Australia’s ‘optimal pathway’ on AUKUS
‘Optimal pathway’ is Prime Minister Albanese’s way of describing the obscure, tortuous AUKUS process
By Alison BroinowskiJan 12, 2023 https://johnmenadue.com/australias-optimal-pathway-into-or-out-of-aukus/
Just in time, the fundamental faults of AUKUS are being exposed in Canberra and Washington.
This development is not only due to the mounting concern among Australian civil society groups. The Australian mainstream media are now discussing the hitherto unmentionable drawbacks of AUKUS. But it’s because two US Senators, Democrat Jack Reed and Republican James Inhofe (since retired) warned President Biden that the US can’t meet its own submarine needs, let alone Australia’s. They also cautioned about American statutes and regulations that would have to be changed.
Their concern came just in time, for the AUKUS agreement between Australia, the US and the UK is promised for March. As any Australian who’s been asking the Morrison and Albanese governments for the details for the past year knows well, there are none. For the nuclear-powered submarines, we don’t know the cost of the weaponry, the dates of delivery, or the training, staffing and crewing requirements, and it’s a good guess that the government doesn’t either.
In a rare burst of candour, Peter Jennings, whose constant theme at ASPI was and remains to urge more Australian spending on American weapons directed at ‘deterring’ China, is now concerned that if Australia/China relations improve, that could compromise secret US nuclear technology to be shared with Australia. But he still wants the agreement.
What is AUKUS if not a means to deter China?’ he asks, adding that if AUKUS fails, so could ANZUS (Australian, 10 January 2023: 9). Jennings’ concerns may open the AUKUS can of worms, which as he implies, also contains a festering mass of unresolved problems for the ANZUS alliance.
ANZUS was negotiated in 1951 as the bare minimum commitment Australia, New Zealand and the US were prepared to make to defend each other. With no effectively binding clauses – apart from Article 1 where they undertake to refrain from the threat or use of force, consonant with international law and the UN Charter – its unwritten purpose was to contain Japan. Talked up for decades, it acquired mythical significance for Australia’s mateship with the US. But would the US defend Australia if that wasn’t in America’s interests?
That nagging doubt was raised with Julia Gillard, as Prime Minister, by Kim Beazley who knew that whatever else the US would not defend, it would fight for a base. The ‘joint facilities’ at Pine Gap, Narrungar, and Northwest Cape weren’t enough: in 2011 Australia proposed US Marine deployments in the Northern Territory. Under the Coalition, the Force Posture Agreement of 2014 went further, giving ‘unimpeded access’, exclusive control and use of agreed facilities and areas to US personnel, aircraft, ships and vehicles. As Bevan Ramsden pointed out here on 10 January, the sovereignty horse has bolted. US-Australia ‘Force Posture Agreement’ undermines sovereignty, must be terminated
It is too late for Prime Minister Albanese to assure Australians that the nation’s ‘sovereign interest’ will be protected: it hasn’t been for more than a century during which alliances to Britain and the US circumscribed Australian sovereignty. It is meaningless for Malcolm Turnbull, having done nothing to arrest the process of ‘interoperability’ with the US as prime minister, now to lament that AUKUS diminishes Australian sovereignty. The nuclear-powered submarines will have to be bought from, operated by and maintained by the US, and Australia’s defence forces are already ‘interchangeable’ with America’s, as Defence Minister Richard Marles has said. Some face-saving concessions to the UK’s submarine industry will further complicate the agreement.
Australia ‘cannot do everything ourselves’, says Retired Rear Admiral Peter Clarke. What if any of this Australia can do ourselves he didn’t go into. Proof of Clinton Fernandes’ description of Australia as a ‘sub-imperial power’ is becoming stronger by the day, even as its ‘power’ element diminishes.
When political leaders adopt defence jargon, the rest of us should reach for our fact-checkers. ‘Optimal pathway’ is Prime Minister Albanese’s way of describing the obscure, tortuous AUKUS process. ‘When we talk about optimal pathway, we talk about not just the issue of what is built, but how it is built, as well as the optimal pathway in building a capacity of skills in the Australian workforce’, he said. Opposition leader Peter Dutton tried for a clearer answer, saying that Australia was really dependent on buying US submarines to ‘keep the region safe’. That too remains debatable.
Our leaders don’t say which countries in our region want Australia to ‘keep it safe’. Most of our regional neighbours are safely managing their relations with others now, without our submarines. They will have to wait until 2040 for that to change. In the meantime, Australia might seek their advice about a shared vision for a safe region. How Australia confronting the PRC with armed force is going to deter China – from reclaiming Taiwan, perhaps – is never explained. Peter Jennings hopes Australia can match China’s growing submarine fleet and join the US to stop the ‘Chinese Communist Party dominating the Indo-Pacific’. But how and when will we do so, and at what cost?
