Focus on Australian news
This site is now to focus on Australian news, rather than including significant international news.
I’m trying this out, because of time pressures.
For international news, please go to https://nuclear-news.net/
David McBride goes to prison – and Australian democracy takes a hit
Peter Greste, Professor of Journalism and Communications, Macquarie University, 17 May 24, https://theconversation.com/david-mcbride-goes-to-prison-and-australian-democracy-takes-a-hit-230007—
Governments and their agencies wield awesome power. At times, it is quite literally the power over life and death. That is why in any functioning democracy, we have robust checks and balances designed to make sure power is exercised responsibly and with restraint.
So, what message does a sentence of more than five years in prison for someone who exposed credible allegations of war crimes by Australian soldiers send?
On Tuesday, ACT Supreme Court Justice David Mossop despatched the former military lawyer David McBride to prison for five years and eight months, for passing classified military documents to journalists. Those documents formed the basis of the ABC’s explosive “Afghan Files” investigation, revealing allegations that Australian soldiers were involved in the unlawful executions of unarmed civilians.
It is hard to think of any whistleblowing more important.
McBride’s case forced us to confront the way our own troops had been conducting the war in Afghanistan, as well as the government’s ongoing obsession with secrecy over the public interest.
McBride had been concerned about what he saw as systemic failures of the SAS commanders, and their inconsistency in dealing with the deaths of “non-combatants” in Afghanistan. In an affidavit, he said he saw the way frontline troops were being –
improperly prosecuted […] to cover up [leadership] inaction, and the failure to hold reprehensible conduct to account.
He initially complained internally, but when nothing happened he decided to go public. In 2014 and 2015, McBride collected 235 military documents and gave them to the ABC. The documents included 207 classified as “secret” and others marked as cabinet papers.
It is hard to deny the truth of what McBride exposed. The Brereton Inquiry later found what a parliamentary briefing described as “credible information” of 23 incidents in which non-combatants were unlawfully killed “by or at the direction of Australian Special Forces”. The report said these “may constitute the war crime of murder”.
Brereton went on to recommend prosecutions of the soldiers who were allegedly responsible. Yet, the first person to face trial and be sent to prison in the whole debacle is not any of those who might have been responsible for alleged killings, but the man who exposed “misconduct” in the Australian Defence Force.
Much has been made of McBride’s reasons for going to the media, but this focus on motives is a form of misdirection. Whistleblowers take action for a host of reasons – some of them less honourable than others. But ultimately, what matters is the truth of what they expose, rather than why.
That is why we recognise media freedom as an essential part of a healthy democracy, including the right – indeed the responsibility – of journalists to protect confidential sources. Unless sources who see wrongdoing can confidently expose it without fear of being exposed and prosecuted, the system of accountability falls apart and gross abuses of power remain hidden.
It is also why the formal name for Australia’s whistleblower protection law is the “Public Interest Disclosure Act”.
This law is designed to do what it says on the tin: protect disclosures made in the public interest, including those made through the media. It recognises that sometimes, even when the law imposes certain obligations of secrecy on public servants, there may be an overriding interest in exposing wrongdoing for the sake of our democracy.
As a highly trained and experienced military lawyer, McBride knew it was technically illegal to give classified documents to the media. The law is very clear about that, and for good reason. Nobody should be able to publish government secrets without a very powerful justification.
But nor should the fact that a bureaucrat has put a “secret” stamp on a document be an excuse for covering up serious crimes and misdemeanours.
In McBride’s case, the judge accepted the first premise, but rejected the second.
This is why my organisation, the Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom, is advocating for a Media Freedom Act. The act would oblige the courts to weigh up those competing public interests – the need for secrecy in certain circumstances against the sometimes more compelling need to publish and expose wrongdoing – rather than assume secrecy as a given.
It is hard to overstate the impact this case is likely to have on anybody with evidence of government misdeeds. Do they stay quiet and live with the guilt of being complicit, or do they speak up like McBride and others, and risk public humiliation, financial ruin and possibly even prison?
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has committed to reforming the whistleblower protection regime, and before the last election, promised to set up an independent Whistleblower Protection Authority. Those commitments are laudable, but they ring hollow while McBride sits in prison and another prominent whistleblower, Richard Boyle from the Australian Taxation Office, faces trial later this year.
It is hard to see the former military lawyer being locked in a cell, and say Australia is either safer, or better because of it.
