band" will only stretch so far & THAT is nowhere near far enough!
A real problem with Labor, holding back Australia's prosperity with its dogmatic refusal to adopt nuclear base load power generation. Hence never support Labor to be elected again.
That was true of Labor in 2012, but Tony Abbott had the perfect opportunity to start nuclear in 2013, and he dropped the ball. Nuclear in 2024 is too little, too late, because it takes 15 years to build out and we need solutions now. HVDC interconnections provides energy solutions now -- nuclear doesn't.
To@@naomieyles210 Thanks for your interest. True Liberal governments have the same trend to not want to manage properly in the interest of the people and rater concentrate to be elected again. Although we have a democracy once the politicians are elected we have very limited control over them, they can even switch sides or go independent without asking the people. That is why Australia should become a better democracy and install citizens initiated referendum. However it is never to late to make changes for the better it is just the cost goes up the longer we wait. And as is said by Helen Cook we need to think long term.
@@KF-bj3ce totally agree re. CIR. On the subject of nuclear, that ship has already sailed for Austraiia. We urgently need to replace our coal power fleet inside the next 10 years, and the build out time frame for a single nuclear reactor is 6 to 10 years, with high risk of cost and time overruns. We don't have the regulatory frameworks and we don't have the skilled personnel, so that pushes the project delivery date out further and makes the massive scale required that much more difficult to achieve. The other solution is HVDC, where each interconnector pays for itself in a short time frame, and each interconnector increases the percentage of cheap variable renewables we can incorporate in the grid. HVDC is already paying for itself in Europe, and is on the way to building out the European super grid. HVDC fits our time frame, needs, and existing skills. It's too late for nuclear to provide what we need here in Australia. I do think nuclear has great potential for niche use cases in Australia, it just doesn't fit the overall coal replacement use case.
@@KF-bj3ce I get the impression that the LNP is more interested in nuclear while in opposition, and less interested when in government. Given a 6-10 year construction time, plus a lead time of several years for regulatory frameworks and other preparation, a nuclear reactor doesn't fit neatly into a term of office. We'd need an entire fleet of nuclear reactors to solve our issues with our coal power fleet coming to end of life, and we need them this decade. Due to the time frame mismatch, we are forced to pursue the HVDC route, so it's fortunate that HVDC is a proven technology and a good match for our needs.
To@@naomieyles210 That may be so, but is the Australian constitution so weak that this can not be legislated for completion and do we forever have to put up with this nonsense.
We need these knowledgeable people to be heard by the people of Australia. The courage to discuss these matters without the fear pushed by politicians and media.. The most important thing is cheap power for manufacturing to be restored in Australia let alone green hydrogen. Contract Rolls Royce or General Electric before it’s too late.
I think rather than trying to manufacture solar panels that Australia produces big batteries. The worldwide trend is battery storage will overtake pumped hydro storage in 2025.
Let’s get the people from Chernobyl and Fukushima to help. This should be the model for Australia. Radioactive waste exploding into the air, it will serve two purposes poison the nation and free fireworks on new years.
I cannot understand Labor's refusal to consider nuclear. It's an area that is revealing new scientific breakthroughs on a consistent basis. Labor is shutting its mind to any new discovery that may come along. Absolutely bizarre.
Yeah. New breakthroughs that boast of "recycling the fuel rods" which is code for "we pile spent nuclear rods on top of each other and leave them in the actual reactor"; Fukushima showed an example of how volatile that can be.
That would mean re-energising the manufacturing sector building new power stations. Had you not noticed they've been dismantling Australian independence on energy for 20+ years? You cannot strangle a strong independent nation, you have to weaken it to the point of starvation.
How many new nuclear power plants are under construction at present in the UK or USA ???. How many new nuclear power plants have actually been fully approved to start construction in the US'UK and actually proceeded into the physical construction phase in the last decade ??? It is certainly easier to build small nuclear power plants, but given a small nuclear sub or power plant would only produce say 37,500 hp which is equivalent to 5 last generation US main line steam engines of say the Mohawk, Niagra or Duplex type which could be built today into a revised geared oil or coal power station for half a billion dollars a minimal cost of about 1 percent of an equivalent 40,000 shp nuclear power plant and would provide basic electricity for only a small town of 40,00 people. There is no point in such small nuclear power plants. Current nuclear power stations are very much based on steam turbine technology of the late 1940s which is totally obsolete technology ( the QE2 cunnard liner and HMS Bristol in the late 1970s are good illustrations of the failure and impossibility of developing the relevant steam tech furthur) and as Rickover said it is the steam turbine part of the equation which is the difficult and dangerous part of the US nuclear plants and just like an old JA NZR last generation rail engine the steam part of a nuclear power station can certainly blow apart due to blowback which when combined with a pressurised water reactor will casuse hari kari in the nuclar system as well. There is no doubt that early nuclear submarines say the USN Skipjack or Soviet November were very fast with top speeds of around 35 knots and they were twice as fast as available anti submarine torpedoes, effective wire guided a's torpedoes capable of use against submarines at ranges of 2-6 miles( before the introduction of the USN Mk 48 in the 1970s) and only available to the UK post cold war. In the case of the Mk 37 or RN Tigerfish no more than 24-26 knots. It is still tremendously difficult for a torpedo to be guided by a sub towards another sub and catch up with a sub moving away from the attacking and tracking torpedo launching sub The problem with small nuclear subs and nuclear power stations are they are dangerous and can be done by many nations while large nuclear power stations or nuclear subs like a LA class or a Akula are very difficult to replicate today as we have far fewer brilliant physicists and mathermaticians and in the nuclear field the relevant chemicals and agents can never🎉🎉 be entirely replicated as even the first nuclear and hydrogen tests changed the chemistry and biosphere of the world quite substantially
@@resurrectingand it's economic. * nuclear is more expensive. * nuclear build out takes 15 years. * we need energy solutions now, not in 15 years. * HVDC interconnections are a mature technology that provides solutions now. Tony Abbott in 2013 was the last decent economic opportunity for Gen 3 nuclear in Australia, and he dropped the ball. We won't have another economic opportunity like that until Gen 4, SMR, or Inertial Fusion reactors are proven out, probably in the 2040s.
I'm pro Nuclear, still, the Mr. Paterson's claim that solar doesn't pay / work, is simply not true. My relative installed solar a few years back in WA and it and I have seen their power bills drop by more than 50%. Nuclear shouldn't be an all or nothing argument, it should be a case of combination with existing and future energy solutions. Frankly the presentation comes off as rather combative, which is counter productive, being flippinet and dismissive of the general public (treating them as they are stupid) doesn't help the cause of upgrading Australia's power grids. Because it's far easier to argue against nuclear, so perhaps showing a more solution based approach would work better.
"My relative installed solar a few years back in WA [...] and I have seen their power bills drop by more than 50%." Because your relative is *_stealing_* power-service.
There is no advantage to Australia to pursue nuclear. We do not need to burden our future with nuclear. The huge cost blowouts are guaranteed, the delay while we build these plant means we will fall behind the most reasonable decarb goals. Renewables with pumped hydro are 100% safe, clean and cheap.
This is all about keeping coal going as long as possible by building a great big, never finish, white elephant. Renewables with battery storage is cheaper than coal and gas and half the price of nuclear. Anyone with solar panels on their roof knows that and that is 1 in 3 homes in Australia. Nuclear for Australia is a criminally negligent waste of taxpayers money and as with all centralised power generation an ongoing national security risk because power stations are military targets. Instead of desperately trying to keep jobs going with coal mining perhaps reducing electricity generation costs by adopting renewables gives regulators the opportunity to harvest a royalty on electricity with the aim of providing more useful jobs for the community than just digging big hole in the ground. All done with no extra cost to the community.
You need to do a bit more research, renewables are not cost effective or the cheapest form of electrical generation when you take into account an extra 28,000 kms of Bushfire starting HV grid transmission lines that are necessary to make their renewable scheme work & that is not costed for, or the dams or batteries needed for storage. Renewables are a low density energy source that is intermittent & unreliable subject to weather conditions & sunshine (the very thing we are trying to change for some ridiculous & false reason), they can’t supply good base load power or industry requirements 24/7 so the industry’s we need will vanish. I could argue if they are even actually green by any real standard because more CO2 is probably created to produce and install these renewables than they will ever offset in their lifetime + their is no recycling program for end of life pv panels or wind generators & blades, on top of this the environmental destruction that is going on to the Great Dividing Range & many other protected areas without debate is criminal, koala & platypus habitats being blasted and bulldozed for wind farms. I am someone who has two properties that both have solar and batteries that I would not have if they were not so heavily govt subsidised, so I am not anti renewables, I have worked in the electrical industry and on solar. Solar and wind power is not a national energy solution at any cost, it will fail (and already is), and so will our economy (which already is) from renewables, they require an endless bucket of money to make it work to some degree, so they are not cost effective. The climate doomsday narrative is an overstated lie to justify their net zero agenda with the renewables scam. Labor hates us and they are wrecking Australia to prove it, open your eyes.
I really like the discussions coming out of the CIS, however I can’t seem to find a discussion similar to this, with a pro-renewables panel. Would you consider doing one if one has not already happened?
Think tanks are paid to promote their funder's agenda. There is no way they would subsdise a forum to promote a counter arguement. It means these foorums end up being rather dull, as there is rarely any disagreement between the panel members, and presentations are often low on visual data and statistics.
