Nuclear curious? Here’s what you need to know about the Coalition’s energy claims
Peter Dutton says building nuclear reactors will bring down power prices but experts doubt it and say it will cost the climate too
Graham Readfearn, https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/feb/04/nuclear-power-liberal-coalition-energy-power-plan-details
Peter Dutton says the Coalition would slow down the rollout of renewable energy and and instead eventually spend tens of billions of taxpayer dollars to build nuclear power plants at seven sites across the country.
He claimed “power prices will be cheaper under us in the near term” and that his policy would be expected to lead to “a 44% reduction, or of that order, being passed through in energy bill relief” – that is, a dramatic and unprecedented cut in household power bills.
Does this stack up? Here’s what you need to know about the Coalition’s plans, the risks it poses to the country’s electricity supply and its climate targets.
What does the Coalition say it will do?
The Coalition wants to build large nuclear reactors at the sites of five coal-fired power stations – Liddell and Mount Piper in New South Wales, Tarong and Callide in Queensland, and Loy Yang in Victoria.
Small modular nuclear reactors, which are not yet commercially available anywhere, are proposed at the sites of Northern power station in South Australia and Muja power station in Western Australia.
All the reactors would be taxpayer-funded. The Coalition claims it could have smaller units working by 2035 and the first large reactor working by 2037.
How long would it take?
Most energy experts, including those from the CSIRO, say the Coalition’s timeline is unrealistic.
They argue it is highly unlikely Australia could do everything necessary – including creating a regulatory system, developing a skilled workforce, completing geological and environmental work and commissioning and building a nuclear reactor, with community approval – before the early 2040s, if not later.
The Coalition would also have to overturn a legislated federal ban on nuclear energy and convince the states to overturn their bans. Most state premiers and opposition leaders are opposed to introducing a nuclear energy system.
With Labor, the Greens and some independents opposed to nuclear energy, repealing federal laws would be a major obstacle.
The Nationals senator Matt Canavan has claimed the Coalition was “not serious” about building nuclear and it was being backed because it “fixes a political issue”.
Would building nuclear reactors keep the lights on?
Many of Australia’s coal plants are old.
On average, coal plants are forced offline through unplanned outages for about 10% of the year. Australia’s electricity market operator expects 90% of coal-fired power stations to be closed by 2035 – two years before the Coalition claims its first nuclear plant would be producing power.
The Coalition’s plan would mean requiring ageing coal plants to run for longer, increasing the risk of unplanned outages unless there was significant new spending on maintenance.
Experts say promising to build taxpayer-funded nuclear plants could also lead to investors deciding not to build the solar, wind, batteries and pumped hydro currently planned, and needed now, to replace much of the electricity from coal.
Would nuclear power really bring down the cost of living?
The Coalition has provided no evidence to back up its claim that its proposal could bring electricity prices down.
Dutton has claimed that modelling by Frontier Economics judged the Coalition’s plan to be 44% cheaper than Labor’s policy of running the grid overwhelmingly on renewable energy, and that this meant power bills would be cut by 44%.
This claim has no basis in fact. Frontier’s own modelling report said it had not modelled the impact of a nuclear plan on prices.
The modelling used by the Coalition is based on an electricity system producing 31% less electricity than Labor’s preferred renewables-based approach.
More than half of a household’s electricity bill is related to factors outside the Coalition’s plans, such as the cost of local poles and wires, or the costs passed on by retailers.
Overseas, particularly in western democracies, nuclear plants have become notorious for large cost blowouts and delays.
The Coalition says its plan would cost less because it would avoid having to build some of the new towers and power lines needed to connect the new solar, wind and battery farms planned across the country.
But CSIRO analysis found even if Australia had an established nuclear program with a suite of reactors, the electricity would cost at least 50% more than power from solar and wind backed by battery and other energy infrastructure needed to ensure the power grid remained reliable even when the wind wasn’t blowing and the sun wasn’t shining.
What will the Coalition’s nuclear plan mean for the climate crisis?
About a third of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions come from burning coal and gas to produce electricity. Cleaning up the grid is essential to cutting Australia’s climate pollution and meeting its international commitments.
The Coalition’s plan assumes that for the next 20 years or so there would be significantly less renewable energy and significantly more electricity from coal and gas-fired power stations than proposed by regulators and backed by the Labor government.
Not surprisingly, this would mean higher emissions. This point was reinforced in modelling supported by the Coalition released in late 2024. It found that Dutton’s proposal would lead to substantially higher pollution between now and 2048 than on the current path.
Independent analysis has backed this up, suggesting the Coalition’s plan would lead to an extra 1.7bn tonnes of CO2 being emitted by 2050. This is equivalent to about four years’ worth of emissions released across the entire Australian economy.
The Coalition’s plan also assumes slower decarbonisation in other parts of the economy. It suggests fewer people would buy electric vehicles than under Labor, and fewer rooftop solar panels would be installed.
The Coalition has aligned its plan to a scenario laid out by the Australian energy market operator that is in line with global heating of about 2.6C by 2100.
Lies, damned lies and Coalition energy economics: Dutton’s latest nuclear claim slammed
“Mr Dutton is either dangerously ill‑informed or he is lying to the Australian public.
Sophie Vorrath, Feb 3, 2025, https://reneweconomy.com.au/lies-damned-lies-and-coalition-energy-economics-duttons-latest-nuclear-claim-slammed/
Blink and you might have missed it, but Peter Dutton delivered another toe-curling example of energy policy hokum on Sunday morning, as the first guest of the first episode of the ABC’s Insiders program for 2025.
In amongst other well-spun lies – such as the claim Labor’s energy policy requires 28,000km of new transmission to be built – the leader of the federal opposition appeared to say that electricity bills would be 44 per cent cheaper under a Coalition government than under Labor.
“[Frontier Economics] look[d] at our energy policy compared to Labor’s, they judge[d] that it’s 44 per cent cheaper than Labor’s,” Dutton says.
When Insiders host David Speers points out that the 44% figure – itself hotly contested, as is Frontier’s Economics’ entire approach to modelling nuclear costs for Australia – relates to the cost of building nuclear between now and 2050 and not the power price impact, Dutton fudges further.
“If you’re delivering a model that’s 44% cheaper, that translates into cheaper power prices,” he says.
Pushed on this point, Dutton says, “If you apply the economics, so if there’s a 44% reduction in the model of delivering an energy system, you would expect a 44% reduction, or of that order, being passed through in energy bill relief.”
Pushing once more, Speers says: “But Frontier didn’t tell you that that number, you’re just, you’re just drawing that assumption yourself.”
Dutton: “Again, David, I mean, that’s that’s the economics of it. …All other variables being equal, if you have a 44% reduction in the overall cost to deliver that model, that is going to translate into that price reduction for households and for businesses, and that’s what we must do.”
Happily for Dutton, the discussion switches away from energy at this point, leaving his highly questionable application of “the economics of it” more or less unchallenged.
Unhappily for Dutton, certain energy market experts and actual economists are not having it.
The Smart Energy Council has responded on Monday by publishing the findings of its own analysis and calculations, using – it says – the same assumptions put forward by the federal Coalition and the nuclear policy costings of Frontier Economics. It also uses modelling from the Institute of Energy Economics and Analysis (IEEFA).
This analysis finds that for Australia’s 4 million (and counting) solar homes, power bills would go up more than $1,100 a year under Dutton’s nuclear policy. For non-solar homes, power bills would increase by an average $665 a year – a 30% jump.
The SEC says the hike in energy costs for solar homes of between $1,181 to $2,468 a year would come from lost energy savings, with “always on” nuclear likely to knock out rooftop solar for an average 67% of the year, forcing consumers on to higher nuclear power prices.
For both solar and non-solar homes, part of the jump in energy bills would come from the fact that nuclear power is a more expensive form of generation – as shown in IEEFA’s report, Nuclear in Australia would increase power bills.
The IEEFA report finds that for a nuclear plant with similar costs to those reported for Sizewell C in the UK to be commercially viable in Australia, wholesale energy prices would need to rise by $98 to $168 per megawatt-hour, relative to 2023-24 levels, to enable cost recovery.