Australia and the AUKUS nuclear waste-dump clause
By Michelle Pini | 16 May 2024, https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/australia-and-the-aukus-nuclear-waste-dump-clause,18609
Australia has entered into a toxic agreement that can only leave us – and the planet – worse off than the sum of our greatest fears.
There may be times when friendships with powerful and dangerous entities, who may also be bullies, can be advantageous. But like most perilous alliances, they will eventually benefit the bully over the weaker link.
This is overtly true in the school playground and carries over in a less obvious way into the adult world. While most of us learn early on that bullies need to be called out and are best avoided, some oppressors are able to amass enough power so as to be almost indiscernible. This is true of vested interests dictating government policy – such as the enormously powerful fossil fuel lobby – and the strategic alliances we form with superpowers, such as the AUKUS agreement.
In this way, the very grown-up (in terms of size and strength) and obscenely well-funded fossil fuel and arms corporations, and foreign superpowers are the same as schoolyard bullies: they target the insecurities of others to advance their own interests.
In the case of the AUKUS agreement, Australia is the little kid with the obvious insecurities that must do the bullies’ bidding.
Australia, a nation that has historically sought protection for perceived insecurities from its allies, following them into endless conflicts and geopolitical strategies, is now careering into freefall with an agreement that is, by definition, poisonous at its core. The AUKUS agreement demands of Australia more than it can ever deliver. This is because its power brokers are known world bullies, supported by massive corporations with a hunger for money and power that no amount of nuclear submarine production or blind allegiance can ever assuage.
So, we are not only expected to spend as much as $368 billion over two decades, or $14,000 for every person in Australia, on nuclear submarines that will be obsolete before they are completed. We are not only expected to follow our masters into any bloody conflict they deem necessary. But we are also expected to dispose of any unwanted toxic waste, as commanded.
This means that:
As a responsible nuclear steward, Australia will manage all radioactive waste generated by its own Virginia Class and SSN-AUKUS submarines, including radioactive waste generated through operations, maintenance and decommissioning.’
A strange use of the term “responsible”, but considering we will be creating this radioactive waste, this section seems reasonable.
However, the arrangement may also mean, that should our AUKUS masters decide they have generated more of their own nuclear waste than they can be bothered dealing with, they can unceremoniously dump it on our shores. After all, what are willing sidekicks for but to do the dirty work for their bosses?
While Defence Minister Richard Marles has said the Government would not accept nuclear waste from other nations, in a bizarre fine-print clause, the AUKUS legislation deals with ‘managing, storing or disposing of radioactive waste from an AUKUS submarine’ — defining an AUKUS submarine as ‘an Australian or a UK/U.S. submarine’.
Given the inability of our tougher associates to deal with their own toxic radioactive waste, this is not the first time they have tried to dump it here, of course, usually covertly encouraged by Coalition governments cosying up to the big boys, as we have detailed over the years.
Now, with the AUKUS covenant extending well into the future and taking into account the Coalition’s nuclear zealotry, not to mention an undercurrent of U.S. political instability that may well see Trump reinstated, they may well succeed.
As Australian Conservation Foundation’s anti-nuclear campaigner, Dave Sweeney, so aptly described it, our bigger tougher friends could well turn Australia into their very own “radioactive terra nullius”.
And as Sweeney has detailed in IA:
‘Nothing about the nuclear industry, especially nuclear waste, is clean or uncomplicated.’
Australia has entered into a toxic agreement that can only leave us – and the planet – worse off than the sum of our greatest fears.
“Picking losers:” Choosing nuclear over renewables and efficiency will make climate crisis worse
Giles Parkinson, May 15, 2024, https://reneweconomy.com.au/picking-losers-choosing-nuclear-over-renewables-and-efficiency-will-make-climate-crisis-worse/
One of the world’s leading energy experts, and the man dubbed the “Einstein of energy efficiency” has debunked the claims that nuclear energy is essential to meet climate goals, saying that choosing nuclear over renewables and energy efficiency will make the climate crisis worse.
“Carbon-free power is necessary but not sufficient; we also need cheap and fast,” says Lovins, the co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute, now known as RMI, and who has been advising governments and companies on energy efficiency for half a century.
“We therefore need to count carbon and cost and speed. At actual market prices and deployment speeds, new nuclear plants would save manyfold less carbon per dollar and per year than cheaper, faster efficiency or modern renewables, thus making climate change worse
“The more urgent you think climate change is, the more vital it is to buy cheap, fast, proven solutions—not costly, slow, speculative ones.”