What our leaders always leave out is why we should do all this. Before the AUKUS deal is signed and it’s too late, Australians need a clear answer. That needs to be more reliable than citing the ANZUS insurance policy. Australia’s interests in our region are not interchangeable or interoperable with those of the US, nor are they identical, and they should be sovereign.
Dr Alison Broinowski AM is a former diplomat, author and academic. She is President of Australians for War Powers Reform.
Eye-popping new cost estimates released for NuScale small modular reactor
Key Findings
NuScale and the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) announced costs of a 462-megawatt small modular reactor (SMR) have risen dramatically
As recently as mid-2021, the target price for power was pegged at $58 per megawatt-hour (MWh); it’s risen to $89/MWh, a 53% increase.
The price would be much higher without $4 billion federal tax subsidies that include a $1.4 billion U.S. Department of Energy contribution and a $30/MWh break from the Inflation Reduction Act
The higher target price is due to a 75% increase in the estimated construction cost for the project, from $5.3 to $9.3 billion dollars
Last week, NuScale and the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) announced what many have long expected. The construction cost and target price estimates for the 462-megawatt (MW) small modular reactor (SMR) are going up, way up.
From 2016 to 2020, they said the target power price was $55/megawatt-hour (MWh). Then, the price was raised to $58/MWh when the project was downsized from 12 reactor modules to just six (924MW to 462MW). Now, after preparing a new and much more detailed cost estimate, the target price for the power from the proposed SMR has soared to $89/MWh.
Remarkably, the new $89/MWh price of power would be much higher if it were not for more than $4 billion in subsidies NuScale and UAMPS expect to get from U.S. taxpayers through a $1.4 billion contribution from the Department of Energy and the estimated $30/MWh subsidy in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).
It also is important to remember that the $89/MWh target price is in 2022 dollars and substantially understates what utilities and their ratepayers actually will pay if the SMR is completed. For example, assuming a modest 2% inflation rate through 2030, utilities and ratepayers would pay $102 for each MWh of power from the SMR—not the $89 NuScale and UAMPS want them to believe they will pay.
The 53% increase in the SMR’s target power price since 2021 has been driven by a dramatic 75% jump in the project’s estimated construction cost, which has risen from $5.3 billion to $9.3 billion. The new estimate makes the NuScale SMR about as expensive on a dollars-per-kilowatt basis ($20,139/kW) as the two-reactor Vogtle nuclear project currently being built in Georgia, undercutting the claim that SMRs will be cheap to build.
NuScale and UAMPS attribute the construction cost increase to inflationary pressure on the energy supply chain, particularly increases in the prices of the commodities that will be used in nuclear power plant construction.
For example, UAMPS says increases in the producer price index in the past two years have raised the cost of:
Fabricated steel plate by 54%- Carbon steel piping by 106%
- Electrical equipment by 25%
- Fabricated structural steel by 70%
- Copper wire and cable by 32%
In addition, UAMPS notes that the interest rate used for the project’s cost modeling has increased approximately 200 basis points since July 2020. The higher interest rate increases the cost of financing the project, raising its total construction cost.
Assuming the commodity price increases cited by NuScale and UAMPS are accurate, the prices of building all the SMRs that NuScale is marketing—and, indeed, of all of the SMR designs currently being marketed by any company—will be much higher than has been acknowledged, and the prices of the power produced by those SMRs will be much more expensive.
Finally, as we’ve previously said, no one should fool themselves into believing this will be the last cost increase for the NuScale/UAMPS SMR. The project still needs to go through additional design, licensing by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, construction and pre-operational testing. The experience of other reactors has repeatedly shown that further significant cost increases and substantial schedule delays should be anticipated at any stages of project development.
The higher costs announced last week make it even more imperative that UAMPS and the utilities and communities participating in the project issue requests for proposal (RFP) to learn if there are other resources that can provide the same power, energy and reliability as the SMR but at lower cost and lower financial risk. History shows that this won’t be the last cost increase for the SMR project.
David Schlissel (dschlissel@ieefa.org) is IEEFA director of resource planning analysis
US military deepens ties with Japan and Philippines to instigate proxy war with China like it did with Russia
Kathrin Hille, Financial Times, Sun, 08 Jan 23
The US and Japanese armed forces are rapidly integrating their command structure and scaling up combined operations as Washington and its Asian allies prepare for a possible conflict with China such as a war over Taiwan, according to the top Marine Corps general in Japan.
The two militaries have “seen exponential increases . . . just over the last year” in their operations on the territory they would have to defend in case of a war, Lieutenant General James Bierman, commanding general of the Third Marine Expeditionary Force (III MEF) and of Marine Forces Japan, told the Financial Times in an interview.