This equates to a 74% to 127% rise in wholesale prices, which would see average household power bills across the states in the National Electricity Market increase by between $561 and $961 (with GST), assuming electricity retailers don’t add a margin on top.
“The latest reported cost blow-out for the UK’s proposed Sizewell C nuclear plant further underlines that the Coalition’s proposal to bring nuclear power to Australia is unrealistic,” say the report’s authors, Tristan Edis and Johanna Bowyer.
“Sizewell C’s revised capital cost estimate is about 2.5 times the capital cost used in the Coalition’s modelling.”
And then there are the other, other costs to Dutton’s nuclear policy plan – including the further cost to taxpayers of propping up old coal plants and relying more heavily on expensive gas.
As SEC chief John Grimes put it in a joint press conference with federal energy minister Chris Bowen on Monday, Dutton’s plan to build nuclear is more accurately – for the next decade, at least – a coal keeper, gas booster and renewables stopper program.
“Billions of dollars to go into coal to keep it in the system for as long as possible… [and] a massive scaling up of the amount of fossil gas, the most expensive fuel in the energy system. And a solar stopper program, a cap of 54 percent on renewable energy, solar and wind, by 2050,” Grimes said on Monday.
“Peter Dutton, he has a plan that will double power bills for ordinary Australians. We think that that is outrageous. We’re here today to call it out.
“Mr Dutton is either dangerously ill‑informed or he is lying to the Australian public.
“We know that his plan… will effectively transfer wealth from homeowners to the big fossil fuel companies. Peter Dutton’s plan delivers for his rich fossil fuel mates. But his plan, his power plan, is a big stop in the road, a stop for solar, a stop for wind, a stop for batteries, a stop for EVs, a stop for ordinary Australians slashing their power bills with solar,” Grimes said.
“A stop for the effective transition of our economy and the massive environmental benefits that that delivers, and economic benefits as well.”
‘No idea what he’s talking about’: Dutton’s nuclear plan could raise – not cut – electricity bills, experts warn
Opposition leader claims a 44% cost reduction compared with Labor’s plan would be passed on to Australian household bills, but not everyone agrees
Graham Readfearn, 4 Feb 25, https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/feb/04/no-idea-what-hes-talking-about-duttons-nuclear-plan-could-raise-not-cut-electricity-bills-experts-warn
Energy experts have rubbished claims by Peter Dutton that his plan to slow the rollout of renewable energy while waiting more than a decade for taxpayer-funded nuclear plants could bring down electricity bills in the short term.
Dutton said if there was “a 44% reduction in the model of delivering an energy system, you would expect a 44% reduction, or of that order, being passed through in energy bill relief”.
However, that was a “complete misunderstanding “of the Coalition’s own policy, according to Dr Dylan McConnell, an energy systems expert at the University of New South Wales. “He has no idea what he is talking about,” McConnell said.
Speaking to the ABC’s Insiders program on Sunday, Dutton said “power prices will be cheaper under us in the near term as well as in the medium to longer term as well”.
If elected, the Coalition would have to overturn federal and state bans on nuclear power; it claims it could have the first plants built by 2037. Experts, including the CSIRO, say the early 2040s is a more realistic timeframe.
The Coalition has not revealed any details on its near-term plans for electricity generation but Dutton said “we’re going to have to do a lot more with gas, with coal, in the system”.
Analysis by McConnell suggested the Coalition’s reliance on more coal and gas would add 1.7bn tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere by 2050, compared with Labor’s plan.
Data from the CSIRO suggests using gas for power generation is more expensive than coal, and solar and wind. Nuclear electricity would be at least 50% more expensive than renewables, the CSIRO has said.
Gas prices tripled when the Coalition was in power, according to Tristan Edis, an analyst at Green Energy Markets.
He said energy prices were likely to fall over the next two years after the inflation caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine subsides.
“Beyond this two-year period, it is difficult to understand how the Coalition will lower power prices if they intend to simply rely on the power plants which are already in place and not foster additional competition,” he said.
“The coal plants are getting old and banks are reluctant to finance refurbishment costs. If we rely on additional gas, that will push up power prices, not reduce them – because gas is expensive.
Edis said the Coalition’s costs for building a 1GW nuclear plant had been set at $1bn, which was “unrealistically low” and could be at least double that. This would push up wholesale electricity prices and household bills, he said.
Frontier Economics released modelling, backed by the Coalition, that compared the cost of Labor’s preferred renewables-based plan with an electricity system that anticipates less demand for electricity and includes nuclear.
Of Dutton’s claim that modelling showed the Coalition’s approach would cost 44% less than Labor’s plan, McConnell was doubtful.
“That’s a clear misunderstanding of what makes up an electricity bill and what the [modelling report] shows.”
He said only about 45% of a household electricity bill related to the cost of the electricity system and the wholesale costs that relate to the cost of the system referred to by Dutton. The rest related to the costs of local poles and wires, retail costs and environmental charges.
Danny Price, managing director of Frontier Economics, defended Dutton’s comments, saying if he was referring to the energy costs portion of people’s bills then the lower cost should transfer to households.
But on the impact on households’ overall electricity bills, “it’s a much more complicated question” he said, because of uncertainties around how prices are set in the market.
For that reason, his company had not attempted to forecast what the Coalition’s plan would do for people’s electricity bills or to electricity prices.
The paradox of recent politics
Crispin Hull, 2 February 25
A paradoxical realignment is under way in Australian and US politics.
Until recently, the Republican Party in the US and the Liberal Party in Australia were the parties of business, entrepreneurs, the professions, and the relatively wealthy. And the Democrats and Labor were the parties of the worker. The Democrats and Labor were always wary of new technology because it invariably costs jobs.
It was a fairly straight-forward labour-capital divide.
Then came some big changes: the rise of China; the threat of global heating; the social revolutions relating to identity (race, gender, nationality, and religion); and the collapse of organised labour.
Global heating was seen by Republicans and Liberals as some trendy, leftie anti-capital nonsense. They saw, with some justification, the rise of China as menacing. They attracted working-class votes based on nationalism and opposition to social causes on racial and sexual equality.
Those changes have thrown up some irreconcilable contradictions.
Private-Sector Economic Rationalist Peter Dutton has a plan under one arm to axe 36,000 “Canberra” public servants. Under the other arm Commissar Dutton he has a plan for massive public ownership of the means of energy production and management with seven nuclear power stations – just so his mates can keep up the profitable burning of fossil fuels for a few more years.
No sensible private-sector organisation will go near the nuclear plan, for obvious reasons. Moreover, only a third of federal public servants work in Canberra. But it sounds good to cut “Canberra” public servants. As if they do nothing – aside from, say, running air-traffic control; policing the borders; running Medicare, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and the defence forces; doing weather forecasts; and generally making society tick.
It leaves Labor, the party that has usually been unenthusiastic about entrepreneur-driven new technology, embracing and financing private-sector investment in new energy………………………………………………………….
Labor, the party of the environment, has now shelved legislative protection for endangered species and approved dozens of extensions to coal and gas projects while putting its hand on its heart saying it has approved no “new” coal or gas projects.
Despite election promises, Albanese, who “goes after Tories”, has delivered a corruption watchdog that bares its gums in private. And his whistle-blower-protection promises have evaporated. His political finance “reforms” tinker about the edges while continuing to allow big corporations and unions to be puppet-masters.
It is a government that clears the in-tray by moving things into the too-scared basket.
Dutton, meanwhile, the friend of the Australian Jewish Community, cynically weaponises and politicises antisemitic attacks in Australia so he can argue that Albanese is “weak” while stirring up divisions for his own ends. With any luck it will back-fire because the Jewish community is a bit more sophisticated and understanding of the nuances of public policy than the former Queensland policeman.
The attacks, of course, are not coming from racialised Muslims, but far-right, nationalist, self-labelled “Christian” neo-Nazis.
