Antinuclear

Nuclear enthusiasm from Australia’s right-wing MPs – the triumph of quackery over substance

Minister Sussan Ley could open the door to overturning Australia’s nuclear power ban, news.com.au, 27 June 19    There are some very good reasons why the push to reverse Australia’s ban on nuclear power is a bad idea. Malcolm Farr@farrm51

in numerology.   That pretty well sums up the new enthusiasm for nuclear power within Government ranks — a triumph of quackery over substance.  The nuclear proponents and their media cheer squad seem so determined to see Australian uranium dug up and used to light up the nation, they have diminished the scientific realities of the exercise.

Minister Ley has said she is open to a review of the ban on nuclear power plants.

This isn’t as easy as her turning Susan into Sussan because, as she explained in 2015, “if you add the numbers that match the letters in your name you can change your personality”.

It is a matter of introducing a power source which would be expensive to build, expensive to run, and expensive to turn off. Plus it would be dangerous.

Make that “very dangerous”.

We have a National Wind Farm Commissioner — created by Tony Abbott when PM — overseeing the largely mythical health hazards caused by turbines generating electricity.

Little of which is being addressed by the new gushing tribe of nuclear fans.

It is unfair to load all of this on Ms Ley, but she does administer the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, which contains the nuclear ban.

It says, “Nuclear action will require approval if it has, will have, or is likely to have a significant impact on the environment. Nuclear actions should be referred to the Minister and undergo an environmental assessment and approval process.”

The pressure for change is coming from a wide range of political figures including One Nation’s new NSW Legislative Council member Mark Latham. And within the Government the pro nuclear voices have included that of Queensland Nationals federal MP Keith Pitt who told The Australian this month, “In our view, the technology has moved on and small modular reactors and thorium need to be investigated…….

If the pro-nuclear MPs are so confident of safety they would have to accept a reactor in their own neighbourhoods, assuring voters they would not become the next Chernobyl, Fukushima or Three Mile Island….

If not, maybe they would accept nuclear waste being buried in their patch, where it would contaminate for thousands of years.

Neither opportunity is likely to embraced by them.  https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/minister-sussan-ley-could-open-the-door-to-overturning-australias-nuclear-power-ban/news-story/2c6214dd0abf15c02f7f9c6dc62fbf11

June 27, 2019 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, politics