Dutton’s nuclear disaster: Cheap lies and a $20 billion deficit
By Steve Bishop | 17 February 2025, https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/duttons-nuclear-disaster-cheap-lies-and-a-20-billion-deficit,19447
The Coalition’s nuclear policy announcement comes with a massive price tag but is also built on disinformation, writes Steve Bishop.
A $20 BILLION deficit and cheap lies mean that Opposition Leader Peter Dutton‘s attempt to “extend the life” of coal-fired power plants with a nuclear “fix” has come spectacularly unstuck.
Dutton and the Coalition stand condemned for presenting the public with a shoddy, ill-prepared policy on a multi-billion dollar project that the Climate Council warns could risk power shortages in the 2030s.
On 13 December last year, Mr Dutton promised:
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Dutton’s nuclear disaster: Cheap lies and a $20 billion deficit
By Steve Bishop | 17 February 2025, 3:00pm | 0 comments |
The Coalition’s nuclear policy announcement comes with a massive price tag but is also built on disinformation, writes Steve Bishop.
A $20 BILLION deficit and cheap lies mean that Opposition Leader Peter Dutton‘s attempt to “extend the life” of coal-fired power plants with a nuclear “fix” has come spectacularly unstuck.
Dutton and the Coalition stand condemned for presenting the public with a shoddy, ill-prepared policy on a multi-billion dollar project that the Climate Council warns could risk power shortages in the 2030s.
On 13 December last year, Mr Dutton promised:
‘By 2050, our plan will deliver up to 14 GW of nuclear energy, guaranteeing consistent and stable electricity for all Australians.’
Yet the Coalition’s costings report, released on the same day, repeatedly deals with only 13 GW.
That’s 1,000 MW short of the target.
Three small modular reactors (SMRs) producing 345 MW each would be needed to make up the shortfall at a cost of almost $20 billion based on the US$4 billion (AU$6.2 billion) price of Opposition energy spokesman Ted O’Brien‘s favoured Natrium reactor.
Just to put this critical mess in focus — that’s twenty thousand million dollars. It makes a mockery of Dutton’s claim that “the Liberal Party has always been a better economic manager…”
And then come the cheap lies.
Mr Dutton claims:
“…electricity is cheaper where there is a presence of nuclear energy. That is a fact.”
No, it’s not a fact. It is a lie.
Ted O’Brien has repeatedly talked about Ontario as having cheap power because it has nuclear reactors.
But Quebec’s electricity prices are far cheaper than Ontario’s. Quebec closed its only nuclear power plant in 2012.
Not only that, but Quebec’s power company paid the provincial government a dividend of $2.5 billion in 2023/24.
On the other hand, the Ontario Government pays subsidies of up to $720 a year to families of four earning less than $65,000 a year.
Coalition frontbencher Dan Tehan says nuclear power contributes to low power prices in Tennessee but Electric Choice shows that this month Idaho, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Utah all have lower power prices — and none of them has nuclear power,
Dutton claims “Australian families at the moment are paying some of the highest energy costs in the world” and they would enjoy ‘massive savings’ if we had nuclear power.
The Opposition Leader also says it’s a fact that countries such as the UK and France, with their nuclear power, have cheaper power prices than Australia.
Here’s the lie exposed again. It’s a complete meltdown. According to Statista, power prices in the UK and France are more expensive than in Australia.
Here’s another lie.
Mr Dutton asserts:
‘…nuclear energy… has proven to get electricity prices and emissions down all over the world…’
Slovenia has a nuclear power plant but is one of the most expensive providers in Europe with Switzerland‘s nuclear power prices not far behind.
Slovakia generates half its power from nuclear plants but power prices are more than twice what Norwegians, with no nuclear power, pay.
Then Dutton has the chutzpah to accuse the Government of lying when it points out that nuclear power is the most expensive type of energy.
In the 2021 edition of its annual cost report, Wall Street firm Lazard estimated that the levelised cost of electricity from new nuclear plants will be $131–204 per megawatt-hour (MWh), whereas newly constructed utility-scale solar and wind plants produce electricity at somewhere between $26–50MWh.
An independent report commissioned by the Clean Energy Council and conducted by Egis, a leading global consulting, construction and engineering firm, has confirmed that nuclear energy is up to six times more expensive than renewable energy.
The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) found nuclear power in Australia could result in electricity bills rising by $665 a year on average
And the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) has found:
‘…building nuclear reactors in Australia would cost at least twice as much as renewable power…’
No wonder that Coalition whistleblower Senator Matt Canavan revealed the nuclear policy is no more than a fix. It doesn’t even deserve a half-life.
The past week in nuclear news
Some bits of good news. The Revival of Germany’s Carbon-Sequestering Peatlands. Australia’s renewable energy growth doubles in six months. Three good things: projects clearing up junk that’s hidden from view.
TOP STORIES. Netanyahu’s Quest to Attack Iran’s nuclear facilities with the ‘Mother of all Bombs’.
Anatomy of an AI Coup.
The Pentagon Is Recruiting Elon Musk To Help Them Win a Nuclear War.
High-Explosive Drone Pierces Shell Of Chernobyl Nuclear Plant At Very Moment Trump Pushes Ukraine Toward Peace.
Climate. World’s sea-ice falls to record low. Two-thirds of Americans still believe climate change is impacting the Earth, despite what Trump contends.
Noel’s notes. Small Nuclear Reactors: Big safety problems, and who pays the piper? “Jobs Jobs Jobs!” screams the nuclear lobby.
AUSTRALIA. Dutton’s nuclear disaster: Cheap lies and a $20 billion deficit. Why are young people like this 18-year-old fronting the pro-nuclear push in Australia? American or Trump’s values, or are they the same? Nuclear advocates: Splitting atoms and spinning agendas. Australia’s technocratic drive to nuclear ignorance. more Australian nuclear news headlines at https://antinuclear.net/2025/02/13/australian-nuclear-news-10-17-february/ 22 February – protest AUKUS this Sat near Pt Adelaide event https://www.facebook.com/events/13888580289
NUCLEAR ITEMS
ART and CULTURE.
Why Welsh speakers oppose Wylfa nuclear plant.
ECONOMICS.
- The £40bn nuclear project at risk of becoming another British white elephant. ALSO AT https://nuclear-news.net/2025/02/12/2-a-the-40bn-nuclear-project-at-risk-of-becoming-another-british-white-elephant/
- Can the nuclear industry find a better way to build?
- Octopus Energy launches renewables investment platform for consumers.
- South Korea increases support for domestic nuclear industry.
- NUCLEAR BRIBERY: Nuclear Waste Services funds Cumbrian community projects.
- Marketing. India PM Modi ends foreign tour with nuclear deals in pipeline.
| EMPLOYMENT. US government tries to rehire nuclear staff it fired days ago.There really ARE necessary nuclear industry jobs – IN DEMOLISHING NUCLEAR REACTORS! |
| ENERGY Prioritizing nuclear power and natural gas over renewable energy is a risky move for Ontario’s energy future. Green power– not for us? |
| ENVIRONMENT ‘Nothing prepared us for Sizewell C devastation‘. Nuclear Free Local Authorities back petition to save fish at Hinkley C. Nuclear waste plan ‘would scar Lincolnshire Wolds‘. |
EVENTS.
- 19 February – WEBINAR. International Update: Nuclear Waste Burial Programs in the UK, US and EU | Nuclear Waste Online 2025.
- 21 February WEBINAR . What Scientists Are Telling Us About Radiation that Nuclear Boosters Won’t.
- 22 February Drone Wars Online Day Conference.