Bierman said that the US and its allies in Asia were emulating the groundwork that had enabled western countries to support Ukraine’s resistance to Russia in preparing for scenarios such as a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
“Why have we achieved the level of success we’ve achieved in Ukraine? A big part of that has been because after Russian aggression in 2014 and 2015, we earnestly got after preparing for future conflict: training for the Ukrainians, pre-positioning of supplies, identification of sites from which we could operate support, sustain operations.
“We call that setting the theatre. And we are setting the theatre in Japan, in the Philippines, in other locations.”
Bierman’s unusually frank comparison between the Ukraine war and a potential conflict with China comes as Beijing has dramatically increased the scale and sophistication of its military manoeuvres near Taiwan in recent years. Japan and the Philippines are also intensifying defence co-operation with the US in the face of mounting Chinese assertiveness.
Japan and the US are set to discuss strengthening their alliance at security talks between the foreign and defence ministers on Wednesday and a summit between US president Joe Biden and Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida on Friday in Washington. The summit comes as Tokyo embarks on a radical security policy shift that will include increasing defence spending and deploying missiles capable of hitting Chinese territory.
III MEF is the Marine Corps’ only crisis response force permanently stationed outside the US. It operates within the range of Chinese medium- and long-range missiles, with which Beijing seeks to constrain US operational freedom in the region.
The unit is at the heart of a sweeping reform of the Marine Corps that aims to replace its focus on fighting counter-insurgency in the Middle East with creating small units that specialise in operating quickly and clandestinely in the islands and straits of east Asia and the western Pacific to counter Beijing’s “anti-access area denial” strategy.
To realise that strategy, closer integration with allies was vital, Bierman said. In a series of recent exercises, the Marines for the first time set up bilateral ground tactical co-ordination centres rather than exchanging liaisons with allies’ command points.
In another sign of deepening co-operation, specific Japanese military units have been designated as part of the “stand-in force” alongside III MEF and US Navy and Air Force units.
Instead of a “round robin” of Japanese military units working with US counterparts, as in the past, a “standing community of interest” is emerging of allied units with responsibility for operational plans, Bierman added.
He said while the US military was paying attention to Chinese aggressive behaviour around Taiwan, the People’s Liberation Army should not be perceived as being “10 feet tall”.
“When you talk about the complexity, the size of some of the operations they would have to conduct, let’s say [in] an invasion of Taiwan, there will be indications and warnings, and there are specific aspects to that in terms of geography and time, which allow us to posture and be most prepared.”
As part of those preparations, the Philippines plan to allow US forces to preposition weapons and other supplies on five more bases in addition to five where the US has already access.
“You gain a leverage point, a base of operations, which allows you to have a tremendous head start in different operational plans. As we square off with the Chinese adversary, who is going to own the starting pistol and is going to have the ability potentially to initiate hostilities . . . we can identify decisive key terrain that must be held, secured, defended, leveraged.
Rolls Royce’s frustration as government holds back on orders for mininuclear reactors.
Treasury will reportedly not sign off on investment until
technology approved by regulators. A funding deal for the first fleet of
mini nuclear reactors may not materialise for another 12 months, to the
dismay of domestic leaders in the technology. The government made small
modular reactors a central element of its plans to generate 24GW of energy
from nuclear by 2050, but according to The Times there is significant
uncertainty in Whitehall over the scale and state of investment plans.
Building 10th Jan 2023
Australia’s only solar manufacturer launches $11m production and innovation facility — RenewEconomy
Australia’s only solar panel manufacturer launches $11m production and innovation facility in Adelaide, marking new milestone for domestic PV supply chain. The post Australia’s only solar manufacturer launches $11m production and innovation facility appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Australia’s only solar manufacturer launches $11m production and innovation facility — RenewEconomy
Bowen “upbeat and excited” about Sun Cable, despite billionaire bust-up — RenewEconomy
Federal energy minister hoses down concerns about Sun Cable’s massive solar export plans, describing its move into administration as “a change of corporate structure.” The post Bowen “upbeat and excited” about Sun Cable, despite billionaire bust-up appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Bowen “upbeat and excited” about Sun Cable, despite billionaire bust-up — RenewEconomy
Pacific states entitled to claims against Japan for discharge of radioactive nuclear wastewater
As a contracting party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Convention on Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident, and the Convention on Nuclear Safety, Japan has knowingly violated them all by making such a dangerous decision. Without exhausting all safe means of disposal, disclosing all information, or fully consulting with surrounding countries and international organizations, the Japanese government went ahead and unilaterally decided to dump its wastewater into the ocean in a flagrant attempt to pass on the disastrous consequences to other Pacific countries. Those countries have every right to defend their rights and interests through legal means.
