Why now is not the time to oppose nuclear technology

With Fukushima No 1, 2 and now 3 plant on the verge of meltdown now might not seem to be a good time to be advocating nuclear power. Yet I am coming to the conclusion that environmentalists like Lovelock are right. If we don’t go nuclear, we are toast. When scientists have good data that says the planet’s temperatures are heading into unknown territory and we don’t seem to want to change our ways, then at the very least we should have a bloody good Plan B. Despite the longer-term potential of solar and wind power, nuclear power is the best proven Plan B we currently have. (picture NTV Japan)

As Japan is proving, nuclear fission is a flawed technology. Yet Chernobyl aside, it has killed only a handful of people since the 1950s despite providing now 15 percent of the world’s electricity and 6 percent of the world's energy. Ever since the CND and Greenham Common, nuclear power has been an emotional talisman for the green movement. Opposition to it is one of its fundamentals and an almost taboo subject of discussion. The Greens, who in Australia are the most steadfast voices for recognising the problem of climate change, refuse to acknowledge the single most advanced technology we have for solving it in the short term.

Unassailable reams of climate data tells us that severe consequences are coming in the next 50 years if we don't do anything about our emissions. Green technologies are not quite ready to step up to the plate to fix the problem. Protectionism of fossil fuel technologies hasn’t helped but the best evidence is that we are 50 years away from renewable sources providing base load electricity that supports our current lifestyle. Renewable power stations will also be just as expensive and will face the same NIMBY issues as nuclear ones do.

Rebellion against that lifestyle motivates many Greens. But most humans, a majority of Greens included, are not yet prepared to give away improvements in technologies such as cheap international travel, internet access, or private transport. Short of some sort of human catastrophe we can all agree is attributable to global warming, the history of climate change international negotiation shows that change will be painfully slow.

Nuclear power is a way of confronting this problem, now. As Crikey editorialised today, the expense of setting up nuclear power is the biggest issue the industry has (though nuclear waste is not far behind as illegal dumping of radioactive waste by mafia groups such as the 'Ndrangheta is a huge law enforcement issue). Nuclear power has nothing to do with morality. What is moral or ought to be, is consistency with uranium and waste policy.

Both problems of creating nuclear power and disposing of its after effects could be resolved with the proceeds of a carbon tax though as yet no one is advocating this. The Libs would be the obvious candidate to suggest this possibility, but their implacable opposition to the tax means no one dares suggest that publicly.

Labor is just as equivocal as the liberals and their party website studiously avoids policy discussion on the subject. Only party extremists on either end such as Martin Ferguson and Peter Garrett could claim to have a coherent policy on nuclear power. Those in the middle equivocate according to the arguments du jour.

Regardless of what The Australian newspaper thinks, the Greens have been a very positive force in politics with their positions on climate change. It’s never a popular position to stand up as a Cassandra and warn of the problem if we don’t change our ways. For this reason, the Greens will never be popular enough to form Government in their own right without significantly ditching many core parts of their agenda.

Their ideological purity allows them to carry most ideas through to logical conclusions without the need for compromise. It’s no surprise to find they are the most inherently coherent party on most aspects of the conversion to a green economy. Yet there is one blind spot to their argument.

The near religious hold “no nuclear power” has on the green movement and many in the Australian Labor Party means we are considerably weakening our options to deal with the problems when they will inevitably arise. The Opposition is no better. The Australian right only seriously considers nuclear power as a wedge to taunt Labor. Together the three major parties perpetuate the fiction Australian is not a nuclear power despite its uranium exports, Lucas Heights facility and the likelihood of nukes at Pine Gap and visiting American warships. The Australian Greens policy remains a monument to pious thinking and not a solution to real world problems.

The Greens have five principals that deal with nuclear power worth exploring in more detail.

1. "There is a strong link between the mining and export of uranium and nuclear weapons proliferation."
This is true enough but is a weak first principle. It seeks to show that people can’t be trusted with nuclear power which is a fault of the people and not of the tool. Mutually assured destruction is not much fun for anymore, but it remains an important tactic for smaller powers to threaten larger ones. Take away nuclear power and they will find other weapons to achieve the same result. As alcohol prohibitionists found out, banning something is not the way to stop it.

