Antinuclear

Old-time crusader for the nuclear lobby, Leslie Kemeny rides again

Noel Wauchope, 11 Jan 13 Make no mistake – the nuclear lobby is on the job in  a big way in Australia.  Leading the charge is that energetic nuclear promotion  group in South Australia – Barry Brook and Ben Heard.

But they’re not alone – with many vested interests pushing the pro nuke message. For example, The Age’s recent song of praise for thorium reactors.

Now the Canberra Times gives that tireless old warrior Leslie Kemeny yet another platform for his pro nuke spruik.

Since the 1970s Kemeny has had well over 200 opinion pieces published.

I find it quite remarkable that Kemeny gets such coverage, as he trots out pretty much the same old arguments, and denigrates opponents in the same old ways.  Kemeny consistently ignores the unsolved problem of nuclear wastes, the environmental effects of radiation, the huge costs of security and of protecting the wastes for hundreds, thousands of years.

In the Canberra Times, Kemeny quotes as evidence this statement by Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith –  ”The nuclear accident in Japan has not killed anybody. There may be one or two people who will die of cancer, but we are talking of very small numbers, if any.”

Here Kemeny brings in that tired old argument style from the tobacco and asbestos lobbies   –  . cigarettes never killed anybody  – maybe one or two will get lung cancer.

Kemeny goes on at length about  global warming  and the necessity for nuclear power.  But to make nuclear power effective against global warming   it will have to produce 16,000 Mtoe of energy per year – a 25-fold increase on its current level. Today the world has 440 operational nuclear reactors, so 25 times more means 11,000 reactors. To have these in 35 years means building, on average, about one a day. Or in an exponential growth scenario, the world would need to sustain an annual increase of 8% per year in the number of operational nuclear reactors for 35 years.  Many of these would need to be located in failed states and countries currently beset by internal wars

As usual – Kemeny dismisses renewable energy policies of Kevin Rudd as “merely symbolic gestures and political spin”. He has no answer to the number of scholarly studies that show that Australia could power all its electricity by renewable means.

Twenty-five years ago, Kemeny had already published dozens and dozens of newspaper articles, and they were subjected to critical analysis by Professor Brian Martin, who was then teaching in the science faculty at the Australian National University.

Martin concluded his analysis: “In quite a number of ways, Kemeny in his public advocacy of nuclear power does not fit the image of the objective, trustworthy expert: he addresses only some of the issues and seldom replies to anti-nuclear arguments; he presents large amounts of irrelevant material; he is subject to inaccuracy, and on occasion fails to acknowledge his mistakes; he continually denigrates opponents; he speaks from a position representing a potential conflict of interest; and his expertise is mostly irrelevant to the issues, or of doubtful quality.”

Nothing changes, for this retired nuclear warrior. I guess it would be like expecting a Cardinal of the Catholic Church to consider the possibility of there being no God.

January 11, 2013 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, spinbuster