The fight over “net zero” at the National Party over the weekend was all a bit of a charade. Yes, it garnered attention from mainstream media, but it was essentially meaningless.
The Nationals, and the Liberal Party coalition partners, are in furious agreement: They are not the slightest bit serious about strong climate action, and the only difference between former National leader Barnaby Joyce and current leader David Littleproud is that Joyce wants to stop the pretence.
Littleproud, let’s remember, believes that net zero 2050 means not having to do much any time soon. Like too many corporates, and the fossil fuel industry in particular, it’s an excuse to sit around and do nothing – make some grand promises and wait for some new technology to come along that doesn’t disrupt their business plan.
Nuclear, and small modular reactors, are a perfect tool for this. SMRs don’t exist in any western country, do not have a licence to exist, and no-one – even in the nuclear industry – seriously believes they will be in commercial production within a decade, if then.
The Minerals Council of Australia recently shipped over a medical doctor from Ontario to spruik nuclear and SMRs, presumably because they couldn’t find anyone who actually knows anything about electricity grids to do the same.
He seemed a nice fellow, got a huge write up in the AFR and on Sky News, another nuclear supporter. He did not get asked about costs, nor timings, which if anything shows a singular lack of curiosity on the part of the journalists.
Just for the record, the Ontario government – which really likes nuclear – doesn’t go into costs either.
But says while it it is hopeful it can get one SMR built by the end of the decade, if it can get a licence for it, it won’t be able to complete the next three until the middle of the next decade – and this in a country with an established nuclear energy industry and know-how.
In the meantime, it is spending $C12 billion upgrading its existing nuclear fleet, or about $1 billion per gigawatt.
Sweden is much the same. The election of a new governming Coalition, including a far right wing party, had led to the inevitable decision to make a big deal out of nuclear. It promised 10 reactors by the end of the 2030s, before pulling down that announcement from its web-site.
Why? Because it can’t do it. Vattenfall is the country’s state owned energy company that operates Sweden’s six nuclear reactors, which have all been operating since the 1980s.
Vattenfall recently published an interesting analysis on SMRs on its own website, titled Small nuclear reactors, the next big thing.
It makes a couple of interesting observations: One is that SMRs are interesting for countries that don’t have much in the way of renewables, particularly solar. And that they may be used to replace existing ageing nuclear.
Vattenfall has started a study on adding SMRs to its nuclear facility, and notes that the earliest it could be done is the early 2030s or mid 2030s. “SMRs are not just around the corner,” it notes.
Remember, this is a country with a well established nuclear industry. The story is the same in both Sweden and Canada, similar sized middling economies as Australia.
Australia, by the mid 2030s, because it does indeed have magnificent solar and wind resources, should be at net 100 per cent renewables.
The International Energy Agency says that net zero by 2050 means having zero carbon grids by 2040, at the very latest. In Australia, there is even a blueprint of how this can be done, the Integrated System Plan, which is being updated every two years.
Littleproud, however, contends that Labor is accelerating the net zero path “from effectively 2050 to 2030. And that’s putting pressure on your energy building every day of the week.”
Labor is having a go, but its target remains steadfastly modest at a 43 per cent cut in emissions by 2030, which it may struggle to reach in any case. This, amid repeated warnings of heatwaves and natural disasters, as the world continues to go off-track with its Paris climate commitments.
The problem with Joyce, Littleproud and Liberal leader Peter Dutton’s argument is that they don’t care wether nuclear is a viable option or not. Their intent – re-iterated again in the Murdoch media on Monday morning – is to bring new wind and solar to a halt.
The people who are advocating for nuclear – Littleproud, Joyce, Matt Canavan, Ted O’Brien, just to name a few, are the same who are arguing that coal should be kept going, or even that new coal plants should be built. In the self-perpetuating nuclear shill industry, nothing much changes.
Because it takes 15 years to get a nuclear plant up and running. Which is plenty of time to sabotage the project so we end up stuck having to use fossil fuels.
Not to mention we would have to burn fossil fuels the whole 15 years we wait for that one nuclear plant.
We realistically needed a mix of nuclear and renewables starting decades ago
Building nuclear in the 80s or 90s might have been a good idea, but a nuclear plant that gets started today in Australia is going to be up and running in 2038, and there’s no way it could compete with 2038’s solar and battery technology.
If you have nuclear plants, sure, keep running them. But it doesn’t make sense to build new ones any more.
It could end up being a situation where wind and solar are needed for the transition to nuclear fusion. Nuclear fission at this point is not worth the cost it would take to set up. And by the time we set it up in Australia, the rest of the world is transitioning to fusion.
Is nuclear fusion going to be cheaper than fission, though? Once we’re on solar and batteries, I can’t see us needing to move off of them onto something else. And I can’t see anything beating solar+battery on price.
Cost is often factored in when it comes to optimising fusion power plant design so potentially, plus other benefits of fusion. Either way, barring a breakthrough the closest power barring breakthroughs is probably at best 2040 imo. Even with all the new startups.
Potentially if scientists can find a way to generate the heat and pressure that’s needed more efficiently. It has the potential to be more efficient (and assumedly cheaper) than any other energy source. But that’s likely still a while away. We definitely need to be investing in this type of research and development rather than building nuclear fission plants though.
The COALition will do literally anything to go the opposite direction to Labor. That’s blatantly obvious.
If Albanese recommends wearing a space suit on the moon, Dutton will be out there without one in two seconds flat.
Albo says don’t jump off a bridge, Dutton will advocate for bridge jumping.
They’re taking advantage of the fact that if there is something to be done (which is often the right thing) there will always be people who disagree with it often with very irrational arguments which are legitimised by a major party agreeing with them because they want their vote
I don’t want to argue about anything else here but this part
Remember, this is a country with a well established nuclear industry.
Is not an accurate representation of the situation in Sweden. It has had very strong anti-nuclear sentiments for at least 40 years and all its nuclear plants are old. Old old. There’s even been strong governmental pressure limiting what you’re allowed to research or develop in regards to nuclear power.
Renewables are good, cheap, and fast, but that part was just not accurate in my mind.
Don’t worry, I’m not here to argue either. And some fair points, although I’d say that they are still a lot more established than Australia by comparison (which is an incredibly low bar of course).
It isn’t (only) about making money from Fossil and Nuclear fuels, it is about control of customers.
It is still illegal to have more than 5kW of Solar panels (20), on a residential roof and you are not allowed to go off grid unless you have a backup petrol or diesel generator. You can’t install a petrol or diesel generator close to a permanent dwelling.
Unless you jump through all sorts of legal hoops, and continue to jump through all sorts of legal hoops, you can’t leave the grid.
It’s all about power and money. Nuclear energy is a bigger monopoly than oil and a gateway to enforcing authoritarian laws
Lol