- 23 February GLOBAL DAY OF ACTION TO CLOSE BASES. – https://worldbeyondwar.org/closebases/
- Third Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons .
| HEALTH. Doctors fear health fallout from nuclear energy plans |
| MEDIA. Media must unshackle itself. |
| OPPOSITION TO NUCLEAR Opposition mounts to planned nuclear plant as Starmer confirms new policy of ‘Build, baby, build’. Sizewell C campaigners slammed “clueless” Government. |
| SAFETY.Oops! Trump accidentally fired hundreds of federal workers who maintain our nuclear weapons. Warning sent about need for strategic policing reform to address security of SMRs. Safety Issues and Impact on Marine Environment of Extension of British Nuclear Plant Lifespan Queried by NGO. Would a fallout shelter really protect you in a nuclear blast?‘ Deeply Concerned’ Dems Want to Know If DOGE Can Access Nuclear Weapons Data. Incident. A drone pierced the outer shell of Ukraine’s Chernobyl nuclear plant. Radiation levels are normal. |
| SECRETS and LIES. Engineer who worked on Hinkley Point C nuclear project quizzed on suspicion of being a Russian spy, The Coventry experiment: why were Indian women in Britain given radioactive food without their consent? Secret terror blueprints for US NSC to ‘help Ukraine resist’ exposed. |
| WAR and CONFLICT. NFLAs endorse international appeal for justice over French nuclear tests. |
| WEAPONS and WEAPONS SALES .A New Military-Industrial Complex Arises. Trump wants Russia, China to stop making nuclear weapons, so all can cut defence spending by half. Trump Promises Billions in Defense Cuts. Will U.S. resume nuclear testing? America’s nuclear gamble: The dangerous push to resume atmospheric testing. Trident nuclear submarine project rated “unachievable” third year running. UK Government urged to scrap nuclear weapons ‘once and for all’. |
Taxpayers should not foot the bill for nuclear risk
Australians for Affordable Energy, 17 Feb 25, https://theaimn.net/taxpayers-should-not-foot-the-bill-for-nuclear-risk/
If private insurers refuse to cover nuclear reactors the financial risks will be shifted onto Australian taxpayers, meaning we are still unclear how much taxpayers will have to cover of the nuclear bill.
Australians for Affordable Energy has expressed deep concern over the revelation the private sector may not be able to insure nuclear reactors, following comments on Monday from the CEO of the Insurance Council of Australia.
Many of Australia’s leading insurance companies won’t cover damage from a nuclear disaster, leaving the government as the insurer. By shifting the financial burden of insuring nuclear facilities onto taxpayers, Australians could be exposed to potentially tens of billions of dollars in liabilities if a nuclear accident were to occur.
“We know that private investors won’t put money into building the industry, that we will need to create a massive new government agency to oversee it, and now we are hearing that we will need to pay for the insurance too? What’s next?”
“Advocates for nuclear energy need to say whether it can stand on its own, including paying their insurance. And they need to tell us what other costs we might be asked to carry. The fact is by the time the reactors are done it won’t be us paying the bills for the insurance, it’ll be our grandkids. I’d like to know what we’re signing them up for. ”
Australians for Affordable Energy spokesperson Jo Dodds, a bushfire survivor and advocate for evidence-based policy, said: “Australians are already struggling with rising energy costs, the last thing we need is a power source that could further inflate our electricity bills and our taxes.
“The high costs associated with uninsured nuclear power could be passed onto consumers, who are already looking at paying higher bills if we were to shift to nuclear power. This is money hardworking Australians simply can’t afford to pay.”
AFAE is warning against locking into costly or uncertain energy options and is calling for greater transparency on the long-term costs of competing energy plans.
Small nuclear reactors: Big safety problems, and who pays the piper?
15 February, 2025 https://theaimn.net/small-nuclear-reactors-big-safety-problems-and-who-pays-the-piper/
As usual, in matters nuclear, the Anglophone news is awash with articles extolling the future virtues of Small Nuclear Reactors. Especially in the UK, where Trumpian antics don’t dominate the news the whole time, nuclear news gets a lot of coverage. As I’ve mentioned before, the UK corporate press is ecstatic about SMRs. SMR critics, (of which there are plenty), usually focus their ire on the subject of costs. Other objections centre on health, climate needs, the environment, and the connection between civil and military nuclear technology.
The nuclear lobby has very successfully touted safety as the big plus for the new (though still non-existent) Small Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) . Everyone seemed to buy this idea, because, after all, SMRs can’t melt down in the same dramatic way that big ones can. So, there’s been relatively little fuss made by the anti-nuclear movement on the grounds of safety, regarding SMRs.
Imagine my surprise when I opened up my eyes today – to see a corporate media news outlet, New Civil Engineer, usually pro-nuclear, coming out with a damning criticism of SMRs on the grounds of safety. It’s not as if New Civil Engineer actually condemned SMRs. Oh no! – they did indeed point out that the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero ((DESNZ) is confident that SMR developments are subject to “robust controls“. And the Office of Nuclear Security (ONR) “ensures that the highest levels of safety, security and safeguards are met”
It’s just that New Civil Engineer brought up a few points that have escaped notice, following the publication of the draft National Policy Statement for nuclear energy generation (EN-7) They note that –
“Despite EN-7 being 64 pages, just two lines are dedicated to specifically addressing the security of SMRs.“
The new regulations for SMRs would allow for many new nuclear sites near communities.
For large nuclear power sites, security is funded by the developers themselves. For SMRs, the security needs would be provided by the Civil Nuclear Constabulary (CNC) and also by local police. But these bodies are not under the direction of the ONR or the DESNZ. The writer quotes a policing expert, John McNeill :
“Not even [the government] can direct them.
Policing of airports and football grounds, even schools and educational campuses, shows how hard this will be to fund fairly.”
The expansion of AI and data centres add another complexity to the question of the amount of security needed, and of who pays for it. The proliferation of nuclear sites, closer to populated areas also means the increase in transport of radioactive materials – again bringing the risks of accidents, theft, and terrorism. And again, bringing the need for more security measures.
There’s some community concern in the UK about the safety of prolonging the life of aging nuclear reactors, and of the safety of coastal reactors and the marine environment. There’s also concern about the safety of the SMRs themselves, as the governments relax regulations.
The highly enriched uranium needed for most SMRs poses another risk – as it is useful for nuclear weapons, and therefore attractive to terrorists, and to countries seeking to get nuclear weapons.
So there has been some awareness of safety and security problems amongst critics, especially in the environmental movement. However, this is the first time that I’ve seen the corporate media speak up about this. As the author quotes questions raised in the House of Lords, it looks as though this issue is at last coming to the fore.
I guess that I should not be surprised that the issue of security of Small Nuclear Reactors is at last going to be taken seriously by The Establishment. After all, the examination of the huge and complicated difficulties raised in trying to organise security of SMRs eventually boils down to costs again – “Finally, who pays the piper?”
Why are young people like this 18-year-old fronting the pro-nuclear push in Australia?
SBS News, 13 February 2025
The regional sessions were not publicised beforehand on Nuclear for Australia’s social media accounts or the tour page on its website — you could only register for tickets if you knew the URL for the event’s webpage.
Campaigns director for the Conservation Council of Western Australia, Mia Pepper, said when she tried to get tickets for the Perth event online, she was denied. She said a colleague also failed to get tickets using their real name, but able to get in using an alias.
Shackel said Nuclear for Australia Googles people’s names beforehand to determine whether they are “likely going to cause a disruption or a threat”
Some polling suggests older Australians are more supportive of nuclear power than their younger counterparts. So why are young people fronting a pro-nuclear push?
SBS News, By Jennifer Luu, 13 February 2025
In a function room at Brisbane’s The Gabba sports ground, around 600 people have gathered to hear Miss America 2023 try to convince Australians nuclear power is a good idea.
Sporting a blue cocktail dress, blonde hair and a wide smile, 22-year-old Grace Stanke looks the part of a beauty pageant contestant.
She’s also a nuclear engineer touring the country with Nuclear for Australia: a pro-nuclear lobby group founded by teenager Will Shackel and funded by donors that include entrepreneur Dick Smith.
The event — billed as an information evening featuring a panel of experts — is off to a rocky start. A protester steps in front of the audience and speaks into a microphone.
“All of the organisers, presenters and sponsorship of this event tonight has a very deep vested interest — ” he says, before he’s drowned out in a chorus of boos and the mic is seized from his hand.
Audience members continue to disrupt last month’s event, raising their voices and speaking to the crowd before being herded out by security.
Among them is Di Tucker, a retired psychologist concerned about climate change. She said she became upset after submitting half a dozen questions online to be answered by the panel — and felt like they were being deliberately ignored.
“I felt so frustrated by the lack of factual information in that so-called information session forum on the safety, the timescale and the reality of nuclear energy,” Tucker told The Feed.
