Julia Gillard reaffirms Australia’s plan for renewable energy, not nuclear
Australia PM: Don’t See Place For Nuclear In Australia’s Energy Mix, Wall St Journal, By Andrew Monahan, Dow Jones NewswiresTOKYO 22 April 11-Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard reiterated Friday that her government doesn’t see any place for nuclear power in the country’s energy policy, and that a review of global nuclear safety is needed in the wake of the crisis at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
“We do not have nuclear energy and we do not plan for it to be part of Australia’s future energy mix,” Gillard said after a speech in Tokyo. “We are a country that has abundant energy resources and we are very focused now on the clean energy sources of the future.” ……http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110421-705327.html
Dispelling the nuclear lobby’s myth about “base load” power
Firstly, the demand for power during the night is generally low and could be reduced substantially by improving our efficiency of energy use and by the forthcoming phase-out of electric off-peak hot water. This is the reverse of the previous policies, which deliberately encouraged an increase in night-time demand to allow our inflexible coal-fired stations to generate 24/7. Under the present circumstances, where coal-fired generators must be phased out, we can reduce base-load demand and supply.
The base-load myth, Mark Diesendorf , ABC, 21 April 2011 To every complex problem there is a simplistic response, which is usually wrong.
For instance, to the challenge of generating all of Australia’s electricity from renewable energy, the deniers and scoffers repeatedly utter the simplistic myth that renewable energy is intermittent and therefore cannot generate base-load (that is, 24-hour) power.
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Antinuclear 