Li Weichao http://eng.chinamil.com.cn/view/2023-01/06/content_10210311.htm
“We must remind Japan that if the radioactive nuclear wastewater is safe, just dump it in Tokyo, test it in Paris and store it in Washington, but keep our Pacific nuclear-free.” Vanuatu’s famous politician Motarilavoa Hilda Lini spoke for all people living in the Pacific region when making this statement.
The Japanese government announced in April 2021 that it will begin dumping the nuclear wastewater stored at Fukushima into the ocean from the spring of 2023. As that day is approaching, the international community is voicing waves of objection, and people living in the Pacific region have consistently expressed their strong protest. Analysts said if Japan did discharge the wastewater into the Pacific Ocean as planned, the Pacific countries would have the right to claim damages.
Japan decided to just dump the wastewater into the ocean in order to save trouble and money, at the price of transferring nuclear contamination to the whole world, which is extremely irresponsible and selfish. South Pacific countries have suffered enough from nuclear contamination. From 1946 to 1958, the US conducted 67 nuclear weapon tests on the Marshall Islands, the aftermaths of which are still haunting the local residents in the form of radioactive poisoning, contamination of marine species, and leak from radwaste landfill.
The Fukushima nuclear station had the highest-level nuclear accident that produced an enormous amount of nuclear wastewater – more than 1.3 million tons in storage right now. Even though Japanese politicians claimed that the wastewater is safe enough for drinking after being treated with the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS), that’s simply not true.
A Japanese NGO recently released an article saying that treated nuclear wastewater still contains 64 kinds of radioactive substances, including tritium, which, once released into the ocean, will contaminate the marine environment and spread through the food chain, till eventually taking a toll on human health and the ecological environment. A report released by Greenpeace, an international environmental protection organization, showed that the technology currently adopted by Japan cannot get rid of the Sr90 and C14 in the wastewater, which are even more damaging than tritium with their half-life of 50 years and 5,730 years respectively.
It’s foreseeable that dumping Fukushima’s more than 1.3 million tons of nuclear wastewater into the ocean is a murderous move for people living along the ocean and will put the marine ecology at stake with irreversible outcomes. A renowned environmental protection organization of Pacific island countries said that such an irresponsible move of transboundary pollution is no different from waging a nuclear war against the people and the islands in the Pacific region.
As a contracting party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Convention on Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident, and the Convention on Nuclear Safety, Japan has knowingly violated them all by making such a dangerous decision. Without exhausting all safe means of disposal, disclosing all information, or fully consulting with surrounding countries and international organizations, the Japanese government went ahead and unilaterally decided to dump its wastewater into the ocean in a flagrant attempt to pass on the disastrous consequences to other Pacific countries. Those countries have every right to defend their rights and interests through legal means.
In fact, there are already precedents for claims of this kind. For instance, the International Arbitration Tribunal ruled in 1938 and 1941 that Canada’s Trail Smelter should compensate America’s State of Washington for the damages caused by the SO2 it emitted. The “Trail Smelter case” is generally considered the basis for holding countries committing transboundary pollution accountable. Countries along the Pacific Ocean can totally refer to it and pursue claims against Japan after scientifically measuring the damages imposed upon them.
The ocean is the common wealth and symbiotic home for humanity. Dumping nuclear wastewater into it is not Japan’s internal affair. Right now the IAEA is still conducting a comprehensive evaluation of the wastewater at Fukushima, and Japan’s pushing for the dumping plan reveals its intention to make it a fait accompli regardless of the concerns of other parties. Japan’s egregious atrocities in history have already caused horrendous miseries to the surrounding countries. Does it plan to add another entry to its infamous track record now?
Editor’s note: Originally published on news.cri.cn, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.
The problem with nuclear energy advocates
There is something curiously bewitching about nuclear power that makes its backers disciples rather than advocates. They become nuclear champions first rather than energy champions (which is what everyone should be), and are either unaware of or intentionally ignoring the fact that most of the time, they are putting their efforts into a solution that is looking for a problem.
ROUGH TRADE, By Ben Kritz, January 10, 2023
I WAS asked over the weekend if I planned to respond to a recent letter to the editor (“SMR issues addressed,” published on January 5), which said it was a reaction to my December 29 column about small modular reactor (SMR) technology and the problems that have been encountered in trying to make it commercially practical.
No, I responded, I had not planned to react to the letter because I could not see much in it to actually react to; while polite and thoughtful, it essentially boiled down to the same long-on-enthusiasm and short-on-specifics kind of pitch for SMR technology I see every day.
Maybe that’s exactly the point you need to address, my annoying yet helpful self-appointed consultant suggested.
I realized she’s right; there’s a bigger problem with nuclear energy and its advocates than just the technical and economic details that make it difficult to develop and use. There is something curiously bewitching about nuclear power that makes its backers disciples rather than advocates. They become nuclear champions first rather than energy champions (which is what everyone should be), and are either unaware of or intentionally ignoring the fact that most of the time, they are putting their efforts into a solution that is looking for a problem.