@@JoeS-o2r agree with you on think tanks. For an objective assessment, you want an engineer, not a think tank. HVDC interconnectors are the vital enabling technology which CIS is skirting around. Look up Australian channel Engineering with Rosie: * Four Reasons Why Nuclear Power is a Dumb Idea for Australia * Can You Run a Grid on 100% Wind + Solar? * Electricity Across Oceans: Is HVDC the Future? Also Real Engineering: * Is 100% Renewable Possible by 2050? - Interconnectors (the European super grid which is already in progress and already paying for itself too) * The Economics of Nuclear Energy (the comparison to gas in the first half of the video is very relevant). Also B1M: * Why Nuclear is Making a Comeback (nuclear is complicated and cost/time overruns are common)
😂 you joking right. If they wanted discussion they wouldn’t sit around in a circle j, talking about how old mates solar panels aren’t making him money because his retailer has cut his feed in tariff. Or how the wind won’t blow this week, because the offshore wind looks pretty darn active most days this week. Yet he wants to bring a power source into the market that will centralise generation increasing cost because the base capacity will require locked in guaranteed revenue for some multinational investment company like Brookfields to take more dollars out of the country.
@@naomieyles210 As much as I like some of her content, it's hard to say that "engineering with rosie" is super trustworthy when it comes to power generation methods, as she works in the renewables sector. Just as you wouldn't trust someone who works in the fossil fuel sector if they tell you how terrible renewables are....
@@cerealport2726 Rosemary Barnes has 19 years in the industry and a relevant PhD. That makes her an authoritative source, which is more than I can say for myself. Real Engineering and B1M creators are also qualified in related fields, which is why I listed them, too. Rosemary Barnes (aka Engineering with Rosie) is supportive of nuclear power in general, just not for Australia given current circumstances. Refer her video entitled "Can Small Modular Reactors Save Nuclear Power?" dated 9th March 2022. The hydrogen conversation there is relevant to process heat for heavy industry, which is of interest to Australia. The load following design is relevant to Australia, too. NuScale is troubled, but SMR remains a potential future technology option for niche use cases here in Australia. The point is not to fangirl over one of my favourite UA-cam channels, but rather to provide @stefancostanzo5396 with a variety of video content to expand their knowledge. If we were on a blogging platform, I'd refer them to research, reports and reference pages instead.
Great debate? Well it might have been a great debate if you included a neutral or critical speaker. No chance of that from the CIS of from Chris's new employer Sky.
To be fair he did say he would debate anyone at any time, so its probly more to do with the anti nuclear people not being willing to have a proper discussion.
This is pitiful. There's no mention of the vast costs of construction, that nuclear energy will run at a loss, and then have $249,000,000,000 in decommissioning and safe storage costs in the next hundred years if the UK is any guide. As the safe storage needs to continue for 100,000 years Australia taxpayers will be on the hook effectively forever.
Australia burying it's head in the sand and ignoring nuclear options including upcoming SMR, MMR and most recent, nano reactor technology is quite ludicrous. Larry Fink the chairman of Blackrock recently told the WEF that investing in renewables is a bad option. This is in part due to data centres and upcoming AI technology require stable and reliable power sources. This is something renewables cannot now or likely ever be able to provide. Going forward, nuclear has to form an integral part of the Australian grid.
Probably true. Coal and Gas already know how goofy and unlikely New Nukes are -- so they put up silly crap like this to deter genuine renewables like Wind and Solar.
Sorry. I'm all for consideration of a possible nuclear power generation future for Australia and the potential it offers for grid stability and flexibility with lower emissions, but if this group of 3 'experts' are supposed to convince me that it's feasible, affordable, can be safe and sold as acceptable to the people, and is not just a Murdoch and Fossil fuel industry inspired and funded attempt to railroad and delay the current renewable energy program they will have to do a lot better. I find Adi Paterson a divisive figure who manipulates the truth to suit his every argument. He downplays the Chernobyl and Fukishima failures, proclaims increasing CO2 will revegetate the world's deserts and intimates that Synroc has solved the nuclear waste issue when it has apparently never been regarded by the global nuclear community as an economic or practical solution. How can he credibly continue to flog SMRs as economically feasible, the way of the future and currently happening in other parts of the world, when he was the CEO of the costly Pebble Bed Reactor in South Africa which failed to attract any serious investors and was scuttled? Where are the safe and affordable SMR's which are currently licensed and being built in other countries? Australia has had years to sort out the legalities and adopt a nuclear power generation future but our political masters have spent decades either sitting on their hands and/or arguing over the high price, much to the glee of the fossil fuel industry.
Sourcewatch says this The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) is an economically liberal (or neoliberal, depending on your point of view) and socially conservative think tank based in Sydney. And doesn’t it show teaming up with a sky news reporter to support an uncosted plan with no details to saddle us with the most expensive way to generate power.
@@jvvoidlol debate the information.. not the so called ideology.. all that does for your argument by highlighting it is shows YOU are ideologically driven
@@Kenneynrg Nuclear is the most expensive option for energy generation. The least efficient. Fact. You enjoy your little fairytale, we adults will deal with reality.
56 nuclear plants in France and still only produces 68% of its power needs. 😅 and Dutton says we only need 7 plants, also France has been building the plants since 1960 that is 64 years of building and replacing them to service just 68% of its needs 🙄. Get real Australia.
Do you appreciate how many dinky solar panels are required to match a single nuclear plant? (And it just gets worse when you account for the amount of overbuild necessary to compensate for the poor availability of renewables)
>85% on 8 July 2024. France is exporting power to Germany/UK/others. Suggest you get your facts right. 37plants built in the 80s; 5 in the 90s; only 4 since 2000. The older units were smaller. The average construction time has ben 6.5 years.
funny the sort who scoff at solar panels on your roof because of "upfront cost" suddenly want to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a nuclear fantasy.
I'm all in with nuclear, part of the reasoning I disagree with, low carbon footprint. forget about carbon, it's a good thing, politicians need to pull their heads out of their @$$ and just get it done for cheap energy. solar and wind is economically and logistically expensive right through is life. not to mention intermittent. also interesting point, I'm in New Zealand and we just had a warning about saving energy because of the risk of blackouts, one reason given by our biggest provider is that the wind farms it partly relies on produced less than expected levels, so there you go !
Solar is far cheaper than nuclear - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source. It's decreased in cost by 82% in the past decade, and is already several times cheaper than nuclear. A nuclear plant would likely take 30+ years to build and pay off, and would need to compete with the cost of renewables then (when it's not competitive now). Australia is up to 39% renewables and on target for 82% by 2030, but these don't work well with nuclear. Nuclear is inflexible - it cannot scale up and down quickly. Hydro, batteries and gas provide the dispatchable energy needed.
In 20 years when nuclear is fully installed and expensive, then offgrid with Battery Vehicles and rooftop PV and dirt cheap electricity will mean customers will abandon the national electrical grid. 15% of rooftop can supply too much electricity. Vehicles parked 23hrs every day can store too much electricity with Battery Vehicles. Most vehicles will trickle charge all daylong. Ezi pezi. Grid owners will be screaming for government protection from dirt cheap offgrid in the suburbs. As each customer abandons the grid, grid customers costs begin to explode. Horse meat was cheap when horses were not wanted. 😮
@jvvoid Sorry, my mistake. I meant to be commenting to someone else. The other person is from outside the electricity supply industry and is ignoring how little electricity is used compared to total fossil fuels used. And how expensive the existing 'small' electricity capacity has to be expanded.
1kg of coal = 6 hrs running a washing machine. Available 24/7 1kg of oil. = 9 hours running a washing machine. Available 24/7 1kg of renewables = less than 1hr running a washing machine. Available less than 30% of the time and requires every watt of power to be backed up by another source of power, usually fossil fuel. This is the equivalent of a second grid when only one is required. 1kg of uranium = 2000 years running a washing machine. Available 24/7 I wonder which one is more efficient and less costly. Why don’t we get rid of all the subsidies and let the market decide which is the most efficient. Renewables will be last on the efficiency/affordable list every which way you look at it.
You think private capital is stupid enough to fall for this?? The market's already decided, genius. That's why Dutton's plan is entirely dependent on govt (taxpayer) funding. No-one else wants to go near it. From all our pockets directly to LNP donors and mates, because their plan is to go from rich.. to obscenely rich.
Pretty much nonsense. We run full houses from Solar PV ONLY. Including Laundry and Air Conditioning. And charging the Tesla EV. Requires no "back up" as Solar PV is the most reliable electrical generation there is. No Moving Parts. Solar PV runs completely unattended on Islands, Buoys and in Space for DECADES. Why are you making up such nonsense?
Anyone bothered to look at world copper reserves, we are at deficit on copper supply and will require 700% to 1000% increase in copper extraction to meet demand, yet there is very little investment in future copper mining. Without copper your just blowing hot air out of your behind.
The grid won't work without generation in addition to wind and solar. We need the grid to work. AI and data are materially increasing the electricity demand. The dispatchable generation can either be gas or nuclear. Nuclear is CO2 free.
But what really matters is that CIS' opinion is that Nuclear is the cheapest and easiest to build. Facts contrary to this opinion are countered by saying the offending report is compromised. CSIRO's, in this case. Supporting evidence not needed.
More people have died from airplane issues & accidents than nuclear failures. Nuclear is no bigger risk to people than normal life issues. Coal mining is a big risk to life & itst not banned. So do we keep this ban in place?
