Your views: on SA nuclear power and more
Today, readers comment on a nuclear debate, university merger and ramping.
Commenting on the opinion piece: Premier squibs the nuclear debate we need to have
The nuclear industry doesn’t need the Labor party or anybody else to shut down debate on nuclear energy generation.
The industry’s own inability to determine any means whatsoever to deal with the decommissioning of existing nuclear facilities and waste materials, despite nearly 70 years and trillions invested in research, is more than enough to end the discussion.
The only serious attempt at a permanent solution, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (an enormous hole in the ground in New Mexico) has failed spectacularly.
Every existing seasoned nuclear power facility in the world is a Fukushima in waiting, full to the gunnels with spent radioactive waste that needs to be kept cool for decades, and no viable solution in sight. The best information available today from the nuclear industry itself is that decommissioning a nuclear reactor at end of life is likely to take more than a century.
Where are those costs factored into the price of nuclear energy? Anyone promoting nuclear energy where there is a viable alternative is, frankly, bonkers. – John Matheson
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When considering implementing a nuclear power industry, it’s worth considering all the impediments outside the obvious political ones.
1. Australia doesn’t have experience or sufficient skilled workers to run a nuclear industry. If nuclear does become popular across the world, the skilled workers in the industry will be in short supply and expensive if not impossible to recruit and train up.
2. The latest version of the CSIRO’s important GenCost report ranks nuclear as the most expensive of existing technologies, and at least double or up to five times the cost of wind and solar, including storage and transmission costs.
3. There are dangers associated with nuclear that don’t apply to renewables.
4. Renewables, apart from being cheaper and getting increasingly so than nuclear, are much quicker operationally to implement. The lag in implementing nuclear power is no solution to the global warming crisis we face.
5. Ironically the UK has announced a new coal mine very near the Sellafield nuclear power plant, site of one of the worlds largest nuclear accidents. It’s currently in the process of decommissioning, something that has been happening since 2009. The current estimate of the decommissioning costs are now estimated at £117 billion – an increase from £25 billion in 2009.
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None of this says nuclear should be completely dismissed, but it does say that nuclear is not a simple solution and a very high bar needs to be in place for its implementation if its supporters want to recycle the old arguments. If anything the technology is now more in favour of renewables than nuclear. – John Hewson
What a load of capitalist bullshit. The Premier is correct when he says the cost of building a reactor for the population is uneconomical for the population.
In countries where nuclear energy has been built there are many cities each with a population greater than the whole of Australia. For them it may be viable. Here in Australia, with the abundance of renewable energy, renewable are the best option to pursue. I believe capitalists hate anything from which no money can be made, and sunshine or wind cannot be taxed. – Mark Eckermann
Look at thorium fission as a an option – short half life of waste and does not melt down. (It needs stimulation to keep nuclear process going.) And Australia owns a lot of the world’s thorium. – Ray Taylor
Commenting on the story: SA universities reach ‘historic’ agreement to merge
I suggest a degree of healthy scepticism be brought to bear upon the possible merger of Adelaide University and University of SA. It is a truth (almost) universally acknowledged that at least in the commercial world, mergers more often than not fail to meet their objectives. Even in the public sector, mergers to create “super departments” or similar are rightly viewed with suspicion.
Secondly, a bigger university isn’t necessarily a better one. Adelaide University currently has approximately 24,000 students, Oxford University has slightly over 26,000.
Thirdly, we are yet to see the business case for the merger. Real (and not fanciful) benefits will need to be identified and (credibly) quantified. Experience tells us that senior management will be able to extract pay rises from a merger, but if there are to be no “net job losses”, then it is hard to see countervailing cost savings.
Fourthly, the timeframe for any merger appears to be measured in years. This, in itself, is a cost. It seems nothing in this State is achieved quickly. In the meantime, Flinders University’s decision to “wait and see” seems prudent. – Stephen Trenowden
Commenting on the story: COVID cases, ambulance ramping continue to increase in SA
It has been nine months since Peter Malinauskas won government largely on a promise to spend $1.15 billion on 350 extra ambulance officers and paramedics, 300 nurses and 100 doctors, five new ambulance stations and 36 extra ambulances.
How long does it take to buy an ambulance or employ new staff? In the face of increased Covid cases and increased ramping, he gives us platitudes about people doing the right thing (how would he know?) and what a lovely summer it is going to be. These are the words of a leader in populism, not a leader in necessary action. – Paul McKinnon
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