“I did stand up and I addressed the crowd, and I said something like: ‘You people need to go away and do your own research … it’s glossing over facts’.”
Nuclear for Australia founder Will Shackel, who was emceeing, estimated there were 20 to 30 protesters heckling the room.
He labelled their behaviour “simply unacceptable and … not in the interest of a fair discussion”.
“They were yelling abuse at us on stage. We had people come up to Grace at the end, call her a clown,” he claimed.
Shackel told The Feed: “We had people [who] had to be physically dragged out because they were resisting security … it was pretty ugly and pretty disturbing.”
Tucker disputes this: “Nobody I saw leave the room was hostile or aggressive, physically aggressive towards the security guards.”
“In fact, it was the opposite. The security guards were shoving the people outside.”
Outside, a separate group of protesters wields banners warning against the dangers of radioactive waste.
The words “Nuclear energy distracts from the climate emergency” are projected onto The Gabba over the image of a red herring.
The teen and the beauty queen
Tucker said the audience was mostly male and over 60. So why are two young people fronting the pro-nuclear movement in Australia?………………………….
As well as launching Nuclear for Australia — which describes itself as “the largest nuclear advocacy organisation in Australia” with over 80,000 supporters — he’s addressed a Senate committee and interviewed French President Emmanuel Macron for his organisation’s social media at the COP28 climate conference in Dubai in 2023.
Shackel first became fascinated with the nuclear debate while in high school in Brisbane.
“I’d just done a school assignment on nuclear energy when I realised it was banned. And that, as a 16-year-old kid, was pretty shocking to me,” he said.
Australia is one of the few countries where using nuclear energy to produce electricity is illegal. The ban was introduced in 1998, when the Howard government made a deal with the Greens in order to build a nuclear reactor in Sydney for research purposes.
At 16, Shackel launched a petition calling on Australia to lift its nuclear energy ban, garnering a flurry of media attention……….
As well as launching Nuclear for Australia — which describes itself as “the largest nuclear advocacy organisation in Australia” with over 80,000 supporters — he’s addressed a Senate committee and interviewed French President Emmanuel Macron for his organisation’s social media at the COP28 climate conference in Dubai in 2023……………………………
Nuclear power is still a contentious topic, but more Australians have become supportive of the idea over time.
A 2024 Lowy Institute poll of 2,028 Australians
indicates 61 per cent support Australia using nuclear power to generate electricity, while 37 per cent were opposed.
Among the 18- to 29-year-olds surveyed, 66 per cent supported nuclear power while 33 per cent were opposed.
In contrast,
a December 2024 poll of 6,709 people conducted for the Australian Conservation Foundation suggests young people were less likely to agree that nuclear is good for Australia, compared to older respondents. For example, 42 per cent of males aged 18-24 agreed, while 56 per cent of males over 54 agreed.
There’s also a gender gap — in the same poll, just over a quarter of women thought nuclear would be good for Australia, compared to half of men.
Nuclear for Australia hopes Grace Stanke can convince the sceptics. Dubbed “the real-life Barbenheimer”, she works for the operator of the largest fleet of nuclear power plants in the US, Constellation. (The company operates 21 of the US’s 94 nuclear reactors).
Now 18, Shackel suggests young Australians are more open-minded towards nuclear power than older generations and are more likely to support parties that are concerned about climate change……..
Physicist Ken Baldwin speculates the rise in support for nuclear power is due to shifting demographics.
He said older generations are more likely to have historical hangups around the dangers of nuclear power, having lived through the British and French weapons tests in the Pacific and nuclear catastrophes like the 1986 accident in Chernobyl and the 2011 accident in Fukushima. ……
“The younger generation … doesn’t have that particular historical baggage, and perhaps they’re more attuned to thinking about the need to do something about climate change,” he said.
Nuclear for Australia hopes Grace Stanke can convince the sceptics. Dubbed “the real-life Barbenheimer”, she works for the operator of the largest fleet of nuclear power plants in the US, Constellation. (The company operates 21 of the US’s 94 nuclear reactors)…………….
Nuclear for Australia has been drumming up public support for nuclear power over the past fortnight, touring every capital city (except Darwin) and holding a parliamentary briefing in Canberra.
It also targeted regional areas near the Coalition’s proposed sites for future nuclear power stations — including Morwell in Victoria, Collie WA, Port Augusta SA, Callide and Tarong in Queensland and Lithgow in NSW. The Coalition says its taxpayer-funded plan is for five large and two smaller reactors, with the smaller ones to come online in 2035 and the rest by 2037.
Nuclear for Australia was slow to reveal all the names for a total number of regional locations for the tour. During the first week of the tour, Nuclear for Australia told The Feed there would only be two regional stops.
The regional sessions were not publicised beforehand on Nuclear for Australia’s social media accounts or the tour page on its website — you could only register for tickets if you knew the URL for the event’s webpage.
Campaigns director for the Conservation Council of Western Australia, Mia Pepper, said when she tried to get tickets for the Perth event online, she was denied. She said a colleague also failed to get tickets using their real name, but able to get in using an alias.
She accused Nuclear for Australia of blacklisting known anti-nuclear activists and trying to avoid criticism by attempting to “creep around the country”.
“If they were really genuine about having a mature debate, they would do their best to invite some people like myself that have engaged really respectfully in the debate over many years to answer the tough questions,” she said.
Shackel said Nuclear for Australia Googles people’s names beforehand to determine whether they are “likely going to cause a disruption or a threat”, and that regional events aren’t publicised on social media because they are not relevant to city-based audiences.
“We care about the safety of our attendees, we care about the safety of our experts,” Shackel said.
“If we believe that someone is a known protester … someone who could cause a physical threat to people in there, we will not allow them in.”
Pepper said: “I have never been physically aggressive to anybody in my entire life.”
“The idea that because you are opposed to nuclear power, you somehow would be aggressive or violent is absolutely outrageous.”
Locals left with more questions than answers
South of Perth, around 100 of the 9,000 residents of the tiny coal mining town of Collie showed up to the Nuclear for Australia event, hoping to learn more about how living next to a nuclear reactor could affect them.
The Coalition has proposed converting Collie’s coal-powered station into a nuclear power plant. But the state government is vowing to phase out coal by 2030 and there’s little chance nuclear power could come online by then, leaving coal workers in limbo.
Resident Jayla Anne Parkin said the information session was “an utter waste of time”, and she came away with more questions than answers. “Their whole speech was very generic. They were probably using the same speech for every single area,” she said.
Parkin asked one of the experts where the water for a nuclear power plant would come from — with large amounts needed to cool the radioactive core.
“He gave a long-winded speech about how we can take any body of water, whether it be the ocean, the river, pool, sewage, and treat it and turn it into the water. But at the end of him answering it, he still didn’t tell me what source of water in Collie they were going to use,” she said.
“We’re very limited with water here as it is.”……………………………………………
there have been reports about Shackel’s alleged political ties.
A 2024 research report from progressive activist group GetUp on nuclear disinformation in Australia
analysed Shackel’s LinkedIn connections and reported that their political party affiliation leant heavily towards Liberal Party MPs, Senators and advisors.
GetUp reported at least 36 of Shackel’s connections, including 11 current or former politicians, were directly linked to the Liberal Party — with the party having the highest concentration of current employees from a single organisation in his network…………………………………..
Lobby groups are allowed to have political party affiliations. While registered charities can participate in campaigning and advocacy, they “cannot have a purpose of promoting or opposing a particular political party or candidate”, according to the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission.
……………………………………………………… Professor Ken Baldwin said nuclear is “not really viable” as an option for decarbonising Australia by 2050, as it would take 15 years at the very minimum to develop the necessary regulations and build a nuclear power station.
“We will have, according to the current plans, converted our current energy system to almost an entirely renewable energy system by that time,” Baldwin said.
“Australia is at the leading edge of the renewable energy transition. We’re installing solar and wind at one of the fastest rates per capita of any country in the world.”…………… https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-feed/article/will-shackel-australia-pro-nuclear-movement-young-people/gucu0iefz
No coal, gas or nuclear: Greens cut deals to “Dutton-proof” Labor’s flagship renewable policies
Sophie Vorrath, ReNewEconomy, Feb 13, 2025
The Australian Greens have had a busy week “Dutton-proofing” the legislation underpinning federal Labor’s flagship renewable energy policies to prevent them being used to support coal, gas or nuclear power in the event of a Coalition election victory this year.