Surely these things mean that Dutton and Albanese have disqualified themselves from leading a majority government. Surely, events of the past three years tell us that a cross-bench holding the balance of power in the House of Representatives will improve government.
If Albanese is Prime Minister, they will demand action on obvious things on pain of being thrown out of office. If Dutton is Prime Minister, they will demand detail, justification, and costings for his nuclear policy or to drop it – again on pain of being removed from office.
How else can the major parties be weaned off the insidious corporate, union, and lobby-group influencers that conspire against the public interest?
The glimmer of hope here is Labor’s massive support of renewable energy. The Australian Energy Market Operator reported this month that coal’s share of electricity generation had fallen below half for the first time. Coal-fired power stations are becoming less reliable and less economic.
The economics are so obvious that households are taking up solar at an unforeseen rate. And they are telling everyone about their zero power bills. So, it is on an unstoppable roll. https://www.crispinhull.com.au/2025/02/03/the-paradox-of-recent-politics/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=crispin-hull-column
Dutton defends nuclear costings as opponents warn of power bill hit
“Peter Dutton wants to force millions of Australians to switch off the solar they bought, make them pay for more expensive nuclear power, and use their taxes to build nuclear reactors,”
The Age, By Shane Wright, February 2, 2025
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has claimed his nuclear energy policy would cut power bills by 44 per cent, but analysis by the renewables sector warns it could actually drive up electricity costs by more than $1000 a year for millions of Australians with rooftop solar panels.
Ahead of an election that will be dominated by cost-of-living issues, Dutton said while it would take time for energy prices to fall under his $331 billion plan to build seven government nuclear plants, they would ultimately drive down costs for consumers and business owners.
Modelling commissioned by the Coalition for its plan to build the reactors by the mid-2040s asserts total costs will be 44 per cent lower compared to the mass rollout of renewables. The same modelling did not estimate a reduction in retail power prices.
But Dutton told the ABC’s Insiders program on Sunday it was “economics” that lower construction and production costs would lead to a large drop in prices paid by consumers…………………
The modelling, however, has come under fire for its underlying assumptions, including an effective lid on the amount of renewable energy. Renewable energy under the Coalition’s modelling reaches 54 per cent of the total power market by 2050. By the end of last year, it had already hit 46 per cent.
Research to be released on Monday by the Smart Energy Council warns that millions of rooftop solar systems would have to shut off every day to allow the baseload power generated by nuclear reactors to fit into the grid.
It found that non-solar households could pay an extra $665 a year in power prices, while for those with rooftop solar, the bill shock could be more than $1000. Rooftop solar households were forecast to pay an extra $1262 a year in NSW, $1108 in Victoria and $1419 in south-east Queensland.
The higher costs to the more than 4 million rooftop solar households were in part because they would be blocked from feeding power into the energy market, the council said. As nuclear needed to be run constantly, if there was too much energy in the market, the first to be turned off would be rooftop solar, which was the easiest to prevent competing against nuclear.
Smart Energy Council chief executive John Grimes said every person who had invested in rooftop solar would pay far more for their energy if expensive nuclear power was forced into the grid.
“Peter Dutton wants to force millions of Australians to switch off the solar they bought, make them pay for more expensive nuclear power, and use their taxes to build nuclear reactors,” he said.
“We know that power bills are going to soar for all Australians because Peter Dutton wants to cap cheap, clean renewable energy and substitute it with expensive, unreliable, polluting coal and gas, while we wait a couple of decades to build their nuclear fantasies.”
The battle over electricity prices is part of a broader debate over the size of government, with Dutton accusing Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of overseeing a $347 billion increase in spending and a 36,000 lift in public servants…………………….
Pressed on where he would cut spending, Dutton ruled out an audit but signalled that voters would have to wait until after the election to get final details………
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said part of the increase in spending and public servants included the indexation of the aged pension and extra resources to the Veterans’ Affairs Department, Medicare and to lift housing construction.
He accused Dutton of trying to hide his planned cuts because he knew people would not support them.
“It is extraordinary that he’s saying to the Australian people he wants to cut $350 billion, but they will have to wait until after the election before he would tell them what that is,” he said.https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/dutton-defends-nuclear-costings-as-opponents-warn-of-power-bill-hit-20250202-p5l8wu.html
Nuclear waste. AUKUS agency’s reckless indifference
Last Friday, government solicitors acting for the Australian Submarine Agency sent me a warning against publishing some embarrassing information about their conduct.
Neither I (Rex Patrick) nor Michael West Media will be subject to their bullying, however.
The Australian Submarine Agency deals with high-level Defence secrets and fissile material, yet it has been caught ignoring security obligations while threatening Rex Patrick, who reports on their conduct.
by Rex Patrick | Feb 3, 2025, https://michaelwest.com.au/aukus-agency-reckless-on-nuclear-waste/
Last Friday, government solicitors acting for the Australian Submarine Agency sent me a warning against publishing some embarrassing information about their conduct.
Neither I nor MWM will be subject to their bullying, however.
The Australian Government has undertaken to accept responsibility for the spent nuclear fuel from our planned AUKUS submarines. This is no light undertaking. It’s more than a lifetime obligation; indeed,
it’s an obligation that will last tens of thousands of years.
The Government has announced that this high-level radioactive waste will be stored on Defence land.
As reported in MWM, in February 2023, the Australian Submarine Agency awarded a contract for nearly $400K to former Defence Department Deputy Secretary Steve Grzeskowiak to find a suitable Defence location
The very expensive irony that lurked behind this contract was the fact that Grzeskowiak had, when he was inside Defence, looked for a location on Defence land to store low-level radioactive waste and had been unable to find a suitable site.
According to Grzeskowiak, there wasn’t a single spot anywhere across the vast Defence estate that was suitable for storing low-level radioactive material. Yet he was now the go-to person who would, through some miraculous divination, find the Australian Submarine Agency a location across the very same territory.
Document request
In December 2023, I requested Mr Grzeskowiak’s report under our Freedom of Information laws. I was refused access on the basis the report was a Cabinet document.
But here’s the interesting thing. I knew that the report had been being worked on by multiple agencies, so I requested related documents from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO), the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA), Geoscience Australia (GA), the Department of Industry, Science and Resources (DISR) and the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C).
What those documents showed me was the report was not, at least until after I made my FOI request, developed on the Government’s CabNet+ system.
I’m now in a legal fight at the Administrative Review Tribunal, pressing my case for the report to be made public.
The Cabinet Handbook, the bible for Cabinet’s processes, makes it crystal clear that cabinet documents must be prepared on a special CabNet+ system.
The protective security framework of the Government also commands that Cabinet documents are stored on CabNet+.
Despite this, the Australian Submarine Agency didn’t do that.
Why? I can’t publish their evidence in the proceeding until the matter has been heard in the Tribunal, but what I can say is that it’s a case of reckless indifference to the rules.
It begs the question, will the Australian Submarine Agency also play fast and loose with the rules in relation to our highly classified data or our allies’ highly classified data?
“The Australian Submarine Agency is under a great deal of pressure to “get the job done”.
There are unquestionably a lot of unrealistic expectations coming down from the top. Will they follow the rules when it comes to nuclear safety, or will they bend and break the rules when they find it expedient to meet a politically driven objective?
Legal arguments
In their legal submissions, the Australian Government asserts: “The fact that the document was not created within the ‘CabNet’ system is not indicative one way or the other as to the intention of the authors.”
Actually, the rules of Cabinet are very strict. A document must meet two tests to qualify as a cabinet document 1) it must have been bought into existence for the dominant purpose of submission for consideration by the Cabinet, and 2) it must have been submitted to Cabinet.
I am satisfied it meets the second test but not the first.
To meet the first test the Government has to present objective evidence to the Tribunal that a minister so commissioned the document for consideration by Cabinet.
“They have not done so.”
And the fact that the document, in breach of the rules, just floated around on a government network not authorised to hold Cabinet documents for months on end will work against the Australian Submarine Agency in the end.