2. "The consequences of the use of nuclear weapons, or of catastrophic accidents at, or terrorist attacks on, nuclear power stations, are so great that the risks are unacceptably high."
Much of this is a repeat of the first principle. The rest is hyperbole despite the current crisis. Nuclear weapons haven’t been used in war since 1945 though many times as exercises (see Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto’s astonishing 14 minute timelapse of all 2053 nuclear explosion between 1945 and 1998). There have been a few catastrophic accidents. But no deaths or serious injuries have ever been attributed to radiation from a Western civil nuclear power plant. Three Mile Island is one of only two meltdowns in the US (Fermi 1 was the other) and neither suffered loss of life.

The IAEA’s International Nuclear Event Scale goes from 0 (no safety issues) to 7 (major accident). The 1986 failure of Reactor 4 at Prypiat, Ukraine, better known as the Chernobyl Disaster is the only INES 7 accident yet recorded with a possible 4,000 deaths recorded caused directly or indirectly by the incident. This was a tragedy of the first rank but it says more about Soviet industry standards than it does about nuclear power. Other power sources in Russia are just as vulnerable. In the 1999 disaster at the largest hydroelectric power station in the country Sayano-Shuskensky in southern Russia seven people died. If the 240m dam had collapsed, hundreds of thousands in the cities below the dam would also have been in jeopardy. Yet there is no talk of The Greens wanting to ban hydroelectrical power because of the possibility of accidents.

The third part of that second policy principal deals with terrorist actions, which remains a potential threat. But again, banning something simply because terrorists use it, is not a problem limited to nuclear power.

3. "Future generations must not be burdened with high level radioactive waste.” This is a noble gesture but it begs the question: what is the extent of the burden? Waste comes from both the front and back end of the nuclear process. The front end waste depleted uranium is used in highly destructive weapons that are morally repulsive but it also has practical applications such as in the keel of yachts. The back end waste, spent fuel rods, is the heavy hitting stuff. The amount of High Level Waste worldwide is increasing by 12,000 metric tons a year, which says nuclear power company Marathon Resourcing is the equivalent to about 100 double-decker buses 100 double-decker buses. As an industry body, it is no surprise to hear them say it is “modest compared with other industrial wastes.” But they might be right. London currently has the largest of double decker buses with about 1200 buses which if put together would amount to 12 years of high level nuclear waste. The burden seems small on this evidence.

4. "Nuclear power is not a safe, clean, timely, economic or practical solution to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions".
The fear factor of safety returns to the ideas in the first three principles. How safe is not addressing global emissions by use of nuclear power? The word “clean” is a platitude presented without any evidence. “Timely” is questionable but has some merit. A nuclear power plant would take 12-15 years to commission and build, a small period of time given the consequences of inaction. They are expensive to build but so will be any solution that envisages humans keep up their energy usage-intensive lifestyles. As for nuclear being not a “practical solution”, go ask any of the world’s 440 commercial nuclear power stations in 30 countries, even those ones that are built on geological faultlines.

5. "Australia's reliance on the US nuclear weapons 'umbrella' lends our bases, ports and infrastructure to the US nuclear war fighting apparatus."
This final argument has nothing to do with nuclear power. Australia’s ANZUS agreement lends our bases to US nuclear war fighting apparatus regardless of our policy on nuclear power. The agreement needs to be understood in what it purports to be protecting Australia from and not what it protecting Australia with. Fight the agreement if this is wrong and not a tool used to enforce it.

These five principals are not wrong individually. It’s just that they are weak arguments given the current deck of cards we’ve been dealt with. Longer term, renewable energy is easily the most sensible solution. But we’ve got to get to that longer term first. Until we overcome the variability of solar and wind power production, land area required, and the NIMBY fights to get there, nuclear power is far and away the best proven technology to achieve base and peak load in an emission-free way. Nuclear reactors will never kill as many people as a nature’s earthquakes or tsunami, they just need to be a bit better built on the Pacific Rim.