Thanks for this excellent information video. Here is Labor burning gas in power plants which in turn could be used as a transport fuel in vehicles in the interim to better battery fuel systems. Solar rooftop systems are great as it generates power where it is being used with some minor upgrades on power transformers but without the need to upgrade Australia's power distribution network to the extent planed by Labor. I have lived in South Australia and seen the blackouts. The big battery in SA buys power at times of low cost then resells it to the citizens at time of need at high costs. Hence one could call the big battery a success but is it really or is it just a smoke screen? What about the damage caused by all these wind turbine structures and the cost of reinstating the land? Labor's plan is seriously flawed and will cause problems in the future if allowed to proceed.
Yes, let's assess our options, Helen. Westinghouse AP1000s? Bzzz, they went bankrupt. French EPRs? Bzzz, they have given up on them. APR1400s from the corrupt South Korean nuclear industry., bzzz. NuScale SMRs, bzzz, non-existent and the company is going bankrupt.
Not even France replaced petroleum for vehicles. The national grid is too small and too expensive. The real problem is grid economics stupi... Less fossil fuel more electricity more national electrical grid. No fossil fuels then, ×7 more electricity, ×7 more grid capacity. Australia can handle the $billion generation problem. Australia cannot handle $TRILLION transmission problem. The most expensive energy, grid electricity replacing all fossil fuels are you insane ? All customers will use dirt cheap rooftop electricity and their BV oversized battery. Most vehicles are PARKED 23hrs every day. And can connect trickle currents all day long. FREE energy storage all day long. Grid cashflows, $110BILLON will be a dead duck in 15 years. Are you insane. I know the French submarine contractors and the Australian Government thought Aidan Morrison was insane until they listened to facts. The French submarines could NOT PARK on station for very long. Half $billion later to the French, and Australia has 6 USA nuclear submarines on order. This is a good decision 👏 👌 😊
AUKUS has us spending significant money on nuke subs. If we had a nuke industry that could support small reactor technology for sub and land based use, that sounds like a strategy that could win broad support.
I can't imagine taking two or three years to build a reactor. The tech is 80 years old. The nuclear community is the biggest problem, it seems to me. They've overvalued their expertise and overcomplicated the entire system. They're boiling water to turn a freaking generator.
It's so great to have this discussion I am fed up with the woke demonisation of nuclear power generation. We need to develop a base load nuclear power generation industry here in Australia.
Helen Cook - fabulous! Great insight all round. Why can countries with far lower GDP embark on nuclear and AUS can't? The simple answer is that, deep down, we are not innovative or willing to take risks.
This would have been much better if it wasn't a circle jerk. Everyone just nodding at each other isn't helping in this debate. The old guy saying that he couldn't get payback on his solar array was either a lie or he isn't nearly as smart as he thinks he is. I've put two systems on houses and both were revenue positive within a short timeframe. One with subsidised tariffs and one without. Pfft.
I shall let you into a secret. The British bomb testing the sixties and early seventies saved Australia. Do you remember Soekarnoe’s Konfrontasi in 1965 when Borneo and Malaya, before Malaysia. Australia was to be next. Do you remember the squadron of RAF Vulcan V bombers which visited Darwin on a “Goodwill Mission”. A nuclear bomb was then flown to Darwin. Soekarno was then quietly warned that if one Indonesian trooper’s foot landed on Australia that bomb would land on him. The bomb had been developed at Marilinga by AWARE, the Atomic Weapons Australia Research Establishment in Adelaide. It was a joint UK-Australia mutual organisation. It stopped an attempted invasion of Australia. This really happened, and I am not James Bond. Be grateful, Aussies, for the Brit bomb and the RAF which saved you from hostile invasion. Oz Brit
Good work. However in the fifties Britain detonated nuclear bombs in central Australia. The Australian soldiers were in shorts and short sleeved shirts with no protective gear at all. They died prematurely.
I really needed to hear this today. The world seems to have gone crazy and finally this panel is talking in common sense. Thanks for the great insights and data what a great panel! :)
Climate deniers who are very troubled with financial assistance to renewables but didn’t mention $14.5 billion assistance annually to the fossil fuel industry, nor the fact that we basically give our gas away, collect minimal royalties from it and employ very few people.
Nuclear Waste Facility Folks - is there any truth in the rumour that Australia's new Nuclear Waste Facility will located at: Unit 3 - 199 Gympie Road Strathpine Queensland 4500 Please advise well in advance - so I can purchase the correct PPE!
Yes. And he said carbon dioxide is good for plants therefore Australia's deserts will become 'light green'. In complete ignorance or denial (or perversion) of the most recent IPCC report (generally accepted to be conservative).
A 2020 report by NSW Chief Scientist Hugh Durrant-Whyte, prepared for the NSW Cabinet, said introducing nuclear power would be expensive and difficult and that it would be naïve to think a nuclear plant could be built in less than two decades .A former Chief Scientific Adviser at the UK Ministry of Defence, Dr. Durrant-Whyte said: "The hard reality is Australia has no skills or experience in nuclear power plant building, operation or maintenance - let alone in managing the fuel cycle. Realistically, Australia will be starting from scratch in developing skills in the whole nuclear power supply chain.”
nuclear is grid electricity. If you are serious then the national grid capacity has to be 7 times bigger if Australia is to be 100% electric. The grid costs $1TRILLION and 7 times bigger is insane. Do your homework and grow up. Gas will half grid electricity. And little to build.
Over 60% of the land in Australia are Desert . Australia should try to sell more coal to China , and buy the Solar Panels from them in return . Install the Solar Panels in Desert areas only and generate a lot of cheap solar energy so as to enable Australia to become competitive in other industries . Cost of Solar Panels is dropping 10% / year and it is not wise to make cheap Solar Panels locally .
The current chief scientist is a physicist. previous chief scientists have been (in order): ecologist biologist immunologist chemical engineer molecular biologist astronomer neuroscientist neuroscientist The discussion about (the cost and timing of) nuclear power implementation is really related to engineering, not so much about science, and they are not the same thing, despite being intertwined.
Who pays them and what legislation is currently in place Answer it has nothing to do with science it’s politics and the Australian government of the pays the chief scientists wage. Legislative bans on nuclear stops any real discussion or debate on the so called green energy agenda. In a nut shell the Chief scientists will do as they are told by the government of the day.
He's not a nuclear scientis or an engineer. You still miss the Pont that wind isn't sufficient and the sun go down at night. Battries only last a few hours. How is major business going to power their companies? Do you relise how many watts a cold storage use in power alone. And you have the cost of 1 5 trillion dollars every 20 years for renewables. Australia can't afford that. Renewables isn't cheap it's dam expensive unreliable and stupidity to have as the only power source. Bowen and Albo and the Scientists you claim want just renewables. Than they better start making everything we use only 12 volts at only 1.2 watts so the battries can support 24/7 to have any reliable power. The avrage house use 25.43 kWh a day.
Youth will be paying for uni, their retirement, your retirement, rural infrastructure, 3 soldiers, climate damage and be delighted to know their country is sprinkled with poison. Definitely voting for their grandad's party.
Can we trust the CSIRO? Their report suggests that nuclear will be more expensive and hence less viable than renewables. This doesn't seem to resonate with what I would expect to be the case given the more extensive use of actual materials spread out across a very large footprint in the case of wind and solar as compared to the more concentrated use of resources with a very dense fuel source in the case of nuclear power.
It's not just the CSIRO - there's a lot of evidence that nuclear is more expensive than renewables. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source Nuclear plants are just extremely expensive to build. Solar and wind are far cheaper for the same production. Currently, nuclear is several times more expensive than solar, and the cost of solar has dropped 82% in the last decade, with batteries on a similar trajectory. Nuclear is already cost uncompetitive, but if you start building it now, it will take 30+ years to build and pay off its capital costs. It has to be competitive with whatever renewables cost then. There's a reason why the LNP is proposing using taxpayer dollars - no business would make that investment.
Is nuclear energy insurable? So should anything go wrong it is financially covered? What exactly happens to the waste and you bad is it? Sky news ...lol. say no more.
I’m very concerned about the land that is proposed for solar panels - and wind farms. Queensland projects are a worry at the moment. Would be good if that was brought out into general understanding so we can decide if we really want that land lost.
Legislation is in place around the world, so it is not a problem to 'Cut and paste'. Australia does not have to start with a clean page. Power stations are again all over the world, so why do we need to start with a brand new design. Part of the time problem is bureaucratic road blocks. Up front costs are high, but energy production is then very low. The comment was made. look at the whole picture and costs over a set time period. then compare with fossil fuel costs. Come and build a plant in my back yard.
Australia could probably even out-source the regulator while training staff to come up to speed using some sort of deal with whoever - US NRC, CA CNSC, UK ONR, Korea's NSSC, etc).
You might want to rethink that Jim boy. A 43 year old reactor would have been commissioned 43 years ago. Fast forward to 50+ years later it is not unreasonable to posit that technology - and hence lifespan of the next generation reactor build - would expand exponentially. The Wright Bros made their first flight in 1903 with only Orville Wright at the controls It was a 12 second flight and covered a distance of 120 feet. Some 83 years later (1986) I flew a B747 6 hours and 30 minutes for 4742 kms flying Jeddah - London with 400+ passengers at .86 Mach (.86 the speed of sound). So 43 years reactor lifespan to potentially 60-80-100 lifespan in a similar period seems eminently reasonable - if not seriously understated.
@@johnd1727 Positing and posturing has nothing to do with facts. Maybe's and should-be's and hopefully's are all nuclear pushers have to go with. Don't let the facts get in the way of the LNP donor's fairytales and their interests.
Yeah, Nukes have tended to become a long-term curse on their owner-operator. They have constant and continually increasing Operation and Maintenance costs as time goes on. It becomes cheaper to shut them down than to continue to operate them. In the US (largest Nuke operations in the World) ALL existing Nukes have been put on welfare this last year to prevent bankrupting off-line early.