Hypocrisy
In response to insistence from Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that Peter Dutton should disclose the intended location of seven nuclear power stations, the Opposition Leader did so.
But Albanese is refusing to be transparent about the intended location of a high-level radioactive waste dump. His government wants to block public debate for as long as possible and then present people with a fait accompli.
It’s yet to be seen whether the Government will win on its claim that the report I’m after is a Cabinet document. But in the end, if it were determined that the report is that, there would still be nothing to stop Albanese from being true to his past rhetoric about the importance of government transparency and releasing the report to inform public debate.
“Australians have a right to know. The fact that the Prime Minister hasn’t already done this says a lot.”
For me, given that the Government has cautioned me against publishing details that reveal security incompetence inside the Australian Submarine Agency, I’ll wait for the knock on the door from the Federal Police. I’m not going to be intimidated.
There’s a vital democratic principle to be defended – the right to publish embarrassing information about government. The only way to protect that right, especially in the face of Government bullying, is to publish.
Dutton’s nuclear plan requires ‘huge’ new bureaucracy.
“Every single dollar spent on nuclear will come from the taxpayer. So of course, that will lead to a bureaucracy.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has criticised what he calls Labor’s “big government” approach and “wasteful” spending
A “huge” new bureaucracy, numbering thousands of extra public servant positions, would need to be created by the Coalition to establish and support an Australian nuclear power industry, according to the minister for public service, Katy Gallagher.
The proposal for a civil nuclear power program, as described by shadow energy minister Ted O’Brien last year, included “institutional architecture” that he said would entail an expansion of the regulatory agency, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA), a new independent nuclear energy coordinating authority and a government business enterprise to be called Affordable Energy Australia.
That architecture raises questions in the midst of the current opposition attacks on the growth and efficiency of the bureaucracy under the Albanese government. The Coalition’s election campaign push to cut government spending, sharpened by the nomination last week of Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price to lead a proposed efficiency department, has focused so far on paring back the public service.
The Coalition’s coal-to-nuclear strategy appears to defy that objective, as it requires building a large department “from scratch”, Gallagher tells The Saturday Paper. “We haven’t run state energy systems for so long,” the minister says. “It would be up there with departments like, you would think, Services Australia. Probably a bit smaller than the NDIA [National Disability Insurance Agency, Defence. It would be thousands of public servants.”
Gallagher likens the bureaucratic infrastructure for a nuclear power industry, which the Coalition has said would be taxpayer funded, to Labor’s creation of the Climate Change Department of more than 2500 staff. She expects more than that would be needed, including outside Canberra, for the Coalition plan to build its proposed seven nuclear power plants across five states.
“It would be planning, construction, safety, getting the skills. I don’t even know how you’re going to get the skills into that,” Gallagher said. “It’d be a lot of travel because you’re all around the country.”
Last year, O’Brien revealed that, under the Coalition’s plan, a coordinating authority would determine how much nuclear power is produced at each of the seven proposed sites before it enters the national energy mix.
“In terms of exactly how many on any plant, we’ll be leaving that to the independent nuclear energy coordinating authority,” he told the ABC’s Insiders last June. “It is right we want multi-unit sites. That’s how to get costs down.”
The shadow minister was not available for an interview. In response to emailed questions, O’Brien did not address the size of a civil nuclear power bureaucracy or the cost of expanding nuclear agencies and creating new ones, but acknowledged that “a highly skilled nuclear workforce will be paramount to ensuring the success of this plan”.
In his response, O’Brien gave more detail about the nuclear program, including outlines of private and public partnerships and a proposition to include the Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation Office (ASNO), which looks after Australia’s international treaty obligations.
“Experience is not cheap, because you’ll have to get it from overseas … we’ll be having to buy that in, at expense. You don’t just train someone up over a two-year period.”
“The ARPANSA legislation will be amended to allow the licensing and regulation of civilian nuclear facilities, including power stations,” the shadow minister said. “ARPANSA will have its resources increased to prepare to license the establishment projects and advice will be sought regarding the merits of regulatory consolidation of ARPANSA and ASNO.
“The independent Nuclear Energy Coordinating Authority will lead community consultation and manage a process to select experienced nuclear companies to partner with Government to deliver these projects.
“Affordable Energy Australia will be financed by the federal government through a combination of debt and equity and, through its partnership arrangements with experienced nuclear companies, will own, develop and operate the establishment projects.”
A former energy adviser to Britain’s Thatcher government says the Coalition is trivialising the bureaucratic support needed for a local nuclear power industry.
Greg Bourne, who is a former president of BP Australasia and is a councillor on the Climate Council, said the experience in the UK showed that the nuclear part of the electricity industry had to be regulated, as “no one commercially wanted it”.
He says established nuclear power countries in comparable democracies such as the United States have very large regulatory organisations rigorously covering issues such as skills, construction, safety, finance and radioactive waste.
“What you would need to do – almost certainly getting the people from overseas, building ARPANSA’s strength – it’s not a trivial act,” Bourne tells The Saturday Paper.
“They will have to build a complete set of public servants, for want of a better word, to be able to advise Department of Energy … on what can be done, what can’t be done, the pace at which it can be done and so on.”
The scale of the Coalition’s nuclear proposal, Bourne says, is obviously a far cry from Australia’s experience with its sole reactor, the 20-megawatt nuclear medical reactor at Lucas Heights in southern Sydney.
“We will have to buy experience. And buying experience is not cheap, because you’ll have to get it from overseas,” he says. “People will be coming in with different models. European models… a number of United States, Canadian models. They’ll all be coming in with different things, but we’ll be having to buy that in, at expense,” he says. “You don’t just train someone up over a two-year period.
“Lucas Heights is a very, very different thing. The people there are good. They understand what they’re doing. I do not think that [the Coalition] will be able to grab the head of the nuclear agency from Lucas Heights, and then that person will have credibility with two gigawatt-size reactors.”
The public service minister suggests that if the nuclear bureaucracy were to be added to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW), not only would the department need to be “a lot larger” but there would likely be “a huge consultant bill”, over decades. “You’d be paying for all of that before anything gets happening.”
The Albanese government, meanwhile, is moving to accelerate household electrification efforts, through a deal with the Senate crossbench to support Labor’s Future Made in Australia legislation. The government aims for 82 per cent of power to be sourced from renewable energy by 2030 – a plan the Coalition has derided as “unrealistic”.
Energy Minister Chris Bowen revealed this week he used ministerial powers at the end of last year to direct the Australian Renewable Energy Agency to consider funding solar panels and home batteries. However, the basis of Labor’s transition plan, Bowen says, is private-sector funded.
“Every single dollar spent on nuclear will come from the taxpayer. So of course, that will lead to a bureaucracy. Our plan is based on private-sector investment. Theirs is based on public investment and a bureaucracy,” the minister tells The Saturday Paper.
He points to the lack of detail in the Coalition’s planning, in contrast with its demands for more detail in the lead-up to the Indigenous Voice to Parliament vote: “They campaigned against an alleged government bureaucracy in the referendum, and they’re proposing at least two new government organisations.”
The Coalition’s plan to build seven nuclear power plants to replace Australia’s ageing coal-fired power stations is backed by a contested set of costings, prepared by Frontier Economics and released late last year, amounting to roughly $300 billion spread over 50 years. The modelling suggests the Coalition plan is $263 billion cheaper than Labor’s renewables proposal, but a wide range of economists have countered that the costings lack crucial information about how the figures were calculated, and are based on a scenario of dramatically lower energy use than is realistic.
The delays in getting the reactors on line have also drawn strong criticism. The opposition insists its plan, under the best-case scenario, would begin producing electricity by 2035, but this is five years earlier than the earliest estimate by the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, and assembling the necessary regulation and skills is a key component of that timeline.
The Coalition’s energy spokesman says the opposition’s civil nuclear policy is well formed and ready to start.
“[T]his policy follows the most comprehensive study ever undertaken by an Opposition, learning from experts in 10 nations about their decarbonisation policies while keeping prices down, the lights on and ensuring energy security,” O’Brien said in his statement.