For the record, my December 29 column dealt with two more exotic forms of SMR technology, the traveling wave reactor (TWR) and the Natrium reactor; the basic difference between the two being that the latter uses uranium fuel that is enriched to a concentration that is four or five times what is used in a conventional reactor, and the former is designed to use unenriched or depleted uranium fuel. For a variety of reasons, both of those technologies are at least eight to 10 years from even being functional, and whether or not they can be made economical at all is still an open question.
The discussion about the less extreme and more common form of SMR technology was in the column prior to that, on December 27, and detailed obstacles with the development of commercial-ready SMRs that have been identified through actually trying to build an SMR plant, on the one hand, and a couple of reliable studies by nuclear experts (Stanford University and the Argonne National Laboratory) on the other.
The first obstacle is cost. A plant being constructed in rural Idaho by SMR developer NuScale — which is designed to eventually consist of six 77-megawatt units — has run into massive cost overruns, despite the assumption that SMRs are relatively inexpensive due to being smaller and simpler than conventional nuclear plants. NuScale is hoping to have the first of the six units online by 2029, but the per-megawatt-hour cost of the plant has hit $58, the threshold set by the consortium of six utilities in the western US which are financing the project to decide whether or not to continue.
The reason for this is that at that cost, there are already a variety of conventional and renewable energy generation sources available, so there is nothing to be gained by building the SMR complex, no matter how cutting-edge its technology may be.
The second obstacle is waste management. Again, because SMRs are smaller and less complex than conventional nuclear power plants, it is assumed that they would produce less radioactive waste, both of the more dangerous high-level variety in the form of spent fuel and the low-level variety in the form of wastewater and contaminated discarded equipment and other materials.
This, however, is not the case, according to the Stanford and Argonne studies, both published last year. Both studies found the same result, that SMRs produce about as much waste as conventional light-water reactors, but differed in their subjective interpretation. The Stanford researchers concluded that this contraindicated the use of SMRs since they do not offer any improvement in waste management, while Argonne’s lead scientist suggested that the result was more positive, as it demonstrated using SMRs wouldn’t be any worse than conventional nuclear power.
Contrary to our recent reader-correspondent’s assertions, neither of those issues — the only two I focused on concerning SMRs, because they are not hypothetical, but demonstrated by real-world experience or analysis — are “addressed” at all by what he presented, which is “a unique approach to SMRs” being developed by an unnamed enterprise only identified as being Seattle-based. The design, according to him, uses “widely available, cheap low-enriched uranium” (as I have pointed out more than once, except for reactors running on exotic fuel like the Natrium, fuel is actually the least of the cost issues for a nuclear plant); do not need to be refueled (are they then considered disposable?); and “are safe enough that their ‘plug-and-play’ generators can be placed anywhere with little infrastructure investment and without any special security.”
As for the application of this mysterious miracle technology in the Philippines, the company in question is “confident that they can satisfy all the requirements of the Philippine government regulators, the power companies and the public. They could even achieve the objective of having the current president preside over the ribbon-cutting ceremony before he leaves office.”
First of all, if the developer of this game-changing technology has created something that is ready enough that they are actively seeking a foothold in the Philippine market, one would think that they would be willing, even eager, to be clearly identified. I suspect I know who it is, and if I’m right, I’m going to be very disappointed because then this sly press release in the form of a letter to the editor (and yes, that’s exactly what it is; I get three or four press releases a day from different companies or trade publications that sound exactly like this) doesn’t even begin to answer questions that have already been raised about this specific company’s technology.
Second, even if this is just a standard-design SMR, we already know that a commercial version in its own country of origin will not be operational by the time President Marcos steps down, let alone be available to the Philippines. Local requirements might indeed be satisfied, but before that can even happen, the hoops that both US and Philippine stakeholders will have to jump through in order to secure export authorization from the US government — with the resulting agreement also needing approval from the Philippine Senate, the sort of thing it never acts quickly on — will take a couple of years at a minimum.
The Philippines could use nuclear energy, and it’s rational not to completely discount the future possibility of its doing so, provided a very long list of conditions are satisfactorily met. But it is in no position to serve as a test site for novel ideas that have been clearly demonstrated to be years from being a viable, let alone a practical, best option. Trying to mislead the public into believing that a magical solution is available for the asking — proselytizing for nuclear energy, rather than seeking actual attainable solutions for the country’s rather more immediate energy problems — is going to achieve very little, except to disappoint people and ensure this won’t be a market for whatever you’re selling.