Greens launch their Safe Climate Bill

Senator Christine Milne has said Australia needs the Greens’ new safe climate bill because of the Federal Government’s “failure to address climate change in a way the science demands.” Senator Milne launched the bill this week saying it was an “environmentally effective and economically sound” response to the Rudd Government’s emission trading scheme. “Our goal is not just to reduce emissions but to pass on to our children and our children’s children the safe climate that has nurtured us and made human civilisation possible,” she said. (photo of Christine Milne by mooks262)

The key targets of the bill are to reduce emissions to at least 25 to 40 percent of 1990 levels by 2020 and to reduce carbon concentrations to 350ppm (parts per million) “as quickly as possible”. The Greens’ plan also abolishes the $10 price cap on permits and places a limit of 20 per cent of permits bought from overseas.

Other recommendations include a mechanism for tallying voluntary action and an industry compensation mechanism as proposed by the Garnaut Review which compensates trade-exposed industries for the difference between their competitiveness under the scheme and what they do now. Senator Milne says the critical question is how much any climate action will reduce carbon emissions. She said Labor’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) was “fundamentally flawed” and its goal of halving global emission by 2050 would not keep carbon concentrations in the atmosphere to below 450 ppm.

Labor’s current target is 5 per cent unilaterally which could rise to 25 per cent if there is agreement at December’s International Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. Ben Eltham from the Centre for Policy Development said Labor’s policy is based on outdated science that 450 ppm was a safe upper limit for carbon pollution. “CO2 concentrations are currently at 387 parts per million and climbing,” he said. Eltham said that was already above what most scientists consider to be safe. “We need to become carbon neutral as quickly as possible,” he said.

Crikey’s political commentator Bernard Keane said the Greens’ bill was “sensible and mean the Greens are currently the most economically-rational party on emissions trading.”

But Family First senator Steve Fielding said the Greens plan would “send Australia back to the Stone Age”. “If we do what the Greens propose, Australia would no longer exist because there’d be no industries left to drive our economy,” he said. Senator Fielding’s opposition means the Senate is unlikely to pass the Greens’ bill even with Government support.

Labor plans to put its own CPRS to a vote before the end of the year. Federal Minister for Climate Change Penny Wong told ABC Radio National Breakfast program she has had a number of meetings with Senator Milne and Senator Bob Brown to discuss the Greens’ proposals. “We think our targets are responsible and ambitious and we do not agree with the Greens' proposition that Australia should cut its emissions by 25 per cent unilaterally,” she said. But Senator Wong also admitted the Greens had done “a significant amount of work” and the Government would be prepared to negotiate further with them.

The Greens say their amendments are consistent with the recommendations of Professor Ross Garnaut’s review last year. Professor Garnaut told ABC’s 7.30 Report on Monday the horsetrading over the ETS was “one of the worst examples of policy making we have seen on major issues in Australia.” He recommended parliament pass the Labor legislation as a base for implementing “earlier rather than later.”

Election 2007: An interview with Green candidate Simon Kean-Hammerson

This is the second in a series of interviews with the declared candidates for the local seat of Lilley in the forthcoming 2007 Australian federal election. With the apparent demise of the Australian Democrats, the Greens have emerged as the third force in Australian politics. Polling roughly 5 to 10 percent in elections, they are unlikely to win any seats in the lower house, but will be hoping to add to their four Senate seats. Two of their senators, Bob Brown (Tasmania) and Kerry Nettles (NSW) are up for re-election this time round. In 2004, Greens candidate Sue Meehan took 5.6 percent of the lower house vote in Lilley. Their 2007 candidate is Simon Kean-Hammerson and Woolly Days met him earlier this week.