The comments by Lovins, made in a keynote presentation at the annual Energy Efficiency Summit in Sydney on Wednesday, are particularly relevant in Australia, where one side of politics is threatening to stop wind, solar and storage, and tear up Commonwealth contracts, and keep coal generators open until such time that nuclear can be built.
The federal Coalition, and its conservative boosters in the media and so called think tanks, argue that nuclear is the best way to get to net zero by 2050, ignoring the pleas and warnings from climate scientists who say that unless emissions cuts are accelerated, then the planet has little chance of keeping average global warming below 2.0° or even 2.5°c.
A common refrain from the Coalition, and conservative parties across the world for that matter, is that nuclear should be included as part of an “all of the above” strategy. To be fair, it is also used by Labor when justifying their infatuation with fossil gas and its proposed future beyond 2050.
“When someone says climate change is so urgent that we need “all of the above,” remember Peter Bradford’s reply: “We’re not picking and backing winners. They don’t need it. We’re picking and backing losers.”
“That makes climate change worse,” Lovins says,. No proposed changes in size, technology, or fuel cycle would change these conclusions: they’re intrinsic to all nuclear technologies.”
He noted that renewables add as much capacity every few days as global nuclear power adds in a whole year. “Nuclear is a climate non-solution (that) isn’t worth paying for, let alone extra.
“Nuclear power has no business case or operational need. It offers no benefits for grid reliability or resilience justifying special treatment. In fact, its inflexibility and ungraceful failures complicate modern grid operations, and it hogs grid and market space that cheaper renewables are barred from contesting.”
Lovins says that grids in Europe have shown that renewable dominated grids can be run with great reliability “like a conductor with a symphony orchestra” with comparatively little storage, and little is needed if politicians and grid operators embraced the full potential of energy efficient and demand site incentives.
Giles Parkinson Giles Parkinson is founder and editor of Renew Economy, and is also the founder of One Step Off The Grid and founder/editor of the EV-focused The Driven. He is the co-host of the weekly Energy Insiders Podcast. Giles has been a journalist for 40 years and is a former business and deputy editor of the Australian Financial Review.
China urges US, UK and Australia to stop AUKUS nuclear submarine deal: FM spokesperson
By Global Times May 15, 2024 https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202405/1312342.shtml
China will continue to utilize platforms such as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), review process to thoroughly discuss the political, legal, and technical issues related to the AUKUS nuclear submarine deal, a spokesperson from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday. Until the international community reaches a clear conclusion, the US, UK, and Australia should halt the advancement of the initiative, the spokesperson noted.
The remarks were made by Wang Wenbin, spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry, when asked to comment on a workshop titled “AUKUS: A Case Study about the Development of IAEA Comprehensive Safeguards” organized by the Permanent Mission of China in Vienna recently.
On May 10th, the Permanent Mission of China in Vienna hosted a seminar on AUKUS. Representatives from nearly 50 countries’ permanent missions in Vienna, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Secretariat, and experts think tanks from both China and other countries attended the meeting, with over 100 participants in total, said Wang, noting that the participants engaged in lively discussions on the supervision and security of AUKUS, highlighting the widespread attention and concern of the international community on this issue.
The AUKUS nuclear submarine deal undermines efforts to maintain regional peace and security. US, UK and Australia are forming a trilateral security partnership, advancing cooperation on nuclear submarines and other cutting-edge military technologies, stimulating an arms race, undermining the international nuclear non-proliferation regime, stirring up blocs, and opposing and disrupting regional peace and stability, Wang said.
The spokesperson said China and other relevant countries in the region have repeatedly expressed serious concerns and strong opposition.
Wang stated that AUKUS also triggered widespread concern about nuclear proliferation internationally. It involves the transfer of nuclear propulsion technology and a large volume of weapons-grade highly enriched uranium, which the existing safeguards and supervision system of the IAEA cannot effectively implement.
There is a significant controversy in the international community over the interpretation and application of relevant safeguards and monitoring clauses. If the three countries insist on advancing cooperation on nuclear submarines, it will create a huge risk of nuclear proliferation and have far-reaching negative impacts on the resolution of nuclear hotspots in other regions, said Wang.