“Coal truck-sized loopholes” loom as Labor floats Safeguard Mechanism reforms — RenewEconomy
Labor unveils proposed suite of reforms to make the Safeguard Mechanism fit for purpose. Greens say, try again. The post “Coal truck-sized loopholes” loom as Labor floats Safeguard Mechanism reforms appeared first on RenewEconomy.
“Coal truck-sized loopholes” loom as Labor floats Safeguard Mechanism reforms — RenewEconomy
Big solar smashes Australian generation record, crunches coal, to close out 2022 — RenewEconomy
Utility-scale solar generation notches up biggest month ever in Australia in December of 2022 and helps send NSW black coal output to new low. The post Big solar smashes Australian generation record, crunches coal, to close out 2022 appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Big solar smashes Australian generation record, crunches coal, to close out 2022 — RenewEconomy
Carbon credit scheme review falls short – and problems will continue to fester — RenewEconomy
An independent review of Australia’s controversial carbon credit system concluded it is largely sound. How the panel reached this conclusion is hard to fathom. The post Carbon credit scheme review falls short – and problems will continue to fester appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Carbon credit scheme review falls short – and problems will continue to fester — RenewEconomy
Greek developer reaches financial close on another 230MW of Australian solar projects — RenewEconomy
Mytilineos has reached financial close on a second portfolio of projects in Australia, two solar farms in Queensland and one in New South Wales. The post Greek developer reaches financial close on another 230MW of Australian solar projects appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Greek developer reaches financial close on another 230MW of Australian solar projects — RenewEconomy
Adam Tooze: Why Nuclear Fusion Is Not the Holy Grail
Of course, the amount of energy necessary to generate the laser beam is multiples larger—in the case of this laser beam, somewhere between 150 times larger than the amount that actually reaches the fuel materials. So this is still a powerfully net negative reaction that we have going on here; it uses more energy than it produces
It’s directly related to the military industrial complex, and so the synergies are there. It’s also very expensive; it requires a lot of capital investment, so the engineering companies like getting in on this.
A recent breakthrough is good news, but renewables are still the better bet.
FP.com By Cameron Abadi, a deputy editor at Foreign Policy. 9 Jan 23
Last month in California, a nuclear reactor produced 3.15 megajoules of energy using only 2.05 megajoules of energy input. That surplus has been treated as a major breakthrough in the future of energy because it was produced through the process of nuclear fusion. Experts have talked for decades about nuclear fusion’s potential as a carbon neutral source of energy without any of nuclear energy’s toxic waste.
What were the economics behind this breakthrough technology? Might it provide a status boost to old-fashioned engineering relative to computer engineering? And what’s the path from laboratory success to industrial use? Those are a few of the questions that came up in my recent conversation with FP economics columnist Adam Tooze on the podcast we co-host, Ones and Tooze. What follows is an excerpt, edited for length and clarity.
For the full conversation, look for Ones and Tooze wherever you get your podcasts.
………………… Adam Tooze: It’s a project that goes back originally to some really far-out thinking in the 1950s about uses that could be made of atomic bombs for the purposes of power generation. And the original idea was literally to organize a continuous stream of atomic explosions underground—you know, find some suitably stable caves, and explode several atomic bombs a day to keep a huge mass of water boiling to generate lots of steam. Anyway, that’s where it started.
But out of all of this, from the late 1960s onward, came more serious programs in fusion energy, which essentially focused on lasers. And that’s what this National Ignition Facility is—it is the ultimate fire lighter, right? Basically it’s a gigantic torch or something—the sort of effect that you generate as a Boy Scout or a Cub Scout or whatever, when you start a fire by concentrating the heat of the sun using a magnifying glass. So that’s essentially what we’re doing. And the stunning success of the current round of experiments announced by the U.S. Department of Energy to the public a few weeks ago now is that now for the first time ever, the amount of energy generated by the fusion reaction is larger than the amount of energy fired at it by the laser.
Of course, the amount of energy necessary to generate the laser beam is multiples larger—in the case of this laser beam, somewhere between 150 times larger than the amount that actually reaches the fuel materials. So this is still a powerfully net negative reaction that we have going on here; it uses more energy than it produces……….
CA: How long are we still from having fusion as a workable source of energy? What is the path generally from basic research to industrial use?
AT: I think the only honest answer to this in general is that we do not know the answer to this. You know, there was somebody talking to the New York Times and it really took me aback because this expert assumed that the answer was half a century away. …. it could easily be many decades.
……….. AT: I think, fundamentally- it’s gee whiz, final frontier, extraordinary stuff. And the physics involved are mind-blowing; the engineering is crazy and so much more exciting than just a solar panel sitting beat up in a field somewhere or on a roof or a windmill slowly turning.