Simon Kean-Hammerson was born in Kenya and came to Australia in 1975. He has worked in a wide variety of occupations including stockman, street counsellor, small business owner and IT contractor. He began the interview by describing his background. “Dad was a farmer and the first man in Africa to take merino sheep back from Australia and New Zealand,” he said. “Africa makes you feel alive. Growing up in Kenya was an adventure every day, you saw lions and giraffes and I learned to speak Swahili and Luo.” His mother moved to country Victoria when Simon was nine. He grew up in Myrtleford and Mansfield and moved to Sydney where aged 17 he helped out in an AIDS halfway house and worked as a street counsellor for St Johns Ambulance. He also spent 9 months working with long-term prisoners in one of Sydney’s toughest jails where he said “his idealism was laughed at.” After an incident where he was threatened at knife-point by one of the state’s ten most wanted men, he decided he had enough and went back to the family farm.

Aged 22, Kean-Hammerson was diagnosed with dyslexia. He had to effectively re-learn to read and write. He freely admits that reading is still a difficulty but it has not stopped him from leading a full life. He said his wife was a great help as were the people he worked with. “In my professional life, I have a synergy with my staff, and I’ve always found people are happy to help me”. He moved to Queensland in 1988. He lived in Yeppoon where he “shovelled sheep manure under shearing sheds.” He moved to Brisbane in the early 1990s. “Brisbane was a lovely cosmopolitan town with great potential for business” he said. “You walked down a street and someone would smile at you. I didn’t see that down south”.

Woolly Days then asked him why he wanted to run for parliament. “I woke one day listening to the radio news about Bush, Howard, Blair and Rudd all talking about the same thing,” he said. “But there was either nothing being done about the environment or what they were doing wasn’t enough.” He said he had a rain tank, solar panels and used water wisely but wondered what else he could do. “I looked at the policies of all the parties,” he said. “What I found out was that the Greens had the same core values as I had on peace, social justice, ecological sustainability and drug policies.” He said the Greens were now a mainstream party. “I’m not a protester, I run a business,” he said. “I use my head, not my brawn. I care.”

Woolly Days asked Simon why the people of Lilley should vote for him. He began by saying he represented the Greens and not himself. “We’ve got the best environmental, health and social justice policies,” he said “If there is no environment, there is no economy. You’re starting to see that with the farmers”. He said he was in politics for the long term: “This is a six year plan for me.” Woolly Days then asked what themes were emerging from his discussions with the electorate. He said that some people had told him that “you politicians were all the same”. Beyond that, people were worried about housing, water, environment, health, education and the lack of public transport. He and pointed to the example of North Lakes where the problems of bored teenagers and youth violence were attributable to the lack of good public transport.

Kean-Hammerson saw the three biggest issues at this election were the environment, health and education. He said water was the biggest immediate challenge in the environment. This was not just a Queensland problem. He said Ballarat in Victoria has a crisis and will run out of water in the middle of Summer. Health was the second issue he rated and he said that doctor training needs to be improved. As for education, he said that learning in early childhood was a critical component of life long learning. “Strong funding for education would benefit us and our children,” he said.

Woolly Days then asked him how the Greens could break through the media framing of issues in the terms of the two major parties. Simon began by saying that Australia has always had a choice beyond the two major parties. “The Democrats have held the balance of power in the Senate and now the Greens are having their day,” he said. “People are taking us more seriously and the media are giving us more time on the air.” Kean-Hammerson then denied the Greens were against development. “We are not an anti-development party, we are anti-unsustainable development,” he said. He said he was against building more roads. What was needed was more public transport “in and out and across the city”. He said developers are only looking at how to move cars not people.

He believed that Larissa Waters “had a great chance” of winning a Queensland Senate sear for the Greens. He continued: “we need to have the conscience back in the Senate. Good debate is good for the country”. Simon Kean-Hammerson finished the interview by bringing up two additional points. He decried the planned move of the paediatrician ward from the Prince Charles hospital to the state funded but privately owned Mater hospital. He also condemned the growing development at Brisbane airport including the proposed new parallel runway. He said the people of Lilley had no say on this development on federal land and it would lead to noise pollution, devalued homes in the area and the destruction of the sensitive habitat of Moreton Bay mangroves.

