Pro nuclear stand by Liberal MPs and Labor’s Paul Howes

Opposition Deputy Leader Julie Bishop and Shadow Energy and Resource Minister Ian Macfarlane both did their part to keep nuclear power on the agenda yesterday, with Bishop taking the strongest stance, that “nuclear power is the only low-emission technology currently capable of supplying the constant energy we need for large cities and industry”. ….AWU secretary Paul Howes is still agitating in that direction, saying this issue should still be weighed up “unemotionally”.

A vanishing vision of nuclear power,Business Spectator, Rob Burgess, 15 Mar 2011

On both sides of politics, those who envisage an Australian nuclear power industry are watching that ambition vanish into the distant future. As the tragic human toll of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami gets perilously close to also becoming an environmental catastrophe, both Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott have restated their policy positions – no plans for nuclear…..
Opposition Deputy Leader Julie Bishop and Shadow Energy and Resource Minister Ian Macfarlane both did their part to keep nuclear power on the agenda yesterday, with Bishop taking the strongest stance, that “nuclear power is the only low-emission technology currently capable of supplying the constant energy we need for large cities and industry”. ….
On the Labor side, plans to debate nuclear power at this year’s national conference will meet strong opposition from the anti-nuclear minded, though AWU secretary Paul Howes is still agitating in that direction, saying this issue should still be weighed up “unemotionally”.

That’s difficult. Voters may not be rational in their fears over the dangers of nuclear power, but it would take a brave government a long time to undo the damage of the past few days.

Gillard’s position, which she put on the ABC’s Q&A program last night, is that: “We are a country with abundant solar, wind, geothermal, tidal, you name it, we have got renewable sources of energy, so we don’t think nuclear energy is right for this country.”

And that is perhaps the big issue that needs to be faced by proponents of nuclear power. The contention that reliable renewable baseload power cannot be achieved does not receive the scrutiny it deserves. …..
the current political set-back to Australia’s nuclear ambitions suggest that a world class renewables industry will be much more achievable in the decades ahead…http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Japan-nuclear-crisis-Gillard-Abbott-pd20110315-EXRWR?opendocument&src=rss

March 15, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, politics