The Nuclear debate
June 18, 2006

(Interventions by or passages related to EFN are highlighted in blue)

This week, in the nuclear debate, the Prime Minister and Green groups called for nuclear energy. Opponents and proponents air their views about our need for more sources of clean green energy to drive the country's economic growth. Will wind and solar sources be sufficient? How clean is the new clean green coal? If we sell uranium, who should we sell it to and what about the waste?

Our panel includes prominent physicists, economists, diplomats and leading environmentalists, all of whom have strong opinions on the development of a new, nuclear industry in Australia. And their views will surprise many. They include Greg Bourne, the former head of BP Australia, turned environmentalist with the World Wildlife Fund who believes the dangerous mineral is no solution to our energy needs, and Harley Wright, an environmentalist who says we have no choice but to go nuclear to save the planet. The politicians too, air their views, from both sides, as Australians question whether the risks of a nuclear world are greater than the risks without it.

TRANSCRIPT

INTRO: With so much concern today about global warming on the one hand and the risks of radioactive waste on the other, our forum guests today are certain to provide a lively discussion. But before we hear their considered opinions, let's first look at what we already know about Australia's energy options.

Australia is truly the lucky country when it comes to energy choices. We have abundant reserves of fossil fuels — coal, oil and natural gas, a well-developed hydro-electricity industry and vast, open sunny spaces just ripe for clean alternative energy industries like solar and wind power. And we are literally rolling in uranium. We possess 40 percent of the world's known uranium reserves and probably a whole lot more. In fact, one-fifth of the world's uranium supplies come from Australia. Uranium is an extremely efficient way of generating power. It contains 20,000 times more energy per kilo than coal. And nuclear power stations generally produce cheaper electricity than the alternatives without toxic or carbon dioxide emissions. While globally only 16 percent of the world's electricity is generated from nuclear power, that figure is rapidly rising. There are some 440 nuclear reactors in 31 countries and, in those like France and Japan, with few natural energy resources, there's an increasing reliance on nuclear power.

As the world finally accepts the fact that fossil fuel reserves are finite and that carbon dioxide emissions produced from them are contributing to global warming, cheap, clean, nuclear power is becoming a very attractive prospect. Australia is perfectly placed to capitalise on future global demand and develop a home-grown nuclear power industry. Australia currently has three mines that produce and export over 10,000 tonnes of raw uranium oxide, or yellowcake, annually. A fourth uranium mine, Honeymoon, in South Australia, is currently under construction. Yellowcake exports are earning Australia almost half a billion a year. But the even more lucrative uranium enrichment and fuel manufacturing processes occur in nuclear reactors overseas. If Australia were to develop its own nuclear industry, we'd not only be able to generate power and lower greenhouse gas emissions, we'd also be able to sell enriched uranium for considerably more than we're earning from selling yellowcake now. But this is easier said than done. Australia lacks the expertise to build and operate a nuclear power station and it is estimated it will take at least a decade and two and a half billion dollars to approve and construct one. But hand in hand with a fully fledged Australian nuclear industry come increased obligations for environmental safeguards and local and global security. There is the emotive issue of the safe disposal of our own nuclear waste products and the economic attractions of storing other countries' waste. The spectre of accidents like Chernobyl and Three Mile Island as well as the horror of nuclear warfare also looms over the debate. Australia is a signatory to the United Nations nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which stipulates our uranium may only be used to generate electricity. But a recent arrangement to sell uranium to China and possibly even to India, both known nuclear weapons states, raises questions of whether we can truly guarantee that Australian uranium will never end up in a warhead. Our global hunger for energy comes at a cost. How high must that cost be?

