Nuclear Energy: No solution to climate change
The public debate about climate change has made a historic shift - we're now talking about solutions, and adaptation, instead of debating the science. There is growing understanding - from all sides of politics and the community - that climate change is one of the greatest threats our nation has ever faced. The recent report by the Allen Consulting Group for the Australian Government entitled "Climate Change: Risk and Vulnerability" confirms these threats.
Greenhouse pollution from Australia's transport and energy sectors is spiralling out of control. By 2020, energy sector greenhouse pollution is expected to be 60% above 1990 levels. We urgently need to change the way we generate and consume energy but nuclear power is not the answer. The real climate-friendly answer to Australia's energy questions is renewable energy - like biofuels, wind and solar power - together with better energy efficiency.
Why nuclear power is not a solution to climate change:
1. Renewable energy and energy efficiency can deliver the power we need without the risk.
2. Nuclear power is too costly, too slow to build and relies heavily on taxpayer subsidies.
3. Still no real solution to radioactive waste.
4. Nuclear power is too dangerous.
1. Renewable energy and energy efficiency can deliver the power we need
Renewable energy (mostly hydro) already supplies 19% of world electricity, compared to nuclear's 16%. Renewable energy could meet most of the world's energy demand by 2100 according to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Nuclear power capacity in Europe is already falling, and is expected to drop 25% over the next 15 years. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) predicts that nuclear will only contribute to 12% of world electricity by 2030, despite the projected growth in China and India. This growth is dwarfed by renewable energy projections. In China, for example, new renewables (excluding large hydro) are expected to supply 10% of electricity by 2020, compared with only 4-6% from nuclear.
Wind power and solar power are growing by 20-30% each year, compared to minimal growth in nuclear. In 2004, renewable energy generation added nearly more than three times as much net generating capacity as nuclear power. By 2010, renewable energy is expected to add more than 100 times the capacity per year as official forecasts for nuclear power suggest, even using the lower estimates for renewables growth.
Australia currently gets 8% of its electricity from renewable energy, down from 10% in 1999. Due to a lack of government support for renewable energy in the form of a higher mandatory renewable energy target, investment in the industry is likely to stall by the end of the decade. By contrast, the UK plans to increase its renewable proportion of electricity by 100% by 2020, Germany and Denmark by 300%.
Australia can also 'go renewable' and reap the benefits of more jobs, clean air, and reduced emissions. If we started now, by 2020 we could generate at least 20% of our electricity from renewables. We could put in place energy saving measures equivalent to five nuclear power stations which would pay for themselves before a nuclear reactor left the drawing board.
2. Nuclear power is too costly and too slow and relies heavily on taxpayer subsidies
Nuclear power has received more than fifty years of extremely generous subsidies, and is still unable to stand alone. Nuclear power in the US has received US$115 billion in direct subsidies, compared to less than $10 billion for wind and solar combined. The pattern is repeated in Europe. According to The Economist: "More than half of the subsidies (in real terms) ever lavished on energy by OECD governments have gone to the nuclear industry."
Despite this intensive taxpayer funded development, there is not a single nuclear reactor built without Governments covering the risks. Providing nuclear power involves enormous costs, most of which are never internalised. For example:
* construction, including added costs associated with terrorism threats,
* insuring reactors against liabilities associated with accidents and attack,
* decommissioning old reactors,
* storing and managing radioactive waste over tens of thousands of years, and
* dealing with any after-effects of accidents if these occur.
The history of nuclear power is also one of cost overruns. The UK Government has just increased their 2002 estimate of decommissioning costs by 25%, to GBP 56 billion. These factors render nuclear power unviable without massive ongoing public subsidies.
An AMP paper has concluded "nuclear power and the uranium industry are neither financially or environmentally sustainable...the argument of cost competitiveness is flawed as it does not consider an adequate return on capital." ("The Nuclear Fuel Cycle Position Paper" Sept 2003 AMP)
3. Still no real solution to radioactive waste
You can't have nuclear power without nuclear waste. 50 years after the nuclear experiment began no country has yet been able to establish a final repository for high level nuclear waste. Every State and Territory in Australia opposes transport, storage and disposal of nuclear wastes. There are currently over 250,000 tonnes of high level nuclear waste in unsafe stockpiles around the world today with no safe long-term disposal or storage in sight.
4. Nuclear power is too dangerous
More nuclear reactors mean more nuclear materials and more chance of nuclear weapons proliferation by nation states or other groups. The IAEA Director General Mohamed El Baradei recently highlighted the risks: "In five years, the world has changed. Our fears of a deadly nuclear detonation - whatever the cause - have been reawakened. In part, these fears are driven by new realities. The rise in terrorism. The discovery of clandestine nuclear programs. The emergence of a nuclear black market. But these realities have also heightened our awareness of vulnerabilities in the Non Proliferation Treaty regime." (Address to May 2005 NPT review conference)