I greatly appreciate this discussion while disagreeing with the overall consensus among these nuclear experts on the best way for us to proceed. And there is no "yeah, but" in that disagreement. These folks are all impressive and authentic imo. Also imo, people like this should be more central to our decision making in general. And I am certain that we can realistically make nuclear work here. But as with things like CCS, the people who could have made this happen weren't sufficiently focused upon it at the time it needed to happen.
Labor and Greens are pushed by foreign Green power companies that have our grid held to ransom. Those Australian and foreign owned companies invested in wind and solar are also heavily invested in Chinese manufacturing follow the money it has nothing to do with the climate con. This eggs all in one basket approach is dangerous for us as nation and this Green religion based politics is dangerous. We need a grid with more than Solar /wind generation purely because of land mass as it’s just not feasible to rely on wind and solar alone. Gas /coal and Nuclear mix is a far better more reliable and realistic option. Australians need to bring back our own public owned power grid and investment in a people bank for infrastructure like the commonwealth used to be before it was sold off by Labor’s Keating. This publicly owned bank could invest in a nation wide power grid that would certainly benefit from a nuclear industry.
does anyone here know if nuclear has ever been able to be shown to be cost effective when retiring the plant is considered? I haven't been able to find an example
AEMO are not following the laws of thermodynamics? You can’t take a diluted form of energy and make it less diluted without putting more energy into the system? I haven’t heard much on the discussion on nuclear waste/costs of management of nuclear waste in Australia. Also, is fusion so far off, it’s not worth considering?
No debate here just a positive push for a dangerous energy source, which Australia does not need. This type of promotion is just a deflection, and serves no useful purpose.
Come on Australia, time to grow up.
I grew up when I became an adult.
We have and nuclear is still a bad idea.
@@alancotterell9207Have you? You been saying some bizarre things about defending renewables on other threads mate
your right some old labor priminster said we will be the smart country
@@hitreset0291 why?
At last, a rational discussion re nuclear power production for Australia. But, I think we’re missing the bigger picture here. Australia has over 40% of the world’s uranium reserves. Australia could become the one stop shop for the sale and thence the safe storage of uranium once used. That’s in addition to the ten or so nuclear reactors we need for power production. We should have started 30 years ago - lots of catch up to do.
That is the most one sided discussion ever.
In Germany we are already above 50% renewables. Nuclear power does not work well with renewables. Look at energy mixes changing bin the world. They dont do that because of ideology but because its cheaper.
The laughing stock is: France has the most enviable nuclear energy program.
Not even the french like their own program. Its old, faulty has huge problems and at the moment their energy is more expensive than in germany.
Can I store my nuclear waste in your backyard?
You don’t want to become the world’s dustbin for uranium waste.
Put nuclear power stations where coal power stations already exist and the infrastructure is already in place.
Yes, a no-brainer
As long as theres water adjacent i dont have a problem with that
Yes, grid infrastructure is in place there, but what do you do for energy supply in the 10 years between coal shutdown and nuclear coming online?
HVDC interconnections is a mature solution available now. Nuclear takes too long to be a viable solution. Tony Abbott should have started a nuclear program in 2013, but he didn't.
@@naomieyles210 .....yes, Australia, as per usual is slow to do what needs to be done and too quick to adopt the stupid ideas....
We need 7 times more electricity to stop CO2 emissions the grid is not big enough.
As an engineer I never understood the opposition of Nuclear in Australia. Some general population sounds like worried as well as Govt. But that is not from technical expertise. What happened in Germany didn't make sense either, but I will say good for France and other European neighbors there can benefit from Electricity exports.
Australia doesn't have that option. Grid sharing with other continent is also not that viable in near future.
Go live in Fukushima and you may get a clue when your children have two heads.
I've been investing in uranium since 2020 , I have watched a lot of interviews regarding this energy. For those who haven't herd of Rick Rule his knowledge is second to none and has stated a couple of times now that the world has spent trillions on renewable energy for less than a 2 percent gain , this is what I would call insanity. Because this is such a critical decision moving forward for Australia should we be voting for a separate body of experienced people to over look our mission to achieve the desired outcome . As all I can see by around 2035 the politicians will realise they have stuffed up and then they will play the usual blame game and none of them will have any accountability for there actions. Great talk and I hope a lot of people watch this.
How’s the stock going?
Fantastic panelists, fantastic presentation
Nuclear is a proven and safe form of energy for major first-world economies used successfully and reliably in practice for over 50 years (e.g. France, Canada, etc.) and we have an abundance of uranium resource which we already export. This should be a bipartisan solution and a sure path to prosperity and higher living standards.
Nuclear would a great solution for the 2040s.
Unfortunately, we need a solution for large scale electricity supply now, this decade, so HVDC interconnectors fit our time frame requirements to replace coal, whereas nuclear doesn't fit our time frame.
HVDC is proven out in Europe, already paying for itself while in progress to building out the European super grid.
HVDC is also perfect for continuing growing needs for electricity supply.
HVDC is also a good fit for our duck curve demand/supply, whereas nuclear is a bad fit.
Nuclear is a good fit for 24/7 constant power needs in heavy industrial processes, which is part of Victoria's rapidly approaching crisis in running out of gas. For that niche case, nuclear is very much worth considering. For Australia's energy needs in general, nuclear simply doesn't scratch the right itch.
@@naomieyles210 Sadly HVDC no use at all without a huge expansion in wind and solar to feed in as well as lots of $$$s. The labor govt has made it clear that what we will get is COG ie. no progress at all
@@jimgraham6722 Agree, except that adding wind and solar is the easy part of the equation. It's market ready and the free-market is well able to supply the need, provided they can overcome regulatory hurdles and get a high voltage connection to the grid.
The missing piece is grid and interconnectors, but that's all doable on short timescales.
@@naomieyles210 Good points but for me it is as much about national strategy as economics.
In this regard wind, solar, their storage mechanisms and grid infrastructure have their points of vulnerability, particularly when you look at the needs of industry and transport.
In this regard a diversity of energy sources and various ways to connect the system up is very important. Nuclear energy is important because it greatly diversifies and strengthens the energy system, particularly for industry.
Having said that, rooftop solar PV with batteries for residential and small business use is an excellent way of achieving a strong diversified system for that sector. We need a lot more of it. This also helps put downwards pressure on domestic energy prices. That is unequivocally a good thing.
We just need to ensure as many people as possible have access to the necessary capital.
Wind will be mostly useful for those applications with a large tolerance for variability and non criticality of supply, electrolysis, some chemical processes, desalination, some heating/cooling applications, water pumping etc.
@@naomieyles210 the world has shown it can build NPPs in about 5 years.
This is not some insurmountable hurdle; it is a matter of planning, scheduling, and project management. Presenting a long time-to-operation as a inherent feature of nuclear is just factually incorrect.
Hire the proper contracting firms, and you'll get it done properly. Hire EDF or Westinghouse - maybe you won't.
Sanity = = Thank You.
Build a nuclear power station or 3, put a cafe and tours in the plant, public opposing mitigated. I can see nuclear as technology, industry, jobs and future for our kids as well as power security. Yes, the nuclear moratorium for nuclear power should be removed so we can start planning to get it right. We MUST start now. I drive a Tesla, I have a roof solar array and home battery but I'm also a nuclear advocate.
I'm a nuclear advocate, too, and nuclear would have been a good solution for Australia in 2013 under Tony Abbott. Nuclear is a bad solution in 2024 because we have a coal power fleet at end of life and need a nuclear fleet now, not in 10 years time.
We cannot magic up a nuclear fleet in a few short years, but we can build out HVDC interconnectors in that time frame. I hear the new grid infrastructure is running late, but running late doesn't stop it from being a good option in our circumstances.
Nuclear probably fits some niche use cases in Australia, but it doesn't solve replacing coal power in the required time frame.
Tell the people living nearby they'll get free electricity and people will beg to have one .
Cos it’s Australian it’s gotta have a cafe.
When all of the 1000s of off river pumped hydro sites have been built to support renewables and their communities, we can have a discussion about 7 nuclear sites being built (or just not needed).
@@hitreset0291 The trouble is corruption. A hydro electricity plant near me has been closed down and replaced by solar. Too much money to be made from tax payer subsidies to use existing hydro. Plenty of native animals killed for solar instead, and this far south, six hours of daylight in winter. Nuclear will cost billions, but renewables will cost trillions, according to the CSIRO.
WHAT A TEAM OF TALENT AND TRUTH ......THANK YOU TO ALL
Fantastic discussion with a very informed panel and moderator. Thank you.
Aidan Morrison argument that if "free" renewable electricity was true then the grid costs added into the customers electricity bills would still be substantial.
He is right.
Grid costs are a huge majority part of the costs.
Grid maintenance costs add to total grid costs. 24/7 servicing capacity.
Other nuclear promoters have said $1million per km new grid construction costs.
Government publications refer to 1million km of grid total length to 20million buildings.
$TRILLIONS construction costs in a 1TRILLION GDP economy.
I am an old Construction Civil Engineer contractor who has worked on coal fired and gas turbine generation electric plant new construction. $$$$$$$$
I have worked on new transmission lines construction 1,700 tower transmission line. $$$$$$$$
I have worked in busy street construction with their access restrictions and daily time frames. $$$$$$$$$
I have grandchildren and their future is more important than the chaotic thinking about the wrong problem that comes from ignorant understanding.
Experts laugh at the non experts speaking about the experts area of knowledge.