“Upon entering government, the Coalition will be ready to implement a detailed energy policy immediately, informed by global best practices and established relationships.”
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has criticised what he calls Labor’s “big government” approach and “wasteful” spending that he says has exacerbated inflation in the lead-up to an election that will be heavily focused on the cost of living.
His most cited example is the 36,000 additional Average Staffing Level places in the public service funded by Labor over three budgets.
The opposition leader now has four frontbenchers whose portfolios cover the public service, two of whom are solely tasked with zeroing in on waste and efficiency: Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and James Stevens.
While Dutton isn’t explicitly referencing as its inspiration the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency in the US, he’s elevating the mission within his ranks just as the Trump administration takes over. Australia’s richest person, Gina Rinehart, has long urged the Coalition to emulate the MAGA policy agenda.
“Our argument is to bring that role, that function, into [the Department of the] Prime Minister and Cabinet as a key central agency, and then to have the authority of Prime Minister and Cabinet to run the operation of senior efficiencies achieved across every department of the Commonwealth,” the Coalition leader told reporters in Perth on Tuesday.
“And that’s something that we would take very seriously.”
Dutton says Labor’s spending on public service positions is a question of “priorities”. Speaking to reporters in his electorate of Dickson last weekend, the opposition leader said, “That’s money that we could be spending elsewhere to provide support to people during Labor’s cost-of-living crisis, or into defence or into security and into priorities for Australians otherwise.
“I just don’t think any Australian can say that their lives are simpler or better off today because of the tens of thousands of additional public servants that the prime minister’s employed in Canberra.”
The plans for cuts have been flagged for at least six months.
“The first thing we’ll do is sack those 36,000 public servants in Canberra, that’s $24 billion worth,” Nationals leader David Littleproud told commercial radio station Triple M in August.
The figure for additional public servants equates to 20 per cent of the workforce, a boost that entailed rebuilding positions lost to more expensive outsourced labour. The cost cited by the opposition is over four years.
An audit, ordered by the Albanese government soon after the 2022 election, found that the Coalition government in the 2021-22 financial year alone spent $20.8 billion on almost 54,000 contractors and external providers. The bulk of the external labour was employed in the defence, social services and agriculture portfolios.
The 36,000 figure under the Albanese government, confirmed in federal budget papers, also covers Labor’s moves to rein in Centrelink and other government call centre waiting times, as well as additional staffing to reduce chronic backlogs in claims and visa processing times.
Gallagher, who is also finance minister, accepts that efficiencies remain to be made within government. She adds that $92 billion was saved over the past three Labor budgets and mid-year updates.
“We’ve had over $4 billion saved from not using consultants as much as the former government did,” the senator says.
She says there is an ongoing effort in explaining the worth and work of the public service.
“It’s always up to us to explain what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, but I would say to Peter Dutton, go and speak to a veteran who actually is getting their pension now, who’s getting their appropriate payment. There was a 40-month wait for people to get their pension,” she told reporters last week. “What he wants to pretend is that you don’t need anyone to do these jobs. Two thirds of these jobs are in the regions. They’re in every part of Australia.”
Peter Dutton’s nuclear energy policy is unclear policy
January 18, 2025 Michael Taylor, https://theaimn.net/peter-duttons-nuclear-energy-policy-is-unclear-policy/
Peter Dutton’s signature nuclear energy policy has rightly been subject to significant criticism and analysis, highlighting several key issues:
- The policy has been criticised for its potential high costs. Reputable sources suggest that nuclear energy is likely to be significantly more expensive than renewable energy alternatives. For instance, the Climate Council estimates that it could increase household electricity bills by $665 annually, and the CSIRO’s GenCost report indicates that nuclear power is at least twice as expensive as renewables.
- The timeline for establishing nuclear power in Australia is considered overly ambitious. It’s estimated that it would take at least 15 years to get reactors up and running, which means significant delays in addressing immediate energy needs. This delay could lead to continued reliance on fossil fuels, thus increasing emissions rather than reducing them.
There are substantial environmental concerns related to nuclear power, including the management of nuclear waste, the risk of accidents, and the overall environmental footprint (which the industry says is nil) when considering the lifecycle of nuclear facilities. Dutton’s policy doesn’t adequately address these risks, particularly in a country such as ours with no prior nuclear energy infrastructure.- Implementing nuclear power requires overcoming significant political and regulatory hurdles. Opposition from state governments, along with existing federal bans on nuclear energy, presents legal and political obstacles. The need for new legislation and the potential for compulsory land acquisition further complicates the policy’s execution.
- The policy could deter investment in renewable energy by creating uncertainty about the future energy landscape. Investors might be reluctant to commit to long-term renewable projects if there’s a possibility that the energy market will shift towards nuclear, potentially leading to higher energy costs and less economic growth.
There are valid doubts about public support for nuclear power in Australia, particularly given historical opposition. The proposed choice of sites for nuclear reactors raises questions about community consent.- The policy focuses on nuclear at the expense of more immediately deployable and cost-effective renewable solutions (Sydney Morning Herald, paywalled). The argument is that renewable energy can be scaled up more quickly to meet current and future energy demands without the risks associated with nuclear.
- There has been a noted absence (Sydney Morning Herald, paywalled) of comprehensive costings from the Coalition for their nuclear plan, leading to skepticism about the economic claims made by Dutton. This lack of transparency has been highlighted as a major flaw.
- In summary, the policy is economically risky, environmentally questionable, and politically contentious, potentially leading to higher energy prices, slower adoption of clean energy, and increased reliance on fossil fuels in the interim.
- It looks as though Dutton is on a loser with his nuclear energy policy. He pursues it at his political peril.
Dutton’s nuclear plan to wipe out Australia’s aluminium smelters
Australian Financial Review, Chris BowenMinister for Climate Change and Energy, 19 Jan 25
The Coalition’s costings are predicated on large industrial facilities in the southern and eastern states of Australia halving their energy use by the end of 2030, and keeping it there.Chris BowenMinister for Climate Change and Energy
Of all the problems with Peter Dutton’s nuclear energy costings released in the dying days of 2024, probably the biggest is that the entire policy assumes much of Australian heavy industry closes over the next few years.
This is particularly ironic as Mr Dutton claims with a straight face that nuclear power is necessary for industrial growth.
The details of his so-called policy costings reveal the only way the Coalition can make nuclear energy appear cheaper than it is – even Ted O’Brien admits he’s not predicting nuclear will bring power bills down – is to assume Australia will need a lot less power.
It indicates an extraordinary degree of pessimism about Australia’s manufacturing future, specifically for electricity-hungry industries like aluminium smelting.
In releasing those figures, the Coalition has tied themselves to a future scenario predicated on large industrial facilities across the southern and eastern states of Australia halving their energy use by the end of 2030 – and keeping it there.
Specifically, the model Peter Dutton has adopted as the basis for his energy policy, shows a material drop and then permanent flatlining in industrial electricity demand for Victoria, Tasmania, Queensland and NSW.
That is, less than half the energy we need to power our biggest industrial users right now – let alone to enable growth in the future.
We need to be planning an energy system for economic growth.
Peter Dutton says he supports the aluminium industry, but his own nuclear costings rely on shutting it down.
Analysis of the timing of large loads coming off, shows it coinciding with the end dates of existing power purchase agreements for each of Australia’s four aluminium smelters across those states.
It shows a Liberal Party either cavalier about, or comfortable with Tasmania’s Bell Bay smelter closing in less than 12 months by January 2026, Portland’s smelter winding down in July 2027, plus NSW’s Tomago and Queensland’s Boyne smelter gone by July 2029…………………………………………………………………
As someone who wants to lead a country, why would Dutton be planning for an economy that’s smaller and an industrial sector that’s worse off with no growth opportunities, before he’s even begun? Why bank on job losses to bring down the cost of his electricity system?
And if you’re not planning for a contracting economy, then where’s your credible energy policy to meet growing demand in the next five, 10 and 20 years?