The Greens say they have successfully amended the Albanese government’s Electricity Infrastructure Legislation Amendment Bill 2025 to protect the Capacity Investment Scheme (CIS) from being tweaked to allow fossil fuel plants to participate. The bills were due to go through parliament on Thursday.
Federal Labor’s CIS is designed to accelerate investment in new dispatchable renewable energy capacity, with the goal of delivering at least 23 gigawatts of wind and solar and 9 gigawatts and 36 gigawatt hours of clean storage…………………….
“The Greens have Dutton-proofed government support for wind, solar and storage which is driving coal and gas out of the electricity system,” Greens leader Adam Bandt said in a statement on Wednesday.
“The Greens want to keep Peter Dutton out and get Labor to act in a minority government, but if somehow Peter Dutton ever makes his way to the Lodge, these amendments will keep his hands off the Capacity Investment Scheme and keep renewables and storage on track.”
Two days earlier, the Greens struck a separate deal with Labor to ensure Dutton’s other favourite energy source, nuclear power, will not get a sideways boost from Labor’s Future Made in Australia (Production Tax Credits and Other Measures) Bill, which passed through parliament on Monday.
Amendments secured by the Greens exclude uranium from being eligible for production tax credits under the Future Made in Australia policy, which was designed by Labor to support green hydrogen production and critical minerals processing.
Greens Resources spokesperson Dorinda Cox said the passage of the amended bill means parliament has confirmed in legislation that uranium can not be listed as a critical mineral or receive a tax credit – and demonstrates what a minor party can achieve.
“The Greens have sent a clear message today – nuclear is not the answer, and we won’t let it be used as a smokescreen to prop up coal and gas,” Cox said on Monday.
“There is no place for uranium in our future. We have felt the history of devastation and destruction of country. First Nations communities have suffered greatly and have been left to clean up the destruction. Australians do not and will not benefit from uranium mining, no matter how the Coalition spins it.
“The Greens have Dutton-proofed this bill and secured jobs and investment in critical minerals processing and green hydrogen production, both of which are critical to our climate and our economic future,” added Bandt.
“Peter Dutton’s dangerous nuclear fantasy is a ploy to keep coal and gas in the system for longer, threatening investment in renewables. Locking support for renewables and storage into law will give the industry certainty that the transition is unstoppable.
“If the Parliament works together like this we can get real action on the climate crisis.
Federal Labor, meanwhile, is keeping up its attack on Dutton’s energy policy, this week pushing out data that claims nuclear uses 1.4 times as much water as coal to generate power.
Under the Coalition’s plan, Labor says, nuclear power in Australia would need three times more water than coal to keep the lights on.
“Peter Dutton wants to spend $600 billion in taxpayer money on one of the most water intensive energies, nuclear,” federal energy minister Chris Bowen said on Thursday.
“Peter Dutton needs to find a Sydney Harbour sized reservoir of water every year to keep his nuclear reactors stable and running.
“In a drought-prone nation you have to ask – which regional community will he steal water from to keep the lights on?” more https://reneweconomy.com.au/no-coal-gas-or-nuclear-greens-cut-deals-to-dutton-proof-labors-flagship-renewable-policies/
Doctors fear health fallout from nuclear energy plans
Canberra Times, By Marion Rae, February 12 2025
Doctors have warned of no “safe” level of radiation from a proposed network of nuclear reactors as battlelines are drawn for the federal election.
Similar to other nuclear-powered nations, Australians living within a certain radius of a reactor would need to be issued potassium iodide tablets for use in a radiation emergency, a nuclear briefing has learned.
“The only reason that everyone in that radius is given that is because they might need it,” Assistant Minister for Climate Change and Energy Josh Wilson told a nuclear briefing on Tuesday.
If anyone comes to buy your house, the proximity of a reactor will be noted on the land titles register, and insurers will not cover nuclear accidents, he said.
The warning came as doctors fronted parliament to warn of long-term health risks for workers and surrounding communities, particularly children.
Evidence included a meta-data analysis of occupational and environmental exposure that accumulated data on more than seven million people.
It found living within 30km of a reactor increased overall cancer risk by five per cent, with thyroid cancer increasing by 14 per cent and leukaemia by nine per cent.
A separate study of workers in the nuclear industry in France, the United Kingdom and the United States analysed results from more than 300,000 people who were monitored for over 30 years.
Finding not only increased cancer rates but surprisingly increased rates of heart attacks and strokes, it found impacts at low doses were larger than previously thought.
“There is no ‘safe’ lower dose of radiation. The science is clear. All exposure adds to long-term health risks,” vice-president of the Medical Association for Prevention of War Dr Margaret Beavis said……………………………
Under the coalition’s nuclear energy blueprint, seven reactors would be built across five states to replace ageing coal-fired power plants with more gas-fired plants to provide baseload power in the interim.
“Zero-emissions nuclear plants” are a key part of the Nationals’ election pitch to regions where coal plants are already closing, while Labor is pressing ahead with the transition to renewable energy backed up by big batteries.
Public Health Association of Australia spokesman Dr Peter Tait said the idea that the nuclear industry was free of greenhouse gas emissions was a “furphy”, given the construction and uranium supply chain involved.
Emissions would rise threefold under the nuclear plan due to increased coal and gas use, he warned, with the first plant not due to come online until the late 2030s.
From a public health perspective, Australians can’t afford that delay, Dr Tait said.
Executive director of Doctors for the Environment Dr Kate Wylie said prolonging the dependency on fossil fuels would mean more Australians would be affected by their known health risks, including increased rates of asthma.
Nuclear energy would also put communities at risk during the next drought, when reactors would be first in line for scarce water, Dr Wylie said.
“The ethical thing to do is to choose the least water-intensive energy sources, which are wind and solar,” she said. https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8890265/doctors-fear-health-fallout-from-nuclear-energy-plans/?fbclid=IwY2xjawIan3hleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHaAJ7wF9BUi9CgA1_tQDXS5gC2WCrX8HSFZUrOQPGgXABnNkhEvlgHKolQ_aem_OShH2FPpE3tO3RIv_gAgBg
Revealed: The water supply risks posed by Dutton’s nuclear plan
The Age, By Mike Foley, February 13, 2025
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s proposed nuclear plants will suck more water from nearby rivers than the coal plants they would replace, posing a challenge to maintaining drinking supply for local communities and irrigation for farms.
The federal government cites its own modelling to claim nuclear would use up to three times more water than the coal plants that are critical for the opposition’s pledge to help households with power prices and reach net zero emissions by 2050.
A secure water supply is crucial for the communities the opposition has selected as sites for the seven nuclear plants it has pledged to build if it wins the election, due by May.
There is no water to spare in the local rivers that supply the coal plants the Coalition has selected to host a nuclear reactor, where state governments issue licences to manage the competing needs of residents, farming and environmental requirements.
Greater water consumption from nuclear energy could shrink the size of the agriculture sector. Introducing a government buyer into the market would also likely raise water prices for the farmers who remain and create tension between key Coalition voter groups.
For example, Lithgow’s Mt Piper coal power station about 140 kilometres west of Sydney, a site earmarked for a nuclear plant, is located in the Macquarie water catchment where cotton, wine grapes and grains are grown.
Departmental data released by Labor on Wednesday states the opposition’s seven nuclear plants would collectively use 500 gigalitres – roughly the same volume as Sydney Harbour – to generate the amount of power they plan to supply to the grid each year.
The seven coal plants earmarked to be replaced by nuclear use 168 gigalitres a year, generating 48-terawatt hours of electricity.
Why does nuclear need more water than coal?
Coal and nuclear plants both use their heat source to boil water, make steam and spin turbines to generate electricity. This steam is cooled back to water (when most water loss occurs) and then re-used in the plant.
The opposition’s energy policy stipulates their nuclear plants would run at near full capacity every day of the year to recoup costs.
