Australia all at sea on nuclear ban stance

Australia has reached a bizarre crossroads when it comes to providing power. It’s a situation where the government seems quite comfortable building nuclear power, just as long as it’s not used to generate electricity and keep our lights on.

The $368bn AUKUS deal to build Virginia-class submarines in South Australia involves the construction of pressurised-water based nuclear reactors to power the vessels. A similar type of technology could power an around-the-clock nuclear power station on the east coast of Australia.

And yet doing so to provide domestic energy remains illegal. In other words, we’re happy to put nuclear reactors under the ocean off our coast, just not on the land.

Former head of Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) Dr Adi Paterson attested to this last month. Dr Paterson highlighted the example of the most recent nuclear power plant to be commissioned in Finland – the Olkiluoto 3 plant.

Despite delays and running over budget, once it was switched on, the Olkiluoto plant resulted in a 60 per cent fall in power prices.

Yet Australia remains one of a handful of modern Western economies that does not have a nuclear energy program, and one of the only ones with an outright ban on nuclear energy.

There is, however, no way around the fact that nuclear power plants are expensive. They cost billions. This is the argument that opponents of nuclear energy repeat ad nauseam.

Billions are also needed for largescale renewable projects, new transmission lines, and the large number of big batteries capable of storing enough power to be of any use when solar panels and wind turbines aren’t contributing enough energy.

Most solar panels have a lifespan of between 15 and 25 years, and the inverters used to make the solar generated electricity suitable for the grid have a lifespan of around 10 years.

Yet according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, most new technology nuclear reactors have a lifespan of up to 60 years or more.

That’s not to say that there will not be advances in renewables, but all new technology electricity generation is going to come at a significant cost.

However, when embedded costs and the current ability of available technology to provide affordable 24/7 electricity are taken into account, nuclear technology should at least be part of the discussion. The first step must be removing the ban so the market can test the idea.

And who knows – the possibility of Australia getting off the bench and joining the rest of the developed world in utilising affordable nuclear power could become a reality.