Wang said China has called on the international community to take seriously the impact of AUKUS on the authority and effectiveness of NPT, as well as the deal’s negative effects on the institutional safeguards and oversight mechanisms. China will continue to utilize platforms such as the IAEA and the NPT review process to thoroughly discuss the political, legal, and technical issues related to the trilateral nuclear submarine cooperation. Until the international community reaches a clear conclusion, the US, UK, and Australia should halt the advancement of their nuclear submarine cooperation.
Mycle Schneider: Nuclear power is not an option
“The idea that we could go from zero to 10 reactors in 10 or even 20 years is a completely distorted idea of the feasibility of nuclear programmes,” said Schneider. “I think that’s probably the worst part of the nuclear myths currently.”
Instead, he said, it is well established that a single nuclear project, from conceptual idea to grid connection, can take up to 25 years to finalise. It’s precisely this timeline that makes nuclear energy an unfeasible solution to the climate emergency—a crisis on which we cannot afford to wait.
https://rightlivelihood.org/news/mycle-schneider-nuclear-power-is-not-an-option/— 14 May 24
Independent energy policy and nuclear analyst Mycle Schneider, recipient of the 1997 Right Livelihood Award for educating the public on the unparalleled risks of nuclear materials, has released the World Nuclear Industry Status Report annually since 2007.
Recently, he visited Stockholm to engage with the Swedish press, academics and politicians on the findings of the 2023 Report. In an interview with Right Livelihood, Schneider busts the Swedish right wing’s assertion that nuclear energy is an indispensable tool for overcoming the climate crisis.
Since Sweden’s right-wing parliamentary faction took power in October 2022, a national debate on the role of nuclear energy in balancing the energy mix and combating the climate crisis has taken centre stage.
This debate came to a head late last year when the Swedish parliament passed a bill removing the country’s 10 nuclear reactor cap and announced its plan to build and start up two new reactors by 2035.
In response to whether nuclear energy has a place in balancing Sweden’s energy mix and combating the climate crisis, Schneider’s answer is resoundingly clear: absolutely not.
But, it’s not for the reasons you may think. Arguing that any debate on nuclear’s environmental or economic costs or benefits is useless, Schneider insists that expanding nuclear energy under the given time constraints is simply not possible.
“The idea that we could go from zero to 10 reactors in 10 or even 20 years is a completely distorted idea of the feasibility of nuclear programmes,” said Schneider. “I think that’s probably the worst part of the nuclear myths currently.”
Instead, he said, it is well established that a single nuclear project, from conceptual idea to grid connection, can take up to 25 years to finalise. It’s precisely this timeline that makes nuclear energy an unfeasible solution to the climate emergency—a crisis on which we cannot afford to wait.
Nuclear energy’s costliness is another barrier that prevents it from being a means of tackling the climate crisis.
“It’s the combination of money and time,” said Schneider. “In order to respond to this challenge, nuclear power is not an option. It’s not a bad or a good option. It’s not an option. It’s too expensive and, above all, it’s too slow to be eligible as an effective instrument to deal with the climate emergency.”
Only ‘two countries’ would survive nuclear war after ‘5 billion die in 72 hours’, says expert
Journalist Annie Jacobsen says ‘most of the world would be covered in sheets of ice’.
Anish Vij 15 May 2024, https://www.ladbible.com/news/politics/nuclear-war-countries-survive-annie-jacobsen-diary-ceo-302018-20240515
There is a chance that around five billion people will die in just 72 hours in the event of nuclear war.
Happy Wednesday, everyone.
Though I’m sure you read the headline beforehand and are well prepared for some depressing insight into the future of humanity.
In this case, we have Annie Jacobsen to thank, an investigative journalist, New York Times bestselling author, and a 2016 Pulitzer Prize finalist.
The 56-year-old from Connecticut, US, has spent years researching the possible effects of nuclear war and she claims that there are only two countries where you might, I repeat, might survive.
The reason being that nuclear attacks would cause a thick smoke from burning fires to spread across the three continents, ultimately causing a mini ice-age.
This would most likely kill five billion of the eight billion people on earth within 72 hours.
She explained on Steven Bartlett’s Diary Of A CEO podcast: “Most of the world, certainly the mid-latitudes would be covered in sheets of ice …places like Iowa and Ukraine would be just snow for 10 years.
“Agriculture would fail, and when agriculture fails people just die.
“On top of that you have the radiation poisoning because the ozone layer will be so damaged and destroyed that you couldn’t be outside in the sunlight – people will be forced to live underground.”