That means nuclear would need to draw on more water, far more often than some of the coal plants they replace, which run about 60 per cent of the time.
What do experts say?
The government cited an Australian National University study to make its claim that nuclear plants use 40 per cent more water than coal plants on average because their cooling processes tend to be less efficient.
ANU engineering professor Andrew Blakers said he stood by his findings.
“The key point is coal and nuclear and thermal power stations need water cooling,” Blakers said. “Solar and wind use vastly less because they don’t need any water for cooling.”…………………………………………………………..
What do farmers say?
NSW Irrigators Council chief executive Claire Miller said “water is a very scarce resource” and all the available supplies around Lithgow and the Hunter Valley are committed to existing industries.
“Governments need to consider very carefully any industries coming in that increase the competition for that resource and what the impacts would be on other water users, including farmers.” https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/thirsty-nuclear-plants-will-suck-crucial-water-from-farm-communities-20250212-p5lbfr.html
Australian nuclear news 10 -17 February
Headlines as they come in:
- No coal, gas or nuclear: Greens cut deals to “Dutton-proof” Labor’s flagship renewable policies
- Why are young people like this 18-year-old fronting the pro-nuclear push in Australia?
- Peter Dutton wants a nuclear future for Australia. Here’s what that might look like
- Doctors fear health fallout from nuclear energy plans
- Revealed: The water supply risks posed by Dutton’s nuclear plan
- Why the USA’s Endless Wars Harm Global Stability & Australia.
- Australia’s technocratic drive to nuclear ignorance.
- Dutton’s nuclear policy is a Coalition scam .
- Nuclear advocates: Splitting atoms and spinning agendas.
Why the USA’s Endless Wars Harm Global Stability & Australia
February 12, 2025 AIMN Editorial, By Denis Hay
Discover how USA’s endless wars destabilise nations and why Australia’s alignment with the US military threatens its sovereignty and security.
Introduction
For over a century, the United States has engaged in military interventions worldwide, often framed as efforts to spread democracy and protect human rights. However, history shows these interventions have frequently served corporate interests, ideological dominance, and geopolitical strategies rather than humanitarian concerns.
From orchestrating coups to funding proxy wars and setting up military bases across the globe, US actions have led to mass displacement, economic turmoil, and loss of sovereignty in many nations. Australia’s increasing alignment with the US military brings significant risks, potentially compromising national security and financial independence.
This article examines the history of US interventions, their consequences, and why Australia must develop an independent foreign policy free from US influence.
The Foundation of US Imperialism
Colonial Expansion and the Displacement of Indigenous Peoples……………….
Military Interventions for Economic and Geopolitical Gain…………………………
US Corporate Interests and Nazi Germany……………….
The Korean War: US Expansion Beyond the 38th Parallel…………………..
Regime Change and Proxy Wars in the Cold War Era………………….
US-Backed Coups in Latin America……………………….
The Vietnam War: A 30-Year US Military Disaster……………
The Post-Cold War Era and US Hegemony……………….
The US Military Empire – 800 Bases Worldwide………………
The Dangers of Australia Aligning with the US Military
Loss of Australian Sovereignty
• The increasing military integration between Australia and the US, including bases and joint operations.
• The AUKUS agreement and its implications for Australian independence.
Increased Risk of Conflict
• Australia’s involvement in US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite no direct national security threat.
• Potential entanglements in US-China tensions and future conflicts in the Indo-Pacific.
Economic and Social Costs
• Military spending redirected toward US-led initiatives rather than domestic priorities.
• The risk of Australia becoming a target in global conflicts due to its close military ties with the US.
Conclusion
…………………………………………….. For Australia, continued alignment with US military strategies poses significant risks. By participating in US-led wars, maintaining military bases, and deepening its commitment to the AUKUS agreement, Australia risks being drawn into unnecessary conflicts that do not serve its national interests. Moreover, prioritising militarism over diplomacy diminishes Australia’s ability to foster independent international relationships, negotiate trade agreements on its own terms, and establish a sovereign defence strategy that prioritises regional stability over foreign interventions.
To protect its sovereignty and long-term security, Australia must adopt a foreign policy that prioritises diplomacy, peace-building, and multilateral cooperation rather than blindly following US military agendas. A truly independent approach would involve reassessing military alliances, reducing foreign troop presence, and focusing on strengthening regional partnerships, particularly within the Indo-Pacific, to ensure a more balanced and peaceful international order. Australia has the resources, economic power, and global standing to lead by example – choosing peace over war, cooperation over subservience, and true independence over external influence………………. more https://theaimn.net/why-the-usas-endless-wars-harm-global-stability-australia/
Nuclear advocates: Splitting atoms and spinning agendas
Ed COMMENT. I can’t help noticing how the Liberal ad Labor agendas overlap here – in this carefully controlled pro-nuclear event -described by Sybilla George.
Labor is pushing on with the AUKUS nuclear submarine folly. Liberal is pretending that jt really intends to start nuclear power in Australia.
Both in the grip of USA militarism and the nuclear lobby
Despite having three women on stage – including Stanke – for the panel event, the Celebrity Room at Moonee Valley Racing Club was dominated by men on Saturday night. Opening the evening, Shackel said his charity aimed to “enable civil debate”, yet panels on the tour featured only pro-nuclear views.
By Sybilla George | 6 February 2025, https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/nuclear-advocates-splitting-atoms-and-spinning-agendas,19407
Former Miss America and nuclear energy activist Grace Stanke‘s Melbourne visit saw a pro-nuclear panel push persuasion over debate, with filtered questions and few dissenting voices, writes Sybilla George.
FOLLOWING EVENTS in Perth and Brisbane, Nuclear for Australia’s ‘An Evening with Miss America 2023 Grace Stanke’ took place last Saturday at the Moonee Valley Racing Club.
Nuclear for Australia is a nuclear power advocacy charity started in 2023 by teenager Will Shackel and patronised by electronics entrepreneur Dick Smith. The Miss America 2023 Australia Tour is also supported by Smith, according to the Nuclear for Australia website which has served as a platform for Smith’s response to The Guardian’s fact-checking of his anti-renewables arguments.
Nuclear for Australia is a nuclear power advocacy charity started in 2023 by teenager Will Shackel and patronised by electronics entrepreneur Dick Smith. The Miss America 2023 Australia Tour is also supported by Smith, according to the Nuclear for Australia website which has served as a platform for Smith’s response to The Guardian’s fact-checking of his anti-renewables arguments.
The tour aims to ‘help bridge the current divide between men and women for nuclear energy’ and cites the Australian Conservation Foundation statistic that 51% of men versus 21% of women support nuclear energy.
Despite having three women on stage – including Stanke – for the panel event, the Celebrity Room at Moonee Valley Racing Club was dominated by men on Saturday night. Opening the evening, Shackel said his charity aimed to “enable civil debate”, yet panels on the tour featured only pro-nuclear views. Questions put to the panel were selected from those sent in before and during the event, omitting the opportunity for live questions.
Stanke, who has an undergraduate degree in nuclear engineering, advocates for clean energy, including wind, solar and nuclear power. She began working for the United States’ largest nuclear energy provider, Constellation Energy, in 2024. Of Constellation’s energy capacity, 60% derives from nuclear power, while 25% comes from oil and natural gas fossil fuels.
The panel portion of the event featured Stanke alongside fellow American Mark Schneider, former operator of U.S. civil and defence nuclear reactors and current chief nuclear officer for UBH Group — an Australian defence consultancy firm angling for a ‘piece of the AU$368 billion nuclear sub [AUKUS] pie’.
They were joined by energy and resources lawyer Kirsty Braybon and Global Nuclear Security Partners’ (GNSP) Australia branch managing partner Jasmin “Jaz” Diab.
Army officer and nuclear engineer Jaz Diab is a star of the pro-nuclear media circuit. She’s made several appearances on Sky News and spoke at The University of New South Wales (UNSW) Navigating Nuclear conference in May 2024 alongside Coalition Shadow Energy Minister Ted O’Brien, before the Coalition’s nuclear energy plan announcement in July 2024.
Diab joined the business group AUKUS Forum, suggesting GNSP will be making a play for the AUKUS pie and nuclear energy contracts should the Coalition get into government at the next federal election.