Sadly experts outside their own expertise remain embarrassingly confident.
Confident and foolish.
Solve the right problem.
Sound economics in your perspective appreciated by this observer. The debate is missing continuing with cleaner coal and LPG.
@@mikehitch7799 thanks for your comment.
Gas is cleaner and can be turned on and off.
Coal CO2 clean up would be twice the gas CO2, and technically and economically extremely expensive.
The rooftop PV, and EV with V2G and big battery have a major problem in that only China is supplying EV and big batteries.
China has been an unreliable trading partner to Australia and has threatened Australia.
The weakest part of my post is enough reliable economic supply.
Robotic factories could make a difference sometime soon I hope.
Just my thoughts.
This was a highly enjoyable discussion on nuclear. This was largely down to our guest speakers being able to say what they had to say in a way that we could all understand.
I do wonder if location of nuclear plants will be the biggest hurdle we face. But I agree with the speakers that once the ball gets rolling on this, it will gain momentum quickly. It just needs to get off to a good start with Facts, Facts and more Facts leading the charge.
And I do like that point about Ecology rather than Environment. I am astounded at the potential damage being caused to flora & fauna in the interest of saving the planet.
It's so refreshing to hear someone who clearly knows what they're talking about! The renewable "rubber band" will only stretch so far & THAT is nowhere near far enough!
Australia is in a wind drought and have been for 2 weeks since this talk. Wholesale prices have been very high.
A real problem with Labor, holding back Australia's prosperity with its dogmatic refusal to adopt nuclear base load power generation. Hence never support Labor to be elected again.
That was true of Labor in 2012, but Tony Abbott had the perfect opportunity to start nuclear in 2013, and he dropped the ball.
Nuclear in 2024 is too little, too late, because it takes 15 years to build out and we need solutions now. HVDC interconnections provides energy solutions now -- nuclear doesn't.
To@@naomieyles210 Thanks for your interest. True Liberal governments have the same trend to not want to manage properly in the interest of the people and rater concentrate to be elected again. Although we have a democracy once the politicians are elected we have very limited control over them, they can even switch sides or go independent without asking the people. That is why Australia should become a better democracy and install citizens initiated referendum.
However it is never to late to make changes for the better it is just the cost goes up the longer we wait. And as is said by Helen Cook we need to think long term.
@@KF-bj3ce totally agree re. CIR.
On the subject of nuclear, that ship has already sailed for Austraiia.
We urgently need to replace our coal power fleet inside the next 10 years, and the build out time frame for a single nuclear reactor is 6 to 10 years, with high risk of cost and time overruns. We don't have the regulatory frameworks and we don't have the skilled personnel, so that pushes the project delivery date out further and makes the massive scale required that much more difficult to achieve.
The other solution is HVDC, where each interconnector pays for itself in a short time frame, and each interconnector increases the percentage of cheap variable renewables we can incorporate in the grid. HVDC is already paying for itself in Europe, and is on the way to building out the European super grid.
HVDC fits our time frame, needs, and existing skills.
It's too late for nuclear to provide what we need here in Australia.
I do think nuclear has great potential for niche use cases in Australia, it just doesn't fit the overall coal replacement use case.
@@KF-bj3ce I get the impression that the LNP is more interested in nuclear while in opposition, and less interested when in government. Given a 6-10 year construction time, plus a lead time of several years for regulatory frameworks and other preparation, a nuclear reactor doesn't fit neatly into a term of office.
We'd need an entire fleet of nuclear reactors to solve our issues with our coal power fleet coming to end of life, and we need them this decade. Due to the time frame mismatch, we are forced to pursue the HVDC route, so it's fortunate that HVDC is a proven technology and a good match for our needs.
To@@naomieyles210 That may be so, but is the Australian constitution so weak that this can not be legislated for completion and do we forever have to put up with this nonsense.
We need these knowledgeable people to be heard by the people of Australia. The courage to discuss these matters without the fear pushed by politicians and media.. The most important thing is cheap power for manufacturing to be restored in Australia let alone green hydrogen. Contract Rolls Royce or General Electric before it’s too late.
I think rather than trying to manufacture solar panels that Australia produces big batteries. The worldwide trend is battery storage will overtake pumped hydro storage in 2025.
Let’s get the people from Chernobyl and Fukushima to help. This should be the model for Australia. Radioactive waste exploding into the air, it will serve two purposes poison the nation and free fireworks on new years.
Open and frank discussions by people that know what they are talking about ……
Aye, it's refreshing.
@@cbrhubs9245 Yep. Won't see that on their ABC.
Funded by anti-renewables corporations and vested interests.
I cannot understand Labor's refusal to consider nuclear. It's an area that is revealing new scientific breakthroughs on a consistent basis. Labor is shutting its mind to any new discovery that may come along. Absolutely bizarre.
Yeah. New breakthroughs that boast of "recycling the fuel rods" which is code for "we pile spent nuclear rods on top of each other and leave them in the actual reactor"; Fukushima showed an example of how volatile that can be.
That would mean re-energising the manufacturing sector building new power stations. Had you not noticed they've been dismantling Australian independence on energy for 20+ years? You cannot strangle a strong independent nation, you have to weaken it to the point of starvation.
How many new nuclear power plants are under construction at present in the UK or USA ???. How many new nuclear power plants have actually been fully approved to start construction in the US'UK and actually proceeded into the physical construction phase in the last decade ??? It is certainly easier to build small nuclear power plants, but given a small nuclear sub or power plant would only produce say 37,500 hp which is equivalent to 5 last generation US main line steam engines of say the Mohawk, Niagra or Duplex type which could be built today into a revised geared oil or coal power station for half a billion dollars a minimal cost of about 1 percent of an equivalent 40,000 shp nuclear power plant and would provide basic electricity for only a small town of 40,00 people. There is no point in such small nuclear power plants. Current nuclear power stations are very much based on steam turbine technology of the late 1940s which is totally obsolete technology ( the QE2 cunnard liner and HMS Bristol in the late 1970s are good illustrations of the failure and impossibility of developing the relevant steam tech furthur) and as Rickover said it is the steam turbine part of the equation which is the difficult and dangerous part of the US nuclear plants and just like an old JA NZR last generation rail engine the steam part of a nuclear power station can certainly blow apart due to blowback which when combined with a pressurised water reactor will casuse hari kari in the nuclar system as well. There is no doubt that early nuclear submarines say the USN Skipjack or Soviet November were very fast with top speeds of around 35 knots and they were twice as fast as available anti submarine torpedoes, effective wire guided a's torpedoes capable of use against submarines at ranges of 2-6 miles( before the introduction of the USN Mk 48 in the 1970s) and only available to the UK post cold war. In the case of the Mk 37 or RN Tigerfish no more than 24-26 knots. It is still tremendously difficult for a torpedo to be guided by a sub towards another sub and catch up with a sub moving away from the attacking and tracking torpedo launching sub The problem with small nuclear subs and nuclear power stations are they are dangerous and can be done by many nations while large nuclear power stations or nuclear subs like a LA class or a Akula are very difficult to replicate today as we have far fewer brilliant physicists and mathermaticians and in the nuclear field the relevant chemicals and agents can never🎉🎉 be entirely replicated as even the first nuclear and hydrogen tests changed the chemistry and biosphere of the world quite substantially
It's ideological
@@resurrectingand it's economic.
* nuclear is more expensive.
* nuclear build out takes 15 years.
* we need energy solutions now, not in 15 years.
* HVDC interconnections are a mature technology that provides solutions now.
Tony Abbott in 2013 was the last decent economic opportunity for Gen 3 nuclear in Australia, and he dropped the ball. We won't have another economic opportunity like that until Gen 4, SMR, or Inertial Fusion reactors are proven out, probably in the 2040s.
I'm pro Nuclear, still, the Mr. Paterson's claim that solar doesn't pay / work, is simply not true. My relative installed solar a few years back in WA and it and I have seen their power bills drop by more than 50%. Nuclear shouldn't be an all or nothing argument, it should be a case of combination with existing and future energy solutions. Frankly the presentation comes off as rather combative, which is counter productive, being flippinet and dismissive of the general public (treating them as they are stupid) doesn't help the cause of upgrading Australia's power grids.
Because it's far easier to argue against nuclear, so perhaps showing a more solution based approach would work better.
"My relative installed solar a few years back in WA [...] and I have seen their power bills drop by more than 50%."
Because your relative is *_stealing_* power-service.
We’ll go live in Fukushima and eat the fish caught off the rock if you like it so much. I’m pretty sure you like it in someone else’s backyard right ?
There is no advantage to Australia to pursue nuclear. We do not need to burden our future with nuclear. The huge cost blowouts are guaranteed, the delay while we build these plant means we will fall behind the most reasonable decarb goals.
Renewables with pumped hydro are 100% safe, clean and cheap.
what a brilliant trio of experts
This is all about keeping coal going as long as possible by building a great big, never finish, white elephant. Renewables with battery storage is cheaper than coal and gas and half the price of nuclear. Anyone with solar panels on their roof knows that and that is 1 in 3 homes in Australia. Nuclear for Australia is a criminally negligent waste of taxpayers money and as with all centralised power generation an ongoing national security risk because power stations are military targets. Instead of desperately trying to keep jobs going with coal mining perhaps reducing electricity generation costs by adopting renewables gives regulators the opportunity to harvest a royalty on electricity with the aim of providing more useful jobs for the community than just digging big hole in the ground. All done with no extra cost to the community.
Sorry, but your facts are getting in the way of this lovely bedtime story.