Jacobsen said that Professor Brian Toon, a leading expert on climate and atmospheric science, told her that only two countries could potentially survive a nuclear winter – New Zealand and Australia, who can ‘sustain agriculture’.
The expert also opened up about the story of former US Secretary of Defence Bill Perry and the idea of a nuclear war happening by accident.
“He was on the night watch during the Carter Administration … he was told by the National Military Command Centre, which is the bunker beneath the Pentagon, that there were ballistic missiles on the way from Soviet Russia,” she said.
“This was confirmed by the nuclear bunker beneath Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska the STRATCOM (Strategic Command) bunker.
“Not only were intercontinental ballistic missiles flying at the United States but there were sub-launched ballistic missiles coming at the United States. It was a massive motherlode of warheads.
“Within a matter of minutes he got word that it was a mistake – how does a mistake like that happen?
“What he told me was that there was a VHS tape of a simulated attack by the Soviet Union against the United States and the VHS tape had mistakenly been inserted into a machine in the nuclear bunker beneath the Pentagon and because it is linked to STRATCOM it was seen in both places.
Perry said to me it looked real because it was meant to look real.”
Renewable Energy company Neoen to build its biggest battery to shift energy to evening peak in nuclear-dominated Ontario
Giles Parkinson & Joshua S Hill, https://reneweconomy.com.au/neoen-to-build-its-biggest-battery-to-shift-energy-to-evening-peak-in-nuclear-dominated-ontario/ 14 Mar 24
French renewable energy company Neoen has announced plans to build its biggest battery project to date – a 400 MW, four hour battery (1600 MWh) to shift excess energy to the evening peak in the nuclear dominated Canadian state of Ontario.
Neoen has created a new subsidiary company called Shift Solar to build the Grey Owl battery project, which was one of 10 storage projects that won capacity contracts offered by Ontario’s Independent Electricity Systems Operator (IESO) in the largest battery storage procurement in Canada’s history.
The Grey Owl Storage project will boast a total nameplate capacity of 400MW/1,600MWh, of which 380MW and four hours of storage (1520 MWH) has been contracted to the IESO over a period of 20 years, providing grid stability and reliability services.
“The battery will be able to charge during off-peak hours and redistribute the stored energy back into the grid at peak times, when it is needed most,” Neoen said in a statement.
Ontario’s grid is dominated by nuclear power, which provides 53 per cent of its electricity. Solar provides less than one per cent of grid production and wind less than 8.2 per cent, underlying the fact that even grids dominated by less flexible “baseload” power need, or want, battery storage to shift excess power to where it is needed most.
The IESO has been seeking up to 2,500MW of energy storage capacity (with multiple hours of storage) as well as some gas capacity to help meet projected shortfalls in electricity supply, made worse by the multi-year outages required to refurbish most of the state’s ageing nuclear plants.
In the tender results announced late last week, a total of 1.8 GW of battery storate capacity (it did not provide storage duration) was awarded, at an average price of $C672 per megawatt per day. A further 790 MW of storage capacity was awarded last year.
The Grey Owl battery will be one of the biggest in the world, and the second largest battery in Canada.
Neoen says it will be the largest in its own portfolio, bigger than the recently announced Collie 2 battery in Western Australia, which will be sized at 341 MW and 1363 MWh, and will have a similar role to the Grey Owl battery, except the W.A. battery will time shift excess solar rather than excess nuclear.
It should be noted, however,. that the Collie facility also included the 219 MW/877 MWh Collie Battery 1 facility that – combined with stage 2 – will create an overall battery project of 560 MW and 2240 MWh.
Neoen has also built the Hornsdale Power Reserve, the Victoria Big Battery (still the country’s largest operating battery), the Bulgana battery, and is building big batteries at Western Downs, Blyth and in the ACT.
“We are thrilled to have been awarded this major contract with the IESO,” said Emmanuel Pujol, CEO of Neoen Americas.
“The province’s energy and capacity needs are massive, and Neoen’s ambition is to be a key contributor, by developing a broad portfolio of renewable energy and storage projects for the years to come.”This is an important step for Neoen in Ontario and Canada, where we are accelerating our development.”
The Grey Owl project will be built in Arran-Elderslie, Bruce County, in Ontario, and is expected to begin operations in early 2028.
Giles Parkinson & Joshua S Hill
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1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 