As reported by the Australian Financial Review in December 2024, the Australian Department of Defence spent AU$811 million on just the big five consultancy firms in 2022-23.
Braybon, who teaches a subject on nuclear law at the University of Adelaide, responded to a question about the current illegality of nuclear power in Australia under the 1998 Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Act.
Some legal barriers to nuclear energy have already been watered down to accommodate AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines, Braybon said, and “no one noticed”, pointing to the entwined framework of defence and civil nuclear programs.
The defence backgrounds of panel members Diab and Schneider also attest to this. Braybon did not specify which law changes she was referring to, however, the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Act 2024, which was pushed through the Senate in October 2024 – designating waste “zones” in Adelaide and Perth for AUKUS-related nuclear waste – was reported on by Independent Australia, Michael West Media, The Advertiser and The Guardian.
While anti-nuclear protesters attended the Perth and Brisbane events – including a community action projecting ‘Nuclear energy distracts from the climate emergency’ outside the Gabba – there were no visible objectors in Melbourne.
However, Latrobe Valley Sustainability Group (LVSG) members attended the Moonee Valley Racing Club ahead of the Morwell event the next evening. The Coalition selected Loy Yang – a coal-fired power station in the Latrobe Valley – as one of seven sites around Australia for proposed nuclear power plants.
LVSG is concerned about the questions that Nuclear for Australia will not answer regarding the impact of nuclear power in fighting climate change and the economic cost of constructing and maintaining nuclear power plants. It points out that renewables have surpassed nuclear energy production in the U.S. in just 15 years and that there is a lack of private investment in nuclear power because of its unprofitability.
Indeed, a popular argument in favour of nuclear power appealing to the increasing energy demands of artificial intelligence data centres took a blow in recent days with the announcement that the Chinese AI program DeepSeek performs a similar function to the U.S. program ChatGPT, at a fraction of the cost and energy.
According to LVSG member Dan Caffrey, the Nuclear for Australia Morwell event attracted 240 attendees, but panel members “expressed a complete ignorance” of issues in the local area that reduce the viability of nuclear power, such as water availability and rehabilitation of the existing coal-fired station. The avoidance of challenging questions about nuclear power was “very disheartening”.
Sybilla George is a freelance writer with an interest in nuclear policy and the Pacific region.
Dutton’s nuclear policy is a Coalition scam
By Steve Bishop | 10 February 2025, https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/duttons-nuclear-policy-is-a-coalition-scam,19427
Overwhelming evidence is proving the Coalition’s nuclear plan to be a scam, writes Steve Bishop.
OPPOSITION LEADER Peter Dutton is scamming Australians with a nuclear power promise he knows he cannot deliver.
LNP research would have revealed the impossibility of providing nuclear power by the Coalition’s target of the mid-2030s.
This means a Dutton government would continue the years of Coalition ineptitude in tackling climate change and failing to provide a workable energy policy.
Coalition Senator Matt Canavan has revealed it’s nothing more than a “fix”.
Canavan said:
“Nuclear is not going to cut it. But we’re latching on to it… because it fixes a political issue for us… But it ain’t the cheapest form of power.”
In other words, it’s a con. Or to use a good Aussie word: a rort.
It’s why an internet search has found no trace of an authoritative nuclear body or expert endorsing the Coalition’s nuclear timeframe.
It’s simply a version of the old-time medicine show that peddled worthless cures to the gullible. The evidence demonstrates that the flimflammery of Mr Dutton’s Miracle Nuclear Elixir cannot work.
Mr Dutton promised:
‘A Federal Coalition Government will initially develop two establishment projects using either small modular reactors or modern larger plants such as the AP1000 or APR1400. They will start producing electricity by 2035 (with small modular reactors) or 2037 (if modern larger plants are found to be the best option).’
The CSIRO found in its GenCost 2023‐24 report that the earliest deployment for large-scale nuclear rectors would not occur until after 2040.
In the U.S., which has a nuclear power industry, AP1000 units at Vogtle, Georgia took 15 years to build, more than twice the projected timeline.
In Finland, the 1600mw Olkiluoto 3 was completed in 2023 — 18 years after construction started.
Even in China, with fewer hurdles to jump and a massive nuclear industry, it took 14 years for the Sanmen1 nuclear power station to be completed with plans for two units approved in 2004 and the first 1200mw reactor starting commercial operation on September 2018.
So it would be impossible to switch on a large plant in Australia before 2040. Is it feasible for the Coalition to build small modular reactors (SMRs) by 2035 as projected?
The ANU Institute for Climate, Energy and Disaster Solutions suggests it would be more like 15 years before the first reactor could start producing.
It says:
In Western countries… recent construction times have far exceeded a decade.
Before any nuclear power plant can be built here, we would first need to establish a regulatory system. That could take up to five years.
The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) has found:
‘SMRs would not be operating before the 2040s in Australia, too late to replace coal.’
It also revealed construction delays of 12 to 13 years had occurred in four of the few completed SMRs in Argentina, China and Russia.
Similarly, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE) has found
‘…a mature market for the technology may emerge in the late 2040s.’
Professor Hugh Durrant-Whyte, a nuclear engineer, told a NSW inquiry in 2020 that it would be naïve to think a power plant could be built in less than two decades.
The UK, which already has nuclear power stations, claims it is running the world’s fastest process to deliver an operational SMR by the mid-2030s. But it started this process in 2021 with a target date of the early 2030s and that has already blown out to the mid-2030s — some 16 years on from 2021.
This process aims to invest in demonstration SMRs in 2029. But a research paper filed on Social Science Research Network (SSRN) has found that if it then takes only two years to deploy resources ready for construction, only three years to build the plant and a further two years to demonstrate successful operation, any follow-on capacity would only come online well after 2040.
Even if a Coalition government was able to emulate this “fastest” process it would be after 2040 before an SMR is built. But a graph on page 7 of the plan released by Mr Dutton shows about 1,750mw of nuclear power being produced by 2036.
That would require six reactors having gone through the planning process, built, tested and commissioned — an impossibility based on the expert evidence.
In June, Mr Dutton said:
“I’m very happy for the Election to be a referendum on energy, on nuclear, on power prices…”
The overwhelming evidence means the Coalition scam should be rejected at the ballot box.
Trident nuclear submarine project rated “unachievable” third year running
A new submarine programme, known as Aukus, to eventually replace the Astute-class boats, is under development with the US and Australia. Its budget for 2023-24 was £495m, but its total cost and delivery date have been kept secret to protect “national security” and “international relations”.
Aukus was rated as amber for 2023-24 and 2022-23. The IPA suggested that the MoD might be over-stretching itself on the project.
The IPA’s latest report for 2023-24 was published in January 2025, six months late. It assessed the feasibility of 227 major government projects, including 44 run by the MoD with a total cost of £298bn.
Rob Edwards, The Ferret 10th Feb 2025
A £4bn project to help replace nuclear-armed Trident submarines on the Clyde has been branded as “unachievable” for the third year running by a UK government watchdog.
The Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) has again given the manufacture of new reactors to power replacement submarines its lowest rating of “red” for 2023-24. There are “major issues” that do not seem to be “manageable or resolvable”, it said.
The IPA has badged eight other major UK nuclear weapons projects, with a combined overall cost of over £55bn, as “amber”. This means they are facing “significant issues” which require “management attention”.
These include building new facilities at the Faslane nuclear base, near Helensburgh, and dismantling nuclear submarines at Rosyth in Fife. The construction of the entire future nuclear-powered fleets of submarines – Astute, Dreadnought and Aukus – was also rated amber.
Campaigners attacked the UK nuclear weapons programme as “an unaffordable shambles” and a “disastrous money pit”. They have demanded its cancellation, and asked for the money saved to be spent on public services.
The Scottish National Party (SNP) accused the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of being “totally unable” to deliver a cost-effective replacement for Trident on time. The Scottish Greens said that public money shouldn’t be wasted on “deadly Cold War hangovers.”…………………………………..
The IPA’s latest report for 2023-24 was published in January 2025, six months late. It assessed the feasibility of 227 major government projects, including 44 run by the MoD with a total cost of £298bn.