It’s directly related to the military industrial complex, and so the synergies are there. It’s also very expensive; it requires a lot of capital investment, so the engineering companies like getting in on this. You know, as much as this National Ignition Facility is a public project, the $3.5 billion were mainly not spent on scientists. It was mainly spent on extremely complex raw materials and labor necessary to build the facilities, and much of that goes to the private sector. So there was a huge private sector stake in these kinds of projects.
But having said all of that, our experience both at the level of economics and at the level of politics with this particular set of technologies—those to do with nuclear power, fission, and fusion—over the last 50 years has been sobering. And on the whole, they appear at this point to be both massively unpopular technologies and, in some cases, hugely politicized technologies as well as incredibly expensive in terms of capital costs—not in terms of operating them but in terms of capital cost to build them.
…………… it’s pretty difficult to see what the case is for investing in new capacity when the costs are as explosively uneconomic.
So that is why I find it difficult to make the case for either conventional atomic power or fusion power as an immediately practical or relevant answer to the issues facing Western countries in the chase for a solution to the problem of the energy transition and decarbonization. And we are lucky, extraordinarily lucky, that renewable technologies have come on as quickly as they have. We should double down on this. We should invest even more.
CA: Can this kind of breakthrough serve to raise the status of materials engineering relative to computer engineering or even financial engineering? Is the old-fashioned kind of engineering in need of that kind of status boost in our society?
AT ………..I actually looked at the data for the National Science Foundation, and it turns out that among Ph.D.s of all types, it’s the humanities and the social sciences that we need to worry about because the share of doctorates in engineering—and this is distinct from computer science—is in fact on the rise and has been very dramatically over the last 20 years…. https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/01/08/adam-tooze-why-nuclear-fusion-is-not-the-holy-grail/
January 9 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “Why Nuclear Fusion Is Not The Holy Grail” • Last month, scientists made a breakthrough in nuclear fusion energy. The reaction produced more energy than it consumed. But the numerous inefficiencies this statement ignores aren’t the only problem. A useful fusion reactor is still a long way off, and we don’t know how […]
January 9 Energy News — geoharvey
This week, in Australian and other nuclear news
A bit of good news. Quitea shortage of good news this week. I’m reduced to falling back on stories of individual goodness. Well, why not? Individuals in their millions are doing kind things every day – that just doesn’t get into the news media. The Top 10 Acts of Kindness in 2022 Warmed Our Hearts and Restored Our Faith in Strangers and Neighbors.
Coronavirus. Weekly epidemiological update on COVID-19
Climate. Climate change could cause ‘disaster’ in the world’s oceans.
Nuclear. Not much happening, except hype for small nuclear reactors. Australia’s nuclear submarines project is beginning to sound less like a goer, and more like something of a 171$billion ego-trip by former PM Scott Morrison, in a bid to look important on the world stage
Christina’s notes: They’re at it again! The nuclear industry dazzles journalists with its newest hogwash – “inflection point”. Corporate media focusses on ‘new’ nuclear solutions. Are they stupid? Or is it just what they’re paid to write?
AUSTRALIA.
- US President Joe Biden warned AUKUS nuclear submarine deal could come at cost to American fleet. Dear US Congress, thank you for saving Australia from itself.
- Australia to buy long-range HIMARS missile system from United States – at unknown cost (? 2 $billion). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_M2JqeY8CA
- Military join rescue effort as floods ravage outback. Bushfire deaths and smoke-related healthcare costs predicted to rise in next few years.
*************************************
CIVIL LIBERTIES. Guilty of Journalism. Key US Allies Collaborate On Espionage Laws Considered Harmful To Whistleblowers And Journalists.
CLIMATE. Coal 2 Nuclear: From the fossil fuel frying pan into the fission fire. Under present conditions, a huge loss of the planet’s glaciers will happen in the next 30 years. Writers protest against UK’s imprisonment of climate activists.
ECONOMICS
- Green surge is circuit breaker on nuclear revival. Nuclear power saw multiple gains in 2022, but economic and other questions remain.
- Sizewell C Nuclear Project’s biggest stumbling block is its funding problem. Sizewell C: How will the £20billion plant be fully-funded? Is EDF using Britain’s “windfall tax” as an excuse to get out of uneconomic Hartlepool and Heysham nuclear reactors?
- Japan’s shortage of engineers and manufacturing capacity sets back its nuclear ambitions.
- GUSTAFSON: Russian nuclear power – unsanctioned – is prospering worldwide.
ENERGY. Analysis Shows U.S. Wind and Solar Could Outpace Coal and Nuclear Power in 2023. European Energy Crisis: France Close to Electricity Rationing Over Problems with Local Nuclear Plants. The Future Remains Uncertain For Nuclear Energy. Nuclear is not the answer to the UK’s energy requirements, and honesty about Sizewell is needed. Solar power innovation by two British local councils. Great Britain produced a record amount of wind-powered electricity in 2022.
