Nuclear would take 20 years to hit power grid: Sam Mostyn

Prominent company director Sam Mostyn said the nuclear fix would take too long to become a reality under current conditions.

BetaShares chief economist David Bassanese and prominent company director Sam Mostyn at The Australian’s BHP Competitive Advantage Boardroom lunch. Picture: John Feder

Prominent company director Sam Mostyn said nuclear would take 20 years to be built and integrated into Australia’s power grid, ruling it out as a realistic medium-term solution to the country’s transition to green energy.

The Minerals Council of Australia and Australian Energy Producers said last week that nuclear should also be considered as part of the long-term energy mix as the power grid gradually moves away from coal.

However, Ms Mostyn – who serves on the boards of Mirvac and Aware Super – said the nuclear fix would take too long to become a reality under current conditions.

“When it comes to planning for nuclear … with the current permits and the lack of engagement from Australian communities, it’s 20 years to get there even if it’s a small modular nuclear reactor because no one really wants a nuclear plant near them,” she told the The Australian’s BHP Competitive Advantage Boardroom Series lunch.

Still, BetaShares chief economist David Bassanese said there should at least be a discussion of how the fuel source could contribute to the energy mix.

“The warnings are getting more dire by the day along with the scale of the requirements,” he said. “And there is a lot of uncertainty about what the technology solution will be.

“One of the problems I think nationally with policy is that we seem to be picking winners and we need to be a bit more open in terms of what will be the winners.

“At the moment we are going solar and wind and it’s all about that. But maybe there are other options too.”

Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen in September released government costings claiming that Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s proposal to convert coal-fired power sites into nuclear small modular reactors would cost $387bn. That followed the Coalition touting a “coal-to-nuclear transition” and tapping Australia’s world-leading uranium stocks as centre­pieces of the Coalition’s 2025 energy policy to secure long-term baseload power, slash emissions and lower electricity bills.

Westinghouse senior vice-president Rita Baranwal – a former assistant secretary at the US Department of Energy – said last month that nuclear power could be a significant contributor to supporting renewables for far less than the $387bn claimed by Labor.

More than $120bn of spending is needed to finance new solar, wind, transmission and energy storage projects by 2030, according to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, but investment is falling short of targets. It estimates a major wind farm needs to be built each month until the end of the decade to hit the ambitious goal.

Two-thirds of traditional coal generators are expected to be retired in the next 10 years, leaving the country scrambling to seek new sources of power.

Modelling by the academic-backed Net Zero Australia group suggests the skilled workforce needed to install and run new generation assets, transmission lines and associated decarbonisation ­efforts will need to double to at least 200,000 by 2030 and reach 700,000-850,000 by 2060 – up to 4 per cent of Australia’s estimated total workforce. Renewable energy generation would need to grow to about 40 times the current power grid generation capacity.