We need to be planning an energy system for economic growth. We need to be planning an energy system for the future, one that has bigger industry, ………………………………………………………. more https://www.afr.com/policy/energy-and-climate/dutton-s-nuclear-plan-to-wipe-out-australia-s-aluminium-smelters-20250119-p5l5l4
Lack of detail Dutton Launches Much to Do About Nothing campaign
January 17, 2025 John Lord Australian Independent Media
You might remember the relentless scrutiny that Peter Dutton applied during the Voice referendum regarding Labor’s proposal. He would challenge the Prime Minister each day, demanding more specifics when many felt the key points were already apparent. Like Tony Abbott or Donald Trump, Dutton seems poised to adopt a campaign strategy that embraces a lack of detail in the upcoming election. He plans to present broad, sweeping outlines of potential policies and actions he might pursue in office rather than delving into the intricacies and specifics many voters desire.
A prime example of the shortcomings in leadership is Peter Dutton’s vague and often frustrating approach to nuclear policy, which raises more questions than it answers. The most effective leaders possess a vast reservoir of accurate information, readily available for reference at any moment. John Howard exemplified this quality, as did Kim Beazley and Peter Costello. In recent times, however, there have been few who can match this standard. Julia Gillard stood out for her sharp insights, while Kevin Rudd’s exceptionally agile mind distinguished him from his peers. Anthony Albanese, in particular, demonstrates an extraordinary ability to recall even the slightest of details; a skill honed during his tenure as Minister for Infrastructure, where he developed an almost uncanny depth of knowledge.
It is precisely in this area that Peter Dutton is likely to struggle. During the frenetic pace of an election campaign, when rapid-fire questions bombard a candidate at their most vulnerable, his lack of depth in detail will become apparent. In politics, it is always the meticulous attention to detail that can make or break a leader…………………………………………….
Dutton emerged from a long yawn to play catch-up politics on Sunday, 12 January, to launch the Coalition’s unofficial election campaign.
During a 38-minute hastily put-together address at a rally in Melbourne, he depicted the forthcoming election as a pivotal “sliding doors moment” for the future of Australia. At this event, he unveiled the Coalition’s rallying cry, “Let’s get Australia back on track,” which resonated with the audience eager for detail. Alongside this slogan, Dutton introduced a new brochure that detailed twelve key governing priorities designed to steer the country in a different direction. In his speech, he strongly criticised the current Labor government, labelling it one of the most “incompetent governments” Australia has ever seen (after only three years, he had forgotten his own) and described the leadership of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese as among the weakest in the nation’s history……..
So, with little detail, Dutton launched his Much to Do About Nothing campaign.
Michelle Grattan wrote about Dutton’s launch:
“What it wasn’t, though, was detailed. The specifics of what a Dutton government would do, and how it would do it, remain unclear.”…… https://theaimn.net/lack-of-detail-dutton-launches-much-to-do-about-nothing-campaign/
Dutton’s new nuclear nightmare: construction costs continue to explode
The latest massive cost blowout at a planned power station in the UK demonstrates the absurdity of Peter Dutton’s claims about nuclear power in Australia.
Bernard Keane and Glenn Dyer. 16 Jan 25, https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/01/16/peter-dutton-nuclear-power-construction-costs/?utm_campaign=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter
Peter Dutton’s back-of-the-envelope nuclear power plan has suffered another major hit, with new reports showing the expected cost of the newest planned UK nuclear power plant surging so much its builder has been told to bring in new investors.
The planned Sizewell C nuclear plant in Suffolk, to be built by French nuclear giant EDF in cooperation with the UK government, was costed at £20 billion in 2020. According to the Financial Times, the cost is now expected to double to £40 billion, or $79 billion.
The dramatic increase in costs is based on EDF’s experience with Hinkley Point C, currently being built in Somerset, which was supposed to commence operations this year but will not start until at least 2029. It was initially costed at £18 billion but is now expected to cost up to £46bn, or $90 billion.
So dramatic are the cost blowouts that EDF and the UK government have been searching, with limited success, for other investors to join them in funding Sizewell.
Meanwhile across the Channel, France’s national audit body has warned that the task of building six new nuclear reactors in France — similar in scale to Peter Dutton’s vague plan for seven reactors of various kinds around Australia — is not currently achievable.
The French government announced the plan in 2022, based on France’s long-established nuclear power industry and its state-owned nuclear power multinational EDF, with an initial estimate of €51.7 billion. That was revised up to €67.4 billion ($112 billion) in 2023. It is still unclear how the project will be financed, with little commercial interest prompting the French government to consider an interest-free loan to EDF.
The cour de comptes also noted the “mediocre profitability” of EDF’s notorious Flamanville nuclear plant, which began producing electricity last year a decade late and 300% over budget. It warned EDF’s exposure to Hinckley was so risky that it should sell part of its stake to other investors before embarking on the construction program for French reactors. The entire program was at risk of failure due to financial problems, the auditors said.
That France, where nuclear power has operated for nearly 70 years, and where EDF operates 18 nuclear power plants, is struggling to fund a program of a similar scale to that proposed by Dutton illustrates the vast credibility gap — one mostly unexplored by a supine mainstream media — attaching to Dutton’s claims that Australia, without an extant nuclear power industry, could construct reactors inside a decade for $263 billion. Based on the European experience — Western countries that are democratic and have independent courts and the rule of law, rather than tinpot sheikhdoms like the United Arab Emirates — the number is patently absurd.
Backed by nonsensical apples-and-oranges modelling by a Liberal-linked consulting firm that even right-wing economists kicked down, the Coalition’s nuclear shambles is bad policy advanced in bad faith by people with no interest in having their ideas tested against the evidence. The evidence from overseas is that nuclear power plants run decades over schedule and suffer budget blowouts in the tens of billions — and that’s in countries with established nuclear power industries and which don’t suffer the kind of routine 20%+ infrastructure cost blowouts incurred by building even simple roads and bridges in Australia.
But good luck finding any of that out from Australian journalists.
Leaked polling shows regional support for renewables.
Colin Packham, January 14th, 2025, https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/leaked-polling-shows-regional-support-for-renewables/news-story/aeba90ecc98aaa1f39698cfdaa237459
Leaked polling commissioned by renewables industry body The Clean Energy Council has found regional voters support renewable energy rather than nuclear power due to concerns about environmental impacts and the promise of economic opportunities from large-scale wind and solar projects.
Should the polling — seen by The Australian but not yet released publicly — be accurate, it indicates the Coalition has just months to reverse the sentiment ahead of an election where the opposition hopes to sway voters with its centrepiece strategy of building seven nuclear power stations.
A record number of Australians are struggling to pay their utility bills, a situation the Coalition hopes will result in a friendly swing to it when voters return to the polls. But, the research by Freshwater Strategy — a widely respected polling firm — shows regional voters remain concerned about nuclear energy despite also holding misgivings about renewables.
The poll showed regional respondents believed renewables would deliver larger benefits for them than metropolitan voters, as the transition sees a spree of new jobs and offers of financial sweeteners.
Both regional and metropolitan voters said they believed nuclear power is environmentally damaging, a stance which fuelled their broad concern about the fuel source.
The concern over nuclear power was sharper with Labor and Greens voters. Voters who identified as Coalition voters had a far weaker commitment to renewables than Greens voters.
Such a sentiment would aid the Coalition in cementing its standing with its core voter base, but the polling also found those yet to make up their minds about voting intentions had a favourable view on renewables.
These swing voters strongly believed renewables would lower power bills, the polling found.
The Coalition has insisted nuclear will lower power bills and remains the only feasible way Australia is going to meet its net zero emissions by 2050 commitment.
Recent polling shows the Coalition ahead in a two-party preferred vote as years of high inflation and 13 interest rate rises has led to simmering anger among voters.
The federal Labor government hopes for some reprieve from the Reserve Bank of Australia via an interest rate cut or two by May. Labor must return to the polls by May and the market has in recent weeks ramped up bets of a loosening of fiscal policy at the central bank’s meeting in February.