ENVIRONMENT. Namibia orders Russian uranium exploration to stop due to environmental concerns.
HEALTH. Electromagnetic radiation – cellphones as a health hazard. Ionising radiation. Return to studying baby teeth for radioactivity from nuclear weapons and nuclear facilities.
HISTORY. It’s all about the bomb: why civilian nuclear power is merely a cover for producing more nuclear weapons. Why Did Portland General Electric Want to Build Trojan Nuclear Plant in the First Place?
LEGAL. John LaForge Set to Be First US Activist Jailed in Germany for Anti-Nuke Protests. Take Japan to court for nuclear water dumping.
MEDIA. Under Musk, Twitter Continues to Promote US Propaganda Networks. Zelensky Expands Crackdown on Ukrainian Media. Media Silent as Latest Twitter Files Expose Flagrant Misconduct in Govt. & Journalism.
NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY.
- $Billions of tax-payer money to go to kickstarting the “new nuclear reactor” industry’s “inflection point”.
- Small Nuclear Reactor (SMR) developers submit 6 designs for UK approval. SMRs – an oversold hype?
- International nuclear fusion project may be delayed by years, its head admits. Is Nuclear Fusion Hotter Than the Sun?. Nuclear fusion may change our world but renewable energy sources will save it: experts.
PERSONAL STORIES.. Beatrice Fihn – a decade fighting to ban nuclear weapons. This man saved the world from nuclear war. His story is a heart-pumper.
POLITICS. German minister reignites coalition row with call to review nuclear exit.
POLITICS INTERNATIONAL and DIPLOMACY. US and South Korea hold talks on “nuclear sharing”. South Korea asks US for greater role in managing nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons and the resistance to reality. U.S. President Biden contradicts South Korea’s President‘s claim that the two countries are planning joint nuclear exercises.
Pakistan supplies India with a list of its nuclear facilities. US Says ‘All Options’ On Table As Iran Nuclear Talks Remain Deadlocked.
SAFETY.
- Nuclear Ukraine? Amid concerns over alleged Russian threat, the world overlooks the real danger .
- Canada: Pressure tubes at two nuclear reactors deteriorated far too quickly .
- Letter in the Morning Star Exposes Links Between Subsea Coal Mine and Subsea Nuclear Dumping. Enforcement action revealed after Hinkley Point C worker death.
- Japan to use Self-Defense Forces to guard nuclear power plants.
- South Korea: Credible nuclear regulation needs independence transparency.
SECRETS and LIES.
- White Lives Matter More in Ukraine. Japan
- Data rewriting and erroneous statements…Sloppy handling continues at Tsuruga Nuclear Power Plant Unit No.2 of JAERI, Regulatory Commission suggests termination of review if no improvement is made. Kashiwazaki Kariwa, a Distant Recovery of Confidence TEPCO Shares Crisis Awareness to Prevent Misconduct. British-run spy tech powers Ukraine proxy war, putting civilians at risk.
- Russian computer hacking team targeted 3 USA nuclear weapons facilities.
- Can nuclear safety protocols be maintained in a poor country like Kyrgyzstan, where corruption is rampant?.
SPINBUSTER. Countering nuclear industry propaganda by telling the facts – Joshua Frank’s book “Atomic Days”. Workington under siege from new nuclear plans.
WASTES.
- Fukushima, Our ongoing accident. Japan must work with the Pacific to find a solution to the Fukushima water release issue – otherwise we face disaster.
- Feds push plan to dispose plutonium using nuclear waste repository near Carlsbad. Editorial: New Mexico right to ask for accounting of nuclear waste.
- Indigenous Taiwanese kept in the dark as a massive nuclear waste dump was imposed on their island.
- UK. Coal Boss Compiles Lastest Nuclear Dump Report for Government who have just Approved his Coal Mine.
WAR and CONFLICT. Before the Bombs Come the Platitudes. Cold War estimates of deaths in nuclear conflict. A Secret War in the Making: Americans Should Not Die to Defend Taiwan.
Number of civilians killed in Donbass revealed. Ukraine – The Big Push To End The War. CODEPINK calls on Zelensky, Biden and Congress to seize this chance for peace in Ukraine. Donetsk shelled in first minute of Christmas truce . Los Alamos National Laboratory’s record $4.6B budget will still mostly fund nuclear weapons.
WEAPONS and WEAPONS SALES. Pentagon pressures NATO allies to boost arms flow to Ukraine. Defensive and offensive operations: “tank-killers” part of new U.S. $45b arms package to Ukraine
North Korea to have “exponential increase” in its nuclear arsenal. Raytheon sells long-range missiles to Romania for war in Black Sea
1 This month.
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/235274195556
19 May – Webinar- Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-05-19 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-05-19 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 