Nine of the MoD projects were related to nuclear weapons and submarine programmes, with a total cost of at least £59bn. The one that was given a red rating was to construct reactors to be installed in four Trident-armed Dreadnought submarines to replace ageing Vanguard submarines at Faslane in the 2030s.
The project was also rated as red in 2022-23 and 2021-22, as The Ferret reported. According to the IPA, that means that “successful delivery of the project appears to be unachievable” and it may need its “overall viability reassessed”.
It said: “There are major issues with project definition, schedule, budget, quality and/or benefits delivery, which at this stage do not appear to be manageable or resolvable.”
The Dreadnought reactors, which are being built by Rolls-Royce in Derby, faced “ongoing challenges associated with achieving the required delivery date” in 2028, the IPA added. This was an “important milestone” for the UK’s policy of keeping at least one nuclear-armed submarine on patrol all the time, known as “continuous at sea deterrent”.
Among the eight other nuclear projects rated as amber, was a £1.9bn scheme to build new facilities at Faslane and nearby Coulport, on the Clyde, to support new submarines. Its rating was kept secret in 2022-23 and it was red in 2021-22.
Amber is defined by the IPA as: “successful delivery appears feasible but significant issues already exist, requiring management attention”. The issues “appear resolvable at this stage” and should not cause delay or increased costs “if addressed promptly”.
The Clyde infrastructure project was entering its “most complex phase” over the next four years, the IPA said. It highlighted “two main issues affecting delivery confidence”.
One was rebuilding existing facilities while they continue to be used for submarine operations. The other was attracting and retaining suitably skilled staff “to a remote site in a very tight labour market in western Scotland.”
Costs of some nuclear projects kept secret
A £362m project to begin dismantling defunct nuclear submarines at the Rosyth naval base on the Firth of Forth, was also rated as amber for 2023-24, as it was for 2022-23 and 2021-22. “This is a novel and complex project and learning by doing encounters difficulty and challenge that cannot necessarily be planned for,” commented the IPA.
A £37bn project to build the four Dreadnought submarines, other than the reactors, has been rated as amber for the last six years. An £11bn project to finish building seven nuclear-powered but conventionally-armed Astute submarines has been amber for the last three years.
A new submarine programme, known as Aukus, to eventually replace the Astute-class boats, is under development with the US and Australia. Its budget for 2023-24 was £495m, but its total cost and delivery date have been kept secret to protect “national security” and “international relations”.
Aukus was rated as amber for 2023-24 and 2022-23. The IPA suggested that the MoD might be over-stretching itself on the project.
There was “a degree of risk relating to the ability of the defence nuclear enterprise and the wider UK supply chain to resource the programme with the necessary skills, experience and infrastructure to deliver against a demanding schedule, without adversely impacting the delivery of the Dreadnought programme,” it said.
A new programme repackaging previous projects for making and storing nuclear materials at Aldermaston in Berkshire has been rated as amber for the last two years. Its total cost and delivery date have been kept under wraps.
The rating, costs and comments on another project to test nuclear weapons in France and England, known as Teutates, have also been kept secret for national security and international relations reasons.
The SNP highlighted the MoD’s record of radioactive leaks and rising costs on the Clyde. “It is disappointing but not surprising that the MoD seems to be totally unable to manufacture a replacement for Trident in a timely or cost-effective manner,” said SNP MSP Keith Brown.
“The UK’s nuclear weapons aren’t safe for workers and wildlife, they don’t work when tested, and their manufacture is not efficient. Nor are they delivering a good deal for taxpayers.”
The Scottish Greens described nuclear weapons as a “moral abomination” that should be opposed. “The fact that they have also proven to be a disastrous money pit only underlines the urgent need to remove them for good,” said Green MSP Maggie Chapman.
“We could do so much good with this money, investing in services that make our lives safer and better, rather than wasting it on these deadly Cold War hangovers.”
The Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (SCND) blasted the UK’s nuclear weapons as “a colonial hangover, an unaffordable shambles, a danger to us and the world”.
SCND chair, Lynn Jamieson, said: “The combined cost of keeping the nuclear weapon system going and of building a replacement escalates while public services are drastically cut.”
The Nuclear Information Service, which researches and criticises nuclear weapons, argued that the UK nuclear programme was unsustainable. “The case for cancelling badly run and unaffordable weapons projects is compelling,” said research manager, Tim Street……………………
https://theferret.scot/trident-nuclear-unachievable-third-year/
Australia’s technocratic drive to nuclear ignorance
The worshipped role of the expert has excised public debate from nuclear policy. The expert’s validation exonerates the government from the onus of explanation, excluding constituents from relevant information and thus precluding commentary. Nuclear science, a field shrouded in esotericism, marks the summit of techno-scientific rationality, in which utter destruction is intellectually atomised out of politics to the realm of the expert/executive.
ARENA, Sybilla George, 11 Dec 2024
Australia is ‘going nuclear’. The addition of nuclear-powered submarines to Australia’s defence arsenal through the $368 billion AUKUS deal passes a threshold of nuclear legitimisation that Oceania’s anti-nuclear activists have been battling for decades. Nuclearisation used to be an eco-ethical debate, as with the anti- vs pro-uranium mining battles since the 70s that have seen wins and losses on both sides. The rapid increase of Australia’s nuclear involvement, however, signals the reframing of national nuclear rhetoric as techno-scientific rationality that precludes dialogue and authorises executive ruling.
While the AUKUS deal plays out in the limelight, at RAAF Tindal in the Northern Territory the building of facilities to host six United States B-52H Stratofortress bombers on rotational deployment, alongside ‘up to 75’ US Armed Force permanent staff, is underway. The facility renovations are funded through the Force Postures Initiative, the most recent phase of the Force Postures Agreement which since 2014 has defined the United States’s military agenda in Australia, with the consent of successive Australian governments. The Enhanced Air Cooperation branch of the US Alliance was recently ratified when Australian Defence provided ‘air-to-air refuelling’ to B-2 Spirit bombers involved in the US’s October strike on Houthi targets in Yemen.
More than half of the United States’s stock of 76 active B-52 bombers is capable of carrying and deploying nuclear weapons; the remainder is conventionally armed. These jets have been flying over Australian airspace for half a century; however, stationing them at RAAF Tindal signals a significant escalation in nuclear involvement, as it will produce for the first time the conditions ‘to support potential nuclear combat missions from Australian soil’, according to a Nautilus Institute Special Report published in August.
This would be illegal under the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), an agreement on which Australia under Labor has abstained since 2022 when it rescinded the Coalition government’s ‘No’ vote. Signing and ratifying the treaty features as a goal in Labor’s 2023 National Platform. Yet progress seems unlikely, given Australia’s third abstention on the TPNW on 1 November 2024 and the persistent silence from the government on the United States’s policy to ‘neither confirm nor deny’ the presence of nuclear arms aboard aircraft or ships. Under this policy, Australia will not be informed whether B-52 bombers on deployment at RAAF Tindal are carrying nuclear weapons.
The public interest in the disclosure of the presence of nuclear weapons includes matters of security, ethics and democratic transparency. Of great concern is the Albanese government’s passive concession to a foreign state’s policy that conflicts with its own commitment to ‘full knowledge and concurrence’ of foreign activities conducted in Australia. Restricted speech has been increasingly utilised as a tactic to expedite pro-nuclear policy in the rush towards technological rationality.
Another example is Albanese’s Nuclear Power Safety Bill, which was rammed through the Senate without debate in October 2024. It stipulates two dumping ‘zones’ for highly irradiated ‘spent nuclear fuel’, to be located within dozens of kilometres of Perth and Adelaide—Western and South Australia being selected once again to play host to nuclear, as during the United Kingdom’s nuclear testing campaign. Indeed, Defence recently withdrew its environmental approval application for developments to prepare HMAS Stirling to host nuclear-powered submarines, and The Australian has reported that the government will resubmit the application with an additional request for the rights to store irradiated waste materials at the facility, which would thus be ‘subject to a single round of community feedback’.