Labor hopes its re-election prospects will be bolstered and has committed Australia to a rapid transition away from coal. Labor has cemented its plan to have renewables generate 82 per cent of the country’s electricity by 2030 — a commitment which requires significant amounts of new wind, solar and batteries.
Some 100,000km of high voltage transmission lines will also need to be built by 2050 if Australia is to meet net-zero emissions targets, which threatens to cause significant upheaval to regional communities.
States and territories have steadily increased their financial compensation offers to affected communities but pockets of opposition remain.
Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen continues to insist Australia will meet its 2030 targets, though independent figures have said the timetable is increasingly unlikely.
Colin Packham Colin Packham is the energy reporter at The Australian. He was previously at The Australian Financial Review and Reuters in Sydney and Canberra.
Critical Archival Encounters and the Evolving Historiography of the Dismissal of the Whitlam Government (Part 4)
COMMENT. This is heavy stuff.
I include it because it goes to explain how it came about that the USA pretty much owns Australia. USA has pretty much owned every Prime Minister since Whitlam.
Gough Whitlam had the guts to question the value of USA’s Pine Gap military intelligence hub.
So he paid the price for his courage
January 10, 2025 AIMN Editorial, By Jenny Hocking, Continued from Part 3
Kerr always claimed that the decision to dismiss the Whitlam government was his alone, that the leader of the opposition, Malcolm Fraser, did not know and that he had spoken to the High Court Chief Justice Sir Garfield Barwick only after he had reached his decision, and that the Palace was in no way involved. Sir Martin Charteris wrote on the Queen’s behalf to the Speaker, Gordon Scholes, soon after the dismissal; “The Queen has no part in the decisions which the Governor-General must take in accordance with the Constitution”.
This narrative of the Governor-General faced with an impossible decision and with no other option available but to dismiss the elected government, was well captured by the Sydney Morning Herald’s editorial the following day: “the course he [Kerr] has taken was the only course open to him”. In its recitation of Kerr’s statement of reasons, released within hours of the dismissal, the editorial makes no mention of the half-Senate election despite its pronouncement on whether other options were available to Kerr.
The invisibility of the half-Senate election is one of the notable features of much of the immediate commentary. Which is all the more puzzling since Whitlam was at Yarralumla on 11 November in order to call the half-Senate election, as Kerr well knew. Yet, in his statement of reasons, Kerr made scant reference to it and indeed misrepresented the half-Senate election in a way that then carried into much of the historical assessments to come………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Whitlam was due to announce the half-Senate election to the House of Representatives on the afternoon of 11 November 1975, and his signed letter to Kerr setting out the details for it was in his hand as he arrived in the Governor-General’s study. It can be found today among Kerr’s papers in the National Archives, with Kerr’s handwritten notation in the upper right corner: “the recommendation was not made”. The early histories of the dismissal were unaware of just how close Whitlam had been to calling the half-Senate election, some see it only as an option considered and not taken, while others fail to mention it at all.
………………………… The half-Senate election takes its place as a critical dismissal moment much overlooked by historical assessments, alongside the 1974 double dissolution election and the motion of no confidence in Malcolm Fraser two hours after his appointment as Prime Minister.
……………………………………………………. In a strident editorial rebuke “Sir John was wrong”, The Age alone among the immediate commentaries on Kerr’s precipitate action, which it termed his “Yarralumla coup d’etat”, implicitly invoked Hasluck’s response in 1974 of granting the election pending the passage of supply:
We are not convinced the decision he [Kerr] took was the only one open to him, or that it was necessary to take it now […] we should like to know if Sir John considered the possibility of urging Mr. Fraser to allow the Senate to pass interim Supply so that a half-Senate election could be held.
Central to the narrative of lonely inevitability, Fraser and Kerr repeatedly denied having any prior contact or warning before the dismissal,
…………………… after a decade of denial Fraser admitted his prior knowledge of the dismissal and his agreement on the terms of his appointment with Kerr. …………………..
………………………………………………………………………………It is an understatement to say that this shared agreement between the Governor-General and the soon to be appointed Prime Minister lacking the confidence of the House, regarding a policy decision directly affecting the Governor-General himself, raises serious political, ethical, and constitutional issues………………………………………………………. more https://theaimn.net/critical-archival-encounters-and-the-evolving-historiography-of-the-dismissal-of-the-whitlam-government-part-4/
PM sharpens attack on nuclear in election-style tour
Maitland Mercury, By Kat Wong and Tess Ikonomou, January 7 2025 –
Anthony Albanese is testing new lines of attack as he hurtles through key battlegrounds ahead of an official election campaign.
The prime minister has embarked a whirlwind tour of Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia just months before voters are expected to go to the polls.
A federal election must be held by late May and, while Mr Albanese is yet to pull the trigger, the trip might be seen as a soft campaign launch………………………………………………….
Labor has renewed its offensive against the opposition’s $330 billion bid to set up seven nuclear reactors.
It initially aimed its criticism at safety and environment concerns, leaning on the nuclear fears of older generations.
But its latest attack highlights cost, viability and time, with a particular focus on economic consequences for the Sunshine State.
Fresh analysis released by Labor shows the coalition’s plan assumes it will cost Queensland more than $872 billion in lost output by 2050 and treasurer Jim Chalmers said Mr Dutton’s “economic madness” would leave Queensland households worse off.
“As a Queenslander, I won’t sit back and watch Peter Dutton push energy prices up and growth down right across the state,” he said…………………………………………………………… more https://www.maitlandmercury.com.au/story/8860529/pm-sharpens-attack-on-nuclear-in-election-style-tour/
The Coalition’s coal-keeper plan
The widespread concern among energy experts is that the introduction of nuclear into the power system would result in renewables, including rooftop solar, being switched off for extended periods, lest the grid be overwhelmed with power, and to assure the financial viability of nuclear generators.
According to analysis by the peak body for the renewables industry, the Smart Energy Council, “up to five million rooftop solar systems will be switched off, and the average power price bill will more than double” as a result.
The Coalition’s nuclear proposal offers no outlook for lower household bills, and the political debate obscures the fact that the plan is undeliverable.
By Mike Seccombe, 21 Dec 24, https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/environment/2024/12/21/the-coalitions-coal-keeper-plan
There are really only two possibilities. Either Peter Dutton and Angus Taylor do not understand the basics of the Coalition’s signature nuclear power policy or they are deliberately, repeatedly broadcasting a falsehood.
At December 13’s Brisbane press conference where the opposition leader and shadow treasurer released the long-awaited costings of the Coalition’s nuclear plan, contained in modelling by Frontier Economics, both men said it showed their policy would cut electricity bills by 44 per cent.
In fairness it should be noted the council has a big vested interest, but the fact remains that Price’s published modelling appears to ignore the impact of nuclear on renewables. As Hamilton noted, in Price’s modelling “these capacity factors [that is, the amount of time renewables are generating power] do not change with the introduction of nuclear producing 38 per cent of generation nearly 24/7.”
In response to the Hamilton critique, Price argued it was already the case that renewables were sometimes turned down or off because there is too much generation. He said this problem would increase as the share of renewables increased.
“This is because you have to build vast amounts of renewables to produce enough electricity to meet demand, and since you never know whether they will produce at the same time or at different times, inevitably you end up at times with too much electricity.”
He did not, however, address the cost issue. And he conceded that under his model, less renewables infrastructure would be built.
The broader point, however, is that this was not apparent in his published work.
Normal protocol in the modelling world is to provide detail of the data on which a model is built, says Professor Warwick McKibbin of the ANU Crawford Centre.
“You should be transparent. That’s just standard good practice. If you can’t see that data that underpins the work, then how do you know what’s been assumed? How do you assess the value of it?” he says.
It doesn’t take an internationally renowned economic modeller to tell us that – every primary-school maths teacher instructs their students to show their work. But when the Smart Energy Council contacted Price, seeking the data underpinning his assumptions, the reply was a single word: “No.”
Dutton did it again on Tuesday at a press conference in Adelaide, called to promote the candidacy of Nicolle Flint, a member of his hard-right faction, for the seat of Boothby at the coming election.