Brethren Rapture excludes the Greens

With the Victorian state election due tomorrow, the Exclusive Brethren have intervened to buy newspaper advertisements to warn against parties with "radical and extreme policies". Brethren member Ernest Morren authorised ads this week in Melbourne’s two main newspapers, The Age and the Herald Sun headed "Warning: the future of Victoria is at stake on Saturday". The ads do not explicitly name any party but they warn “persons promoting radical and extreme policies” could gain control of Victoria’s upper house. The radical policies that Morren is worried about include drug laws, gay marriage and opposition to new dams. The Greens, expected to poll well this weekend, fit the description to a tee.

Despite their exhortation to voters, the Exclusive Brethren will not be able to lead the fight. Brethren do not vote as voting interferes with God's right to ordain who rules. As their name would suggest, they are extremely exclusive. As well as avoiding polling booths, they also shun contact with technology, books, TV, radio and non-Brethren. However they appear to be taking a new direction under their leader, the Elect Vessel, whom mere mortals know as Sydney businessman Bruce Hales. He is behind the current activism that seems at odds with their beliefs.

Victoria is not the first election where they have taken direct action having come to prominence in the 2004 federal election. Then in March 2006, Tasmania went to the polls. In the week prior to the election, two members of the Exclusive Brethren placed newspaper ads urging Tasmanians not to vote for the Greens. Two half-page advertisements attacked Greens policies on same-sex marriages and transgender rights. Liberal Party members admitted to meeting the Exclusive Brethren before the election campaign. State director Damien Mantach refused to admit what was discussed but said there was nothing untoward in the meetings.

The Brethren also campaigned against the New Zealand Greens in their 2005 election. The Brethren followed their Australian federal election tactics and released identical pamphlets headlined "Beware!" and "The Green Delusion" in a well-funded half million dollar campaign. Opposition leader Don Brash initially denied knowing who was behind the pamphlets but later reveal4d he was told about the campaign during a meeting with Brethren representatives a month from the election.

Brash lost despite the support of the Brethren. And this week he announced his resignation as party leader when the caucus meets on Monday. It comes after months of speculation over his future and ahead of the release of a book that documented links between his National Party and the Exclusive Brethren. Author Nicky Hagen’s new book The Hollow Man is out today after a court injunction against it was lifted. The book said the two parties met at a National Campaign Strategy Meeting. The Exclusive Brethren launched a major pamphlet campaign against the Labour government's defence and anti-nuclear policies. Hager claims Brash supported the campaign despite misgivings from his own party members. The Brethren, as usual, are making no comments on the allegations.

Bruce Hales took over leadership of the 42,000 strong worldwide Brethren after his father John died in 2002. Hales Jnr managed the political awakening of the organisation. He told members in 2004 if George W. Bush and Australian PM John Howard were not re-elected that year, "the rapture", or end of the world, would be near. Hales has met Howard and he (Hales) is a very powerful man, possibly a billionaire. Green Senator Christine Milne said, “Hales already seems to have ultimate authority in possibly hundreds, and maybe even thousands, of Exclusive Brethren companies, charities, trusts and enterprises on a worldwide basis.”

The Brethren were founded in the late 1820s in Dublin. Its founders were a group of men (John Nelson Darby, Anthony Norris Groves, John Bellet, Edward Cronin and Francis Hutchinson) who felt that the established Protestant Church had become too involved with the secular state and abandoned many tenets of Christianity. The first assembly in England was established at Plymouth in 1831 and Brethren are often called Plymouth Brethren to this day. In the 1840s they split in to Open and Exclusive branches. The former Church of Ireland minister John Nelson Darby led the Exclusive branch into an extreme removal from the secular world.

Exclusive Brethren members cut themselves off from outsiders to the extent of refusing to eat with them. They function as a cross between the masons and the Mansons, supporting and employing each other but ruthlessly ostracising any family members who stray from the flock. They are not allowed to use broadcast media because the Book of Revelation tells them that the devil is "the prince with the power of the air". But Hales seems to be at home with the power of print and is taking the brotherhood into a new and not-so-exclusive direction. They will be a force to be reckoned with at the Australian next federal election in 2007.