You need to do a bit more research, renewables are not cost effective or the cheapest form of electrical generation when you take into account an extra 28,000 kms of Bushfire starting HV grid transmission lines that are necessary to make their renewable scheme work & that is not costed for, or the dams or batteries needed for storage.
Renewables are a low density energy source that is intermittent & unreliable subject to weather conditions & sunshine (the very thing we are trying to change for some ridiculous & false reason), they can’t supply good base load power or industry requirements 24/7 so the industry’s we need will vanish.
I could argue if they are even actually green by any real standard because more CO2 is probably created to produce and install these renewables than they will ever offset in their lifetime + their is no recycling program for end of life pv panels or wind generators & blades, on top of this the environmental destruction that is going on to the Great Dividing Range & many other protected areas without debate is criminal, koala & platypus habitats being blasted and bulldozed for wind farms.
I am someone who has two properties that both have solar and batteries that I would not have if they were not so heavily govt subsidised, so I am not anti renewables, I have worked in the electrical industry and on solar.
Solar and wind power is not a national energy solution at any cost, it will fail (and already is), and so will our economy (which already is) from renewables, they require an endless bucket of money to make it work to some degree, so they are not cost effective.
The climate doomsday narrative is an overstated lie to justify their net zero agenda with the renewables scam.
Labor hates us and they are wrecking Australia to prove it, open your eyes.
@@evil17 Bullshit.
Renewables are intermittent. Next.
@@WillyWanka LOL the name says it all.
Great forum. Thank you.
I really like the discussions coming out of the CIS, however I can’t seem to find a discussion similar to this, with a pro-renewables panel. Would you consider doing one if one has not already happened?
Think tanks are paid to promote their funder's agenda. There is no way they would subsdise a forum to promote a counter arguement. It means these foorums end up being rather dull, as there is rarely any disagreement between the panel members, and presentations are often low on visual data and statistics.
@@JoeS-o2r agree with you on think tanks. For an objective assessment, you want an engineer, not a think tank. HVDC interconnectors are the vital enabling technology which CIS is skirting around.
Look up Australian channel Engineering with Rosie:
* Four Reasons Why Nuclear Power is a Dumb Idea for Australia
* Can You Run a Grid on 100% Wind + Solar?
* Electricity Across Oceans: Is HVDC the Future?
Also Real Engineering:
* Is 100% Renewable Possible by 2050? - Interconnectors (the European super grid which is already in progress and already paying for itself too)
* The Economics of Nuclear Energy (the comparison to gas in the first half of the video is very relevant).
Also B1M:
* Why Nuclear is Making a Comeback (nuclear is complicated and cost/time overruns are common)
😂 you joking right. If they wanted discussion they wouldn’t sit around in a circle j, talking about how old mates solar panels aren’t making him money because his retailer has cut his feed in tariff. Or how the wind won’t blow this week, because the offshore wind looks pretty darn active most days this week.
Yet he wants to bring a power source into the market that will centralise generation increasing cost because the base capacity will require locked in guaranteed revenue for some multinational investment company like Brookfields to take more dollars out of the country.
@@naomieyles210 As much as I like some of her content, it's hard to say that "engineering with rosie" is super trustworthy when it comes to power generation methods, as she works in the renewables sector.
Just as you wouldn't trust someone who works in the fossil fuel sector if they tell you how terrible renewables are....
@@cerealport2726 Rosemary Barnes has 19 years in the industry and a relevant PhD. That makes her an authoritative source, which is more than I can say for myself. Real Engineering and B1M creators are also qualified in related fields, which is why I listed them, too.
Rosemary Barnes (aka Engineering with Rosie) is supportive of nuclear power in general, just not for Australia given current circumstances.
Refer her video entitled "Can Small Modular Reactors Save Nuclear Power?" dated 9th March 2022. The hydrogen conversation there is relevant to process heat for heavy industry, which is of interest to Australia. The load following design is relevant to Australia, too.
NuScale is troubled, but SMR remains a potential future technology option for niche use cases here in Australia.
The point is not to fangirl over one of my favourite UA-cam channels, but rather to provide @stefancostanzo5396 with a variety of video content to expand their knowledge. If we were on a blogging platform, I'd refer them to research, reports and reference pages instead.
Great debate? Well it might have been a great debate if you included a neutral or critical speaker. No chance of that from the CIS of from Chris's new employer Sky.
Agreed. Zero credibility unfortunately.
Yeah, would love to see an actual debate on the pros and cons.
@@Fraraccio1 I'm sure you've also been over to the Australia Institute to make similar comments about their single-minded devotion to renewables...
To be fair he did say he would debate anyone at any time, so its probly more to do with the anti nuclear people not being willing to have a proper discussion.
Coal is the best by far. But the country has gone mad on all sides.
This is pitiful. There's no mention of the vast costs of construction, that nuclear energy will run at a loss, and then have $249,000,000,000 in decommissioning and safe storage costs in the next hundred years if the UK is any guide. As the safe storage needs to continue for 100,000 years Australia taxpayers will be on the hook effectively forever.
So that was the nuclear lobby. Will CIS host panelists lobbying renewable energy?
Hah!! You made me laugh!! Their "studies" are about as honest as their name.
@@jvvoid Yes, I find it pretty funny too, but in a tragic way.
@@MagisterHenrik Hmmm: long on smart alec insults. Short on actual arguments. Telling...
1:18 - All 3 pages? Does it have any content or just the glossy front and back cover?
Look into my eyes, look into my eyes.. when I count to three you'll wake up and believe that nuclear is perfectly safe. And cheap!!
Australia burying it's head in the sand and ignoring nuclear options including upcoming SMR, MMR and most recent, nano reactor technology is quite ludicrous. Larry Fink the chairman of Blackrock recently told the WEF that investing in renewables is a bad option. This is in part due to data centres and upcoming AI technology require stable and reliable power sources. This is something renewables cannot now or likely ever be able to provide. Going forward, nuclear has to form an integral part of the Australian grid.
This video has been brought to you by the coal and gas industry. Approach with caution.
Probably true. Coal and Gas already know how goofy and unlikely New Nukes are -- so they put up silly crap like this to deter genuine renewables like Wind and Solar.
Finally someone is making sense
Great presentation! Thank you🇦🇺😎
A very informative discussion
Sorry. I'm all for consideration of a possible nuclear power generation future for Australia and the potential it offers for grid stability and flexibility with lower emissions, but if this group of 3 'experts' are supposed to convince me that it's feasible, affordable, can be safe and sold as acceptable to the people, and is not just a Murdoch and Fossil fuel industry inspired and funded attempt to railroad and delay the current renewable energy program they will have to do a lot better.
I find Adi Paterson a divisive figure who manipulates the truth to suit his every argument. He downplays the Chernobyl and Fukishima failures, proclaims increasing CO2 will revegetate the world's deserts and intimates that Synroc has solved the nuclear waste issue when it has apparently never been regarded by the global nuclear community as an economic or practical solution. How can he credibly continue to flog SMRs as economically feasible, the way of the future and currently happening in other parts of the world, when he was the CEO of the costly Pebble Bed Reactor in South Africa which failed to attract any serious investors and was scuttled? Where are the safe and affordable SMR's which are currently licensed and being built in other countries? Australia has had years to sort out the legalities and adopt a nuclear power generation future but our political masters have spent decades either sitting on their hands and/or arguing over the high price, much to the glee of the fossil fuel industry.
Sourcewatch says this
The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) is an economically liberal (or neoliberal, depending on your point of view) and socially conservative think tank based in Sydney.
And doesn’t it show teaming up with a sky news reporter to support an uncosted plan with no details to saddle us with the most expensive way to generate power.
Their "studies" are about as honest as their name.
@@jvvoidlol debate the information.. not the so called ideology.. all that does for your argument by highlighting it is shows YOU are ideologically driven
@@Kenneynrg Nuclear is the most expensive option for energy generation. The least efficient. Fact. You enjoy your little fairytale, we adults will deal with reality.
56 nuclear plants in France and still only produces 68% of its power needs. 😅 and Dutton says we only need 7 plants, also France has been building the plants since 1960 that is 64 years of building and replacing them to service just 68% of its needs 🙄. Get real Australia.
Do you appreciate how many dinky solar panels are required to match a single nuclear plant?
(And it just gets worse when you account for the amount of overbuild necessary to compensate for the poor availability of renewables)
>85% on 8 July 2024. France is exporting power to Germany/UK/others. Suggest you get your facts right. 37plants built in the 80s; 5 in the 90s; only 4 since 2000. The older units were smaller. The average construction time has ben 6.5 years.
funny the sort who scoff at solar panels on your roof because of "upfront cost" suddenly want to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a nuclear fantasy.
I'm all in with nuclear, part of the reasoning I disagree with, low carbon footprint. forget about carbon, it's a good thing, politicians need to pull their heads out of their @$$ and just get it done for cheap energy. solar and wind is economically and logistically expensive right through is life. not to mention intermittent. also interesting point, I'm in New Zealand and we just had a warning about saving energy because of the risk of blackouts, one reason given by our biggest provider is that the wind farms it partly relies on produced less than expected levels, so there you go !
If I hear this "net zero" crap one more time I will pull my hair out. "Net Zero" is a brain fart thought up by some advertising and PR dept.
@@musicalneptunian when they say "net zero" they don't mean themselves, they mean us.
I don't believe the carbon tales of the Malthusian Death Cult either.
I don't believe the carbon tales of the Malthusian Death Cult either.
