There’s no rational reason for maintaining the nuclear ban

The weekend articles and Monday’s biting Johannes Leak cartoon caution readers not to take stated facts and figures in the energy debate at face value. For example, we’ll shortly learn that the $275 reduction in power bills won’t be met. Broken promises matter; so too their associated human costs that lead to energy poverty.

The energy regulator’s report confirms that affordability is a growing and serious problem. Last financial year close to 200,000 people were carrying energy debts, averaging just on $1000. Specific hardship programs covered another 96,000 people. Their electricity debts averaged $1762. The taxpayer-funded relief packages reached only half of all households, leaving many of the working poor struggling on their own.

In opposing nuclear, Energy Minister Chris Bowen asserts that renewables are the cheapest form of energy. This leaves many questions unanswered. Why is it that South Australia, with the largest penetration of renewables, has the highest costs of power? Why are our power costs among the highest in the world? Why shouldn’t emissions-free nuclear be subsidised, knowing Labor’s model would collapse without them? When will we know the full costs of Labor’s transition?

It’s expected the 2030 jobs and emissions targets won’t be met. Our trade exposed-industries and jobs remain at risk without guaranteed baseload power. There’s no rational reason for maintaining the nuclear ban. While discussion is not consent, virtue signalling blinds us to reality.

Jennie George, Mollymook, NSW

Chris Bowen insists to get nuclear up and running in 10 years is “fanciful”. He needs to be reminded that in May 1961, John F. Kennedy said the US “should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to Earth”.

Note the words, “before this decade is out”. From 1961 to 1969 is eight years and that was, to use Bowen’s own words, literally starting from scratch, to go where no man had gone before, inventing technology and processes on the fly. Yet Bowen says nuclear power, with known and available technology, can’t be managed in 10 years. This just shows how far the West has regressed in the past 50 years.

Jim Ball, Narrabeen, NSW

The argument about nuclear power stations being too expensive by both sides of the political divide is absurd. Taxes have paid for our road system. It’s not a matter of getting a return. The money spent on subsidising renewables is also too expensive. At least a nuclear power station provides reliable power, doesn’t devastate the Earth’s resources and does not have the replacement cost and associated disposal nightmare. I object to Chris Bowens irresponsible personal agenda on the nuclear power matter.

Evatt Furney, Gordon, NSW

If renewable energy sources, notably wind and solar, are so efficient, why not remove all the taxpayer-funded subsidies? The subsidies were originally intended to encourage the uptake of an emerging industry. It can no longer be described as emerging as tens of thousands of hectares of farming and environmentally significant land are covered by wind and solar installations.

This is only fair as proponents of renewable energy are demanding that any potential nuclear industry not be taxpayer funded.

Without the generous taxpayer-funded subsidies, let’s see how long renewables stay cheap.

Meg Davis, Corinda, Qld

Dale Ellis rightly explains that “by 2035 not a single coal-fired power station will be operating” (Letters, 11/3). We need replacement energy sources, and quickly. For decades we have grappled with the best alternative based on the holy grail energy trifecta of security, affordability and sustainability. Impacted by global supply and costs, fossil fuels are neither secure nor sustainable, which is why we are now stuck in a nuclear and/or renewables debate. No doubt Australia’s ban on and lack of nuclear industry lowers the feasibility of nuclear. Cost and time required are, however, the real barriers.

With renewable energy already accounting for more than 35.9 per cent of our electricity generation, the nuclear-championing Coalition must release a viable policy if nuclear is to have a fighting chance to form part of the future energy mix.

Amy Hiller, Kew, Vic