“The work of Frontier says that over time electricity prices will be 44 per cent cheaper under our policy than Labor’s,” he said.
On Wednesday, Taylor repeated the claim. The opposition plan, he said, “will bring down electricity bills by 44 per cent. There’s no doubt about that.”
It’s not true. In fact, the Frontier report specifically says, on page 18: “We do not, at this stage, present any results for the prices, as this will depend on how the cost of new capacity will be treated in the future.”
What the Frontier modelling actually concludes is something quite different: that the total cost of upgrading and running the national electricity market out to 2050 – when we are committed to reaching net zero greenhouse emissions – would be 44 per cent less under one scenario including nuclear power than under another not including nuclear.
That claim, too, is misleading, according to many economists and energy experts, because it compares “apples and oranges” – that is, two dissimilar scenarios labelled “step change” and “progressive”.
The first scenario, step change, is premised on Australia electrifying its economy in a big way between now and 2050, largely using renewable energy to power vehicles, homes, existing industries and energy-hungry new ones, such as data centres and AI services, in a robustly growing economy. The other is premised on a future in which that transition away from coal, gas and oil is slower and growth is significantly smaller.
“This is unequivocally about politics, not policy. The Coalition’s $331 billion nuclear fantasy is a coal- and gas-keeper energy transition plan for Australia, funded by taxpayers.”
According to the modelling produced pro bono for the Coalition by Danny Price, managing director of Frontier, the step change scenario without nuclear would cost $594 billion. The progressive scenario with nuclear would cost $331 billion, a difference of $263 billion, or 44 per cent.
But that does not equate to a similar reduction in prices for consumers. Not if the economy ends up being smaller, with less demand for electric power.
Simon Holmes à Court, businessman, energy analyst and director of pro-renewables body The Superpower Institute, summarises the opposition’s case as “we’re going to pay $263 billion less for electricity, but it’s for a lot less electricity”.
“And meantime, we have to pay an extra $500 billion for fossil fuels.”
His calculation factors in the long lead times involved in building nuclear capacity. The Price model would see 13 gigawatts of nuclear commissioned across Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria by 2050. The first unit would not come online until 2036 – and even this is a highly optimistic forecast. According to the CSIRO, a more realistic timeline is 15 years, not 11, to get the first one up and running. Other experts suggest even longer.
The Price model would see only a small amount of nuclear power before 2039 and the whole 23 gigawatts not operational until 2049.
In the meantime, his report says, Australia would have to extend the life of its fleet of coal-fired power plants.
“Already,” says Nicki Hutley, economist, former banker and now a councillor to the Climate Council, “at any one time, about 25 per cent of coal is down because it is ageing and is either under planned or unplanned repairs. What does that do to power prices when you don’t have enough supply to meet demand?”
In his report, Price suggested the problems with coal-fired plants could be ameliorated by introducing much more gas into the grid, but the cost of that, he wrote, “has not been modelled”.
Nor would the extra costs incurred by a delayed transition to renewables only be financial. More fossil fuels would be burnt, so more planet-warming gases would be emitted.
According to Price’s own modelling, the emissions intensity – the amount of greenhouse gas produced per unit of power generated – remains vastly higher under his plan than the government’s, all the way out to 2046.
The fact that emissions under the Price–Dutton nuclear plan eventually come down to the same level as the government’s renewables-heavy plan is beside the point, says Dylan McConnell, an energy systems analyst at UNSW Sydney.
“The pathway there is more important than the destination, in some respects, because it’s the cumulative emissions that matter,” he says.
By his calculations, as well as those of Hutley and the Climate Council, Steven Hamilton of the George Washington University, and the Tax and Transfer Policy Institute at the Australian National University, the extra cumulative emissions under the Coalition policy would be enormous.
The Price–Coalition plan would produce about 2.5 times the emissions of the government’s preferred step change model – 1.65 billion tonnes, compared with 0.6 billion, according to Hamilton’s analysis, which was published in The Australian Financial Review this week.
And that is in the electricity sector alone, Hamilton wrote.
Add in the costs outside the generation sector, arising from things such as greater consumption of petrol and diesel resulting from the slower take-up of electric vehicles under the Coalition plan, and the cumulative emissions rise even more. To a total of more than 1.7 billion tonnes, according to Holmes à Court.
Those extra emissions “would blow our carbon budget”, says Hutley. “No wonder the opposition wants to abandon the 43 per cent emissions reduction target,” she says, “because you can’t possibly get anywhere near it under this policy.”
Scrapping that 2030 reduction target set by the current government would breach the Paris climate agreement and make Australia an international “pariah”, she says.
Hutley stresses that she has no objection to nuclear power, per se.
“It’s not ideology. It is purely and simply about the numbers. And I just can’t make them add up. You can’t just say we’re going to produce a grid with a whole lot less energy and that’ll cost us less.”
A large part of the problem in trying to make sense of the Price modelling, Hutley and others say, lies in the assumptions that underpin it. Some, like the capital cost per kilowatt of installed capacity, are generally seen as implausibly low.
Price factors in a cost of $10,000 a kilowatt, although the actual delivered costs of nuclear plants in comparable Western countries are about double that.
Others are simply mystifying, such as his assumed “capacity factors” for nuclear generation compared with wind and solar. Skipping the technical details, the essence of the issue is that nuclear runs more or less continuously, producing a constant amount of relatively expensive electricity. Renewables, by contrast, are intermittent, depending on the sun and wind, but produce cheap electricity.
The widespread concern among energy experts is that the introduction of nuclear into the power system would result in renewables, including rooftop solar, being switched off for extended periods, lest the grid be overwhelmed with power, and to assure the financial viability of nuclear generators.
According to analysis by the peak body for the renewables industry, the Smart Energy Council, “up to five million rooftop solar systems will be switched off, and the average power price bill will more than double” as a result.
An approach to the shadow minister for climate change and energy, Ted O’Brien, seeking the data got no response at all.
Experts interviewed by The Saturday Paper noted other worrying or peculiar aspects of the opposition’s policy, including the party of business’s vision of a nuclear industry wholly funded by government.
They say the reason is that the private sector would not risk investing.
But perhaps the biggest mystery, says Holmes à Court, is why Dutton and co chose to bring on this fight.
Opinion polling shows nuclear is not a popular option with the public, in contrast with wind and particularly solar. More pertinently, it is a policy that almost certainly can’t be implemented any time soon.
The Dutton Coalition would have to win both houses of federal parliament in order to overturn a ban on nuclear legislated under the Howard government in 1998 as part of a deal with the Greens. The odds of that happening are very long.
On top of that, Queensland, Victoria and NSW also have bans on nuclear power and show no inclination to reverse them, even though the Liberal National Party of Queensland now holds government.
“A little-known fact,” says Holmes à Court, “is that Queensland made it a requirement that there be a plebiscite to un-ban nuclear. That’s a lovely little poison pill that they left in the legislation.”
That being the case, why pursue it?
Because it is a means of exploiting voter concerns about the cost of living, even if it relies on the untrue promise of a 44 per cent reduction in electricity prices.
And because it avoids another round of the climate wars that have riven the conservative parties for decades. Those wars played a major part in the demise of several Coalition leaders, including Malcolm Turnbull, twice – the second time as a consequence of the plotting of Peter Dutton.
What the nuclear policy actually does is kick the energy-policy can down the road. It promises to get to net zero by 2050, but in the meantime to keep the electricity system running on fossil fuels for another decade or more.
Indeed, says Stephanie Bashir, of the energy consultancy Nexa Advisory, it is a mistake to consider it a serious policy at all.
“This is unequivocally about politics, not policy,” she says.
“The Coalition’s $331 billion nuclear fantasy is a coal- and gas-keeper energy transition plan for Australia, funded by taxpayers,” she says.
And that about sums it up.
1 This month.
Help Aunty Sue Protect Her Land and Sacred Sites From Destructive Rocket Testing.
.
Australians deserve the truth
about
AUKUS – https://aukuspublicinquiry.com/
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 