Solar is far cheaper than nuclear - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source. It's decreased in cost by 82% in the past decade, and is already several times cheaper than nuclear. A nuclear plant would likely take 30+ years to build and pay off, and would need to compete with the cost of renewables then (when it's not competitive now).
Australia is up to 39% renewables and on target for 82% by 2030, but these don't work well with nuclear. Nuclear is inflexible - it cannot scale up and down quickly. Hydro, batteries and gas provide the dispatchable energy needed.
The same idiots that gave us this really great affordable, reliable, superfast NBN system, are now going to the same to power generation
Rosie counters this nonsense
In 20 years when nuclear is fully installed and expensive, then offgrid with Battery Vehicles and rooftop PV and dirt cheap electricity will mean customers will abandon the national electrical grid.
15% of rooftop can supply too much electricity.
Vehicles parked 23hrs every day can store too much electricity with Battery Vehicles.
Most vehicles will trickle charge all daylong. Ezi pezi.
Grid owners will be screaming for government protection from dirt cheap offgrid in the suburbs.
As each customer abandons the grid, grid customers costs begin to explode.
Horse meat was cheap when horses were not wanted. 😮
That's more likely than nuclear being a viable proposition.
@@jvvoidif you have not built or priced construction then you should stay in your expertise.
@@stephenbrickwood1602 Who?
@jvvoid Sorry, my mistake.
I meant to be commenting to someone else.
The other person is from outside the electricity supply industry and is ignoring how little electricity is used compared to total fossil fuels used.
And how expensive the existing 'small' electricity capacity has to be expanded.
1kg of coal = 6 hrs running a washing machine. Available 24/7
1kg of oil. = 9 hours running a washing machine. Available 24/7
1kg of renewables = less than 1hr running a washing machine. Available less than 30% of the time and requires every watt of power to be backed up by another source of power, usually fossil fuel. This is the equivalent of a second grid when only one is required.
1kg of uranium = 2000 years running a washing machine. Available 24/7
I wonder which one is more efficient and less costly.
Why don’t we get rid of all the subsidies and let the market decide which is the most efficient. Renewables will be last on the efficiency/affordable list every which way you look at it.
You think private capital is stupid enough to fall for this?? The market's already decided, genius. That's why Dutton's plan is entirely dependent on govt (taxpayer) funding. No-one else wants to go near it. From all our pockets directly to LNP donors and mates, because their plan is to go from rich.. to obscenely rich.
@@jvvoid Fasinating
Pretty much nonsense. We run full houses from Solar PV ONLY. Including Laundry and Air Conditioning. And charging the Tesla EV. Requires no "back up" as Solar PV is the most reliable electrical generation there is. No Moving Parts. Solar PV runs completely unattended on Islands, Buoys and in Space for DECADES. Why are you making up such nonsense?
There's actually no need to do anything. There is no climate emergency.
100%
The only intelligent person on here. It is almost as real as Santa Clause.
Anyone bothered to look at world copper reserves, we are at deficit on copper supply and will require 700% to 1000% increase in copper extraction to meet demand, yet there is very little investment in future copper mining.
Without copper your just blowing hot air out of your behind.
lets build some new copper mines Australia
@terenceharvey6432kong Australia doesn't have that much of it in our soil. Australia has more iron ore Uranium aluminium gold ect
(pssst -- Grids run on Aluminum Conductors -- not Copper)
The grid won't work without generation in addition to wind and solar. We need the grid to work. AI and data are materially increasing the electricity demand. The dispatchable generation can either be gas or nuclear. Nuclear is CO2 free.
Today the CSIRO called bullshit on the Nuclear option re: price. Twice as expensive apparently.
Are they lying?
But what really matters is that CIS' opinion is that Nuclear is the cheapest and easiest to build. Facts contrary to this opinion are countered by saying the offending report is compromised. CSIRO's, in this case. Supporting evidence not needed.
If Russia and China put there energy into making nuclear energy not weapons the would could be a better place 😊
Definitely
It is sometimes hard to tell if the Nuke Fanbois are intentionally lying or just stupid. But either way, they rarely tell the truth
Yes!
where is the conversation around smart grids ?
More people have died from airplane issues & accidents than nuclear failures. Nuclear is no bigger risk to people than normal life issues. Coal mining is a big risk to life & itst not banned. So do we keep this ban in place?
Why would Australia ever ever want to create an unacceptable national security risk with nuclear?
Why didn't the coalition propose this while they were in power? It was just 2 years ago - I remember, I was there!
Thanks for this excellent information video.
Here is Labor burning gas in power plants which in turn could be used as a transport fuel in vehicles in the interim to better battery fuel systems. Solar rooftop systems are great as it generates power where it is being used with some minor upgrades on power transformers but without the need to upgrade Australia's power distribution network to the extent planed by Labor. I have lived in South Australia and seen the blackouts. The big battery in SA buys power at times of low cost then resells it to the citizens at time of need at high costs. Hence one could call the big battery a success but is it really or is it just a smoke screen? What about the damage caused by all these wind turbine structures and the cost of reinstating the land? Labor's plan is seriously flawed and will cause problems in the future if allowed to proceed.
Nice to see a discussion that doesn’t mention politicians.
Yes, let's assess our options, Helen. Westinghouse AP1000s? Bzzz, they went bankrupt. French EPRs? Bzzz, they have given up on them. APR1400s from the corrupt South Korean nuclear industry., bzzz. NuScale SMRs, bzzz, non-existent and the company is going bankrupt.
Yes let's doi a holistic economic analysis, Aidan. How does nuclear economics work if the industry has to pay insurance costs?
Not even France replaced petroleum for vehicles.
The national grid is too small and too expensive.
The real problem is grid economics stupi...
Less fossil fuel more electricity more national electrical grid.
No fossil fuels then, ×7 more electricity, ×7 more grid capacity.
Australia can handle the $billion generation problem.
Australia cannot handle $TRILLION transmission problem.
The most expensive energy, grid electricity replacing all fossil fuels are you insane ?
All customers will use dirt cheap rooftop electricity and their BV oversized battery.
Most vehicles are PARKED 23hrs every day. And can connect trickle currents all day long.
FREE energy storage all day long.
Grid cashflows, $110BILLON will be a dead duck in 15 years.
Are you insane.
I know the French submarine contractors and the Australian Government thought Aidan Morrison was insane until they listened to facts.
The French submarines could NOT PARK on station for very long.
Half $billion later to the French, and Australia has 6 USA nuclear submarines on order.
This is a good decision 👏 👌 😊
Nuclear is too expensive and can’t compete with solar.
Wind and solar are *_infinitely-expensive,_* on a sustained basis.
AUKUS has us spending significant money on nuke subs. If we had a nuke industry that could support small reactor technology for sub and land based use, that sounds like a strategy that could win broad support.
The reactors in subs will be sealed for their lifetime. It's a very different environment to a nuclear power plant.
Go holiday in Fukushima and Chernobyl, come back and get your chemo and tell us how enjoyable it was.
What an excellent discussion. Its a pity that our politicians are so intellectually inferior. This would go straight into over Chris Bowen’s head.
Why didn't any of you mention costs? Other than current prices. What is the cost per KWH over the life of the unit. Build run store. To end date?
And let’s not forget-this is not the last level of power creation. New tech will appear in the future. Nuclear is a transitional power source.
I can't imagine taking two or three years to build a reactor. The tech is 80 years old. The nuclear community is the biggest problem, it seems to me. They've overvalued their expertise and overcomplicated the entire system. They're boiling water to turn a freaking generator.
The biggest issue is the pursuit of low cost energy. The cheaper it is the most it will be used and the more of it we'll need produce.
Clinate change - It’s easier to fool someone than to convince then they’ve been been fooled .
It's so great to have this discussion I am fed up with the woke demonisation of nuclear power generation. We need to develop a base load nuclear power generation industry here in Australia.
Helen Cook - fabulous! Great insight all round. Why can countries with far lower GDP embark on nuclear and AUS can't? The simple answer is that, deep down, we are not innovative or willing to take risks.
This would have been much better if it wasn't a circle jerk.
Everyone just nodding at each other isn't helping in this debate.
The old guy saying that he couldn't get payback on his solar array was either a lie or he isn't nearly as smart as he thinks he is. I've put two systems on houses and both were revenue positive within a short timeframe. One with subsidised tariffs and one without. Pfft.
It was not a debate. It was a lame info-mercial sales pitch.
I shall let you into a secret. The British bomb testing the sixties and early seventies saved Australia. Do you remember Soekarnoe’s Konfrontasi in 1965 when Borneo and Malaya, before Malaysia. Australia was to be next. Do you remember the squadron of RAF Vulcan V bombers which visited Darwin on a “Goodwill Mission”. A nuclear bomb was then flown to Darwin. Soekarno was then quietly warned that if one Indonesian trooper’s foot landed on Australia that bomb would land on him. The bomb had been developed at Marilinga by AWARE, the Atomic Weapons Australia Research Establishment in Adelaide. It was a joint UK-Australia mutual organisation. It stopped an attempted invasion of Australia. This really happened, and I am not James Bond. Be grateful, Aussies, for the Brit bomb and the RAF which saved you from hostile invasion. Oz Brit
Good work. However in the fifties Britain detonated nuclear bombs in central Australia. The Australian soldiers were in shorts and short sleeved shirts with no protective gear at all. They died prematurely.
I really needed to hear this today. The world seems to have gone crazy and finally this panel is talking in common sense. Thanks for the great insights and data what a great panel! :)
So does Adi Patterson take ANY responsibility for the disgraceful safety record at ANSTO while he was CEO?