Deferral to the United States’s ‘neither confirm nor deny’ nuclear weapons policy is an appeal to ignorance, and thus innocence, which in turn forecloses systems of accountability, since governments’ denial of information renders their constituents ignorant. The current government’s silence on the presence of nuclear weapons on US aircraft stationed at RAAF Tindal eerily resembles Robert Menzies’ ‘extreme’ commitment to the United Kingdom’s ‘need to know’ policy during the nuclear testing campaign from 1952 to 1963. As prime minister, Menzies exclusively assented without consulting Cabinet or scientific advisers to the use of the Montebello Islands as the site of Operation Hurricane, the nuclear bomb detonation that cemented the United Kingdom as the world’s third nuclear power. The program was not announced until 1952, prior to which Menzies deliberately misled the media about plans for nuclear testing on Australian soil, claiming he had ‘heard nothing’ about it.
The worshipped role of the expert has excised public debate from nuclear policy. The expert’s validation exonerates the government from the onus of explanation, excluding constituents from relevant information and thus precluding commentary. Nuclear science, a field shrouded in esotericism, marks the summit of techno-scientific rationality, in which utter destruction is intellectually atomised out of politics to the realm of the expert/executive.
. The UK nuclear testing campaign caused massive human and ecological suffering to Aboriginal communities in Western and South Australia. It was not until the publication of the 1985 Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia, more than two decades after the final tests, that the extent of Australian government collusion was revealed, typified by Menzies’ ‘complete’ acceptance that Australia be entirely excluded from technical information about the tests. This submission to an allied foreign state enacts the technocratic power of nuclear, which pitches influence disproportionally towards those with technical knowledge and renders those without it mute and nakedly vulnerable to, in the case of nuclear arms, annihilation………………………………
The Albanese government’s silence on the presence of nuclear weapons aboard B-52s at RAAF Tindal regurgitates the United States’s policy so as to allow it to skirt its democratic responsibility to inform the public of potential nuclear escalation. Extensive control of messaging and media across the decade-long nuclear testing campaign by Menzies on behalf of the United Kingdom, particularly regarding its true health risks, denied Australians the opportunity to establish informed opinions on the tests. The drive to ignorance common to both Menzies’s and Albanese’s nuclear policy strategies has been achieved via the interiorisation of allied foreign states’ intelligence protocols. This techno-scientific rationale dangerously licences executives to accelerate nuclear proliferation beyond the forum of public debate to which it belongs, and into reality. https://arena.org.au/australias-technocratic-drive-to-nuclear-ignorance/
American or Trump’s values, or are they the same?
Crispin Hull, 11 Feb 25 https://www.crispinhull.com.au/2025/02/10/american-or-tumps-values-or-are-they-the-same/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=crispin-hull-column
Australia can now either grimace and bear it for four years pretending nothing has happened; or face reality and question whether AUKUS and the US alliance more generally are worth it.
ANZUS and AUKUS were, from the start, purportedly based on “shared values”. Less than a month into the Donald Trump presidency can we put our hands on our hearts and say, “We share values with the US, and we will spill blood and treasure for those values”?
The acid question now is: to what extent are Trump’s values American values?
Can they be separated as if there is a separate pocket of American values – the rule of law; the separation of powers; freedom of the press; international order; liberal democracy and its spread throughout the world; and the helping hand to people and countries less fortunate?
It is difficult to see how.
The assertion by Trump of his “values” has attracted dozens of lawsuits in less than a month. He acts unlawfully; he bullies; he acts with cruel indifference to human suffering; he acts capriciously and vindictively and without diplomacy.
Trump is reversing 400 years of progress in governance: the rule of law; and the principle that those who are governed owe their loyalty to the law and not to the ruler and that those who govern do so with the consent of the governed and owe their loyalty to the law and the people not to themselves.
The time has come for the allies of the US to ask: what are the passing Trump values that we do not share that will disappear and what values, under Trump, have transmogrified into American values. After all, that is what Trump asserts: that his values are American values.
And, let’s face, a majority of voters voted for Trump.
If Trump values are now American values and American values Trump values, does Australia want to be a part of it? Is Australia safe relying on a new transactional America that sees everything through the selfish prism of only what is good for America, or more narrowly what is good for Trump.
Surely it is dangerous to presume that there are some underlying intrinsically good Amercian values that transcend Trump and will re-emerge when he is gone – when the chances are that this Trump administration will have trashed America’s constitutional framework and electoral processes so badly that the next election, if there is one, will be Trump’s for the taking, with the constitutional prohibition against third terms ignored. Or it will be a shoe-in for his anointed successor – probably JD Vance.
Surely, a better, safer, and more morally sustainable position would be for Australia to suspend the alliance until we can truly say that we have “shared values”.
How do we know that contributing militarily to any US international action is nothing more than Australian blood and treasure being expended to enhance Trump’s personal real-estate empire? He wants to buy Greenland; make Canada the 51st state; and overrun Gaza.
The treatment of Canada is alarming. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that Trump’s desire to make Canada a 51st state “is a real thing”. Remember Trump referred to Trudeau as “Governor Trudeau”.
He threatened Canada with crippling tariffs They have been suspended, but you cannot undo the threat. The relationship dynamic is forever changed because threats (economic, violent, or psychological) destroy trust.
If he can treat Canada, the US’s closest neighbour geographically, linguistically, and historically in that way, surely Australia is no more than a bit piece in the American game of global dominance and economic exploitation.
Australia should now also look at its alliance with the US against the background of history. Against that it is alarming: Trump is not a passing aberration but part of a continuum of some deep-seated ugly American traits.
It starts with the Declaration of Independence when “all men are created equal” excluded women and slaves. Then the Constitution was framed with a deep suspicion of the mass of people and set up an Electoral College to elect the President, rather than by the people directly.
Violence, racism and guns have dominated US history, beginning with the dispossession and genocidal cruelty against the indigenous population. Shortly after fighting a civil war over slavery, the south reverted to segregationist racism that lasted into the 1960s.
In the 19th century, the US was a vicious colonial occupier of the Philippines, In the 20th century, rampant capitalism tipped the US into the Great Recession. Selfish America refused to join the fight against racist Nazism and Japanese fascism until it was itself directly attacked.
Yes, Australia benefited from the US joining the fight against Japan, but the US did not do it to help Australia; that was a side-effect. It just used Australia as a base for its efforts to counter Japan’s threat to the US.
What if our naïve belief in US goodness and exceptionalism is misguidedly founded upon those four or five years of US munificence immediately after World War II despite a 250-year violent history of a male, white, Christian assertion of supremacy?
In those brief years after World War II, the US led the foundation of the United Nations; set up the international rules-based order leading to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
The US led the way promoting peace, law, harmony, and immense generosity in adopting the Marshall Plan to reconstruct Europe and a benign, forgiving occupation of Japan.
The US has benefitted and traded off that immediate sunlit post-war image for way longer than its used-by date. And US allies have fallen for it.
Later decades gave us the Korean war; the Vietnam War; Iraq; and Afghanistan. It gave us the Bay of Pigs and numerous other ill-founded, unwarranted interferences in small nations to promote US economic interests under the guise of promoting democracy over communism. The incessant US blood-spilling belligerence went on and on, and Australia was sucked into it at great cost to our blood and treasure.
Do we really now want to contribute to a genocidal expulsion of two million Palestinians so Trump’s America can erect a hotel-strewn shoreline in Gaza for Israel and exploit the rights to newly found oil and gas offshore?
Under Trump, the AUKUS deal takes on a different complexion. Australia, under then Prime Minister Scott Morrison, was stupid enough to sign up to an asymmetrical deal where we pay (and have in fact mostly paid) $A4 billion to US shipyards to help them hasten the construction of Virginia-class nuclear submarines of which we are supposed to get three. But this would be contingent on the President of the day certifying that US would not need the submarine.
Does anyone imagine that transactional Trump would allow any submarines to go to Australia without some further payment or supplication?
The US does not protect Australia, it uses us – and puts us in harm’s way in doing so.
Perhaps we should just be honest and say we do not care about shared values or morality we just want protection and we are willing to pay for it – like some nervous shop owner being stood over by a gangster.
But I think Australia is better than that and that, in the face of the Trumpian wrecking ball, we should suspend AUKUS and the US alliance, or at least have an inquiry into them. Disruptive surprises need not be the sole purview of the attention-seeking and attention-demanding man in the Oval Office.
1 This month
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