Look into my eyes, look into my eyes.. when I count to three you'll wake up and believe that nuclear is perfectly safe.
Climate deniers who are very troubled with financial assistance to renewables but didn’t mention $14.5 billion assistance annually to the fossil fuel industry, nor the fact that we basically give our gas away, collect minimal royalties from it and employ very few people.
Nuclear Waste Facility
Folks - is there any truth in the rumour that Australia's new Nuclear Waste Facility will located at:
Unit 3 - 199 Gympie Road Strathpine Queensland 4500
Please advise well in advance - so I can purchase the correct PPE!
Adi: renewables "are destroying the ecology of our country" Further proof he is a nutjob.
Yes. And he said carbon dioxide is good for plants therefore Australia's deserts will become 'light green'. In complete ignorance or denial (or perversion) of the most recent IPCC report (generally accepted to be conservative).
I couldn't believe it when he said that. What a looney.
Australia will have Nuclear powered submarines in the next decade so what’s the difference ?
Very different types of reactors.
Fukushima and Chernobyl were all on land.
Too little power, too expensive and too late.
now she is saying nuclear isn't viable without government welfare.
The question is, what will we achieve for the environment by phasing out our cheap coal and gas?
Nothing really
Aidan
.... you have a physics background! how can you seriously maintain that stance and accept the utterly flawed AGW hypothesis ?
A 2020 report by NSW Chief Scientist Hugh Durrant-Whyte, prepared for the NSW Cabinet, said introducing nuclear power would be expensive and difficult and that it would be naïve to think a nuclear plant could be built in less than two decades .A former Chief Scientific Adviser at the UK Ministry of Defence, Dr. Durrant-Whyte said: "The hard reality is Australia has no skills or experience in nuclear power plant building, operation or maintenance - let alone in managing the fuel cycle. Realistically, Australia will be starting from scratch in developing skills in the whole nuclear power supply chain.”
You obviously didn’t listen to the discussion. All this was covered.
nuclear is grid electricity.
If you are serious then the national grid capacity has to be 7 times bigger if Australia is to be 100% electric.
The grid costs $1TRILLION and 7 times bigger is insane.
Do your homework and grow up.
Gas will half grid electricity.
And little to build.
Should have gone for 2 hours is my only complaint - great work.
Over 60% of the land in Australia are Desert . Australia should try to sell more coal to China , and buy the Solar Panels
from them in return . Install the Solar Panels in Desert areas only and generate a lot of cheap solar energy so as to enable
Australia to become competitive in other industries . Cost of Solar Panels is dropping 10% / year and it is not wise to
make cheap Solar Panels locally .
Japan & South Korea are our main coal customers. China has little need for our coal. They have plenty of their own.
Why is it that the Australian Chief Scientist opposes nuclear power, as do at least 2 former Australian Chief Scientists, and the NSW Chief Scientist?
The current chief scientist is a physicist. previous chief scientists have been (in order):
ecologist
biologist
immunologist
chemical engineer
molecular biologist
astronomer
neuroscientist
neuroscientist
The discussion about (the cost and timing of) nuclear power implementation is really related to engineering, not so much about science, and they are not the same thing, despite being intertwined.
Who pays them and what legislation is currently in place
Answer it has nothing to do with science it’s politics and the Australian government of the pays the chief scientists wage.
Legislative bans on nuclear stops any real discussion or debate on the so called green energy agenda. In a nut shell the Chief scientists will do as they are told by the government of the day.
He's not a nuclear scientis or an engineer. You still miss the Pont that wind isn't sufficient and the sun go down at night. Battries only last a few hours. How is major business going to power their companies? Do you relise how many watts a cold storage use in power alone. And you have the cost of 1 5 trillion dollars every 20 years for renewables. Australia can't afford that. Renewables isn't cheap it's dam expensive unreliable and stupidity to have as the only power source.
Bowen and Albo and the Scientists you claim want just renewables. Than they better start making everything we use only 12 volts at only 1.2 watts so the battries can support 24/7 to have any reliable power. The avrage house use 25.43 kWh a day.
Fukushima and Chernobyl
Is it not possible to have some of the hardware ready to go for a neuclear power plant in expectation for this future you are looking at?
Youth will be paying for uni, their retirement, your retirement, rural infrastructure, 3 soldiers, climate damage and be delighted to know their country is sprinkled with poison. Definitely voting for their grandad's party.
Can we trust the CSIRO? Their report suggests that nuclear will be more expensive and hence less viable than renewables. This doesn't seem to resonate with what I would expect to be the case given the more extensive use of actual materials spread out across a very large footprint in the case of wind and solar as compared to the more concentrated use of resources with a very dense fuel source in the case of nuclear power.
CSIRO formulas and data are available publicly for anyone to scrutinise.
I'm sure you know better than the CSIRO.
It's not just the CSIRO - there's a lot of evidence that nuclear is more expensive than renewables. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source
Nuclear plants are just extremely expensive to build. Solar and wind are far cheaper for the same production. Currently, nuclear is several times more expensive than solar, and the cost of solar has dropped 82% in the last decade, with batteries on a similar trajectory.
Nuclear is already cost uncompetitive, but if you start building it now, it will take 30+ years to build and pay off its capital costs. It has to be competitive with whatever renewables cost then. There's a reason why the LNP is proposing using taxpayer dollars - no business would make that investment.
Is nuclear energy insurable? So should anything go wrong it is financially covered?
What exactly happens to the waste and you bad is it?
Sky news ...lol. say no more.
I’m very concerned about the land that is proposed for solar panels - and wind farms. Queensland projects are a worry at the moment. Would be good if that was brought out into general understanding so we can decide if we really want that land lost.
Legislation is in place around the world, so it is not a problem to 'Cut and paste'. Australia does not have to start with a clean page. Power stations are again all over the world, so why do we need to start with a brand new design. Part of the time problem is bureaucratic road blocks. Up front costs are high, but energy production is then very low. The comment was made. look at the whole picture and costs over a set time period. then compare with fossil fuel costs. Come and build a plant in my back yard.
Australia could probably even out-source the regulator while training staff to come up to speed using some sort of deal with whoever - US NRC, CA CNSC, UK ONR, Korea's NSSC, etc).
60-80-100 year lifespan for reactors, Helen? Average lifespan of reactors closed over the past 5 years is 43 years.
You might want to rethink that Jim boy.
A 43 year old reactor would have been commissioned 43 years ago.
Fast forward to 50+ years later it is not unreasonable to posit that technology - and hence lifespan of the next generation reactor build - would expand exponentially.
The Wright Bros made their first flight in 1903 with only Orville Wright at the controls
It was a 12 second flight and covered a distance of 120 feet.
Some 83 years later (1986) I flew a B747 6 hours and 30 minutes for 4742 kms flying Jeddah - London with 400+ passengers at .86 Mach (.86 the speed of sound).
So 43 years reactor lifespan to potentially 60-80-100 lifespan in a similar period seems eminently reasonable - if not seriously understated.
@@johnd1727 Positing and posturing has nothing to do with facts. Maybe's and should-be's and hopefully's are all nuclear pushers have to go with. Don't let the facts get in the way of the LNP donor's fairytales and their interests.
Yeah, Nukes have tended to become a long-term curse on their owner-operator. They have constant and continually increasing Operation and Maintenance costs as time goes on. It becomes cheaper to shut them down than to continue to operate them. In the US (largest Nuke operations in the World) ALL existing Nukes have been put on welfare this last year to prevent bankrupting off-line early.
I greatly appreciate this discussion while disagreeing with the overall consensus among these nuclear experts on the best way for us to proceed. And there is no "yeah, but" in that disagreement. These folks are all impressive and authentic imo. Also imo, people like this should be more central to our decision making in general. And I am certain that we can realistically make nuclear work here. But as with things like CCS, the people who could have made this happen weren't sufficiently focused upon it at the time it needed to happen.
Actual Intelligence manifestation.
Unmodified on topic Journalism by Observation.
Australia of the ANZAC legend in Defence by practical pragmatism.
Tom Switzer: "All the available evidence shows that Gen Z and millennial Australians strongly support nuclear energy." Ignorant or just another liar.
The terms are interchangeable. So borh.
Noticed Hinkley Point C was not mentioned. Interesting.
Just remove the nuclear ban and start the discussion.
Labor and Greens are pushed by foreign Green power companies that have our grid held to ransom. Those Australian and foreign owned companies invested in wind and solar are also heavily invested in Chinese manufacturing follow the money it has nothing to do with the climate con. This eggs all in one basket approach is dangerous for us as nation and this Green religion based politics is dangerous.
We need a grid with more than Solar /wind generation purely because of land mass as it’s just not feasible to rely on wind and solar alone. Gas /coal and Nuclear mix is a far better more reliable and realistic option.
Australians need to bring back our own public owned power grid and investment in a people bank for infrastructure like the commonwealth used to be before it was sold off by Labor’s Keating.
This publicly owned bank could invest in a nation wide power grid that would certainly benefit from a nuclear industry.
does anyone here know if nuclear has ever been able to be shown to be cost effective when retiring the plant is considered? I haven't been able to find an example
AEMO are not following the laws of thermodynamics? You can’t take a diluted form of energy and make it less diluted without putting more energy into the system? I haven’t heard much on the discussion on nuclear waste/costs of management of nuclear waste in Australia. Also, is fusion so far off, it’s not worth considering?
No debate here just a positive push for a dangerous energy source, which Australia does not need. This type of promotion is just a deflection, and serves no useful purpose.
Why listen to the experts when you can listen to Chris Bowen on the 6 o'clock news.