THE PANEL


Ian Macfarlane (Minister for Industry and Resources)

Julie Bishop (Science Minister)

Ass. Prof. Martin Sevior (Physicist Melbourne Univesity)

Tony Grey (Chairman of Precious Metals Australia /ex Pancontinental)

Dr John White (Chair of the Uranium Industry Framework)

Harley Wright (Australian local correspondent of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy)

Martin Ferguson (Federal ALP)

Richard Butler (Former diplomat, weapons inspector and Governor of Tasmania)

Prof. John White (President of Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering)

Dr. Mark Diesendorf (UNSW Senior Lecturer Institute of Environmental Studies)

Danny Kennedy (Greenpeace)

Dr. Sue Wareham (MAPW and Nuclear Free Alliance)

Greg Bourne (WWF)

Prof. Richard Broinowski (Former diplomat)

Leslie Kemeny

Iand Hore-Lacy (Uranium Information Center and World Nuclear Association, interview recorded before the debate)

Bruno Comby (President of Environmentalists For Nuclear Energy, interview recorded before the debate)


Jana Wendt (moderator)

________________



JANA WENDT: Thank you very much to all of you for joining us for this forum today. We've just heard Australia has 40 percent of the world's uranium reserves. How much more do we think is out there, Tony Grey?

TONY GREY: Probably considerably more, but the industry has not done any new exploration now for well over a decade. But in the '70s, we ran into a political controversy and the result was that we failed to develop our resources in time to catch that price boom fully.

JANA WENDT: Do we know, Ian Macfarlane, what is in the ground, how much more is in the ground?

IAN MACFARLANE: Well there's obviously quite a deal more, and if you look at the Northern Territory at the moment we are seeing exploration there increase 20-fold in the last 12 months. Now that's partly been driven by the price of uranium which has trebled. It's also been driven by the fact that there is now certainty that if they discover uranium, they'll be able to mine it.

JANA WENDT: Is it possible to put a dollar sum on what Australia might be able to make out of this were it to get all this stuff out of the ground?

IAN MACFARLANE: Well if we just look at the mines that are in operation now, and if you look at Olympic Dam, which will probably double in size and look at the prospective markets, including China as well as the customers we already have, you will see the uranium industry double if not treble in the next decade. And for Australia, that means probably another billion and a half dollars exports from uranium. We have, as you said, 40 percent of the world's deposits. We are a country that is very proficient and efficient and safe when it comes to mining, and that includes uranium mining. So really we need to step up to the plate.

JANA WENDT: Martin Ferguson, if we were to do all of this exploration, would it make us to uranium what Saudi Arabia is to oil?

MARTIN FERGUSON: Look, it would be a giant step forward in terms of our export earnings, it�s a fact of life. I actually believe what the previous two speakers has said is correct. It is all about economics. For the last decade uranium has not been as valuable. It has trebled in price in the last 18 months to two years. It's back on the agenda. There is a debate about uranium mining in Australia. And I think we as a nation will seize the opportunity to actually export more uranium.

JANA WENDT: But is it of that dimension or am I overstating it?

MARTIN FERGUSON: Look, it is not going to be the Middle East for us in comparison with oil, but it is going to be a step forward in terms of export earnings and us diversifying our resource exports.

JANA WENDT: OK, so is there an opportunity there for Australia to be value-adding, if you like, to this?

DR JOHN WHITE: Jana, as a manufacturer and a value-adder in this country, I think it is a real missed opportunity that we do not move into the fuel cycle. And really as a country which is going to be producing more uranium into the world market, we should take the opportunity of leveraging that position and actually moving into something which I call nuclear fuel leasing, which means we take responsibility at the back end and really provide a big service to the world in terms of taking that material away from harm's way and therefore leverage on our great opportunities of the best geology in the world, highly skilled workforce and our position in the world as part of the alliance.

JANA WENDT: We are, of course, selling yellowcake around the world. In fact, Australia has signed an agreement to sell uranium to China. Still a communist state, a state with a shocking human rights record, just this week it was accused by Amnesty International of secretly supplying conventional arms to places like Sudan and Nepal and Burma, fuelling the bloody conflicts there. Why should we trust China Ian Macfarlane to do the right thing?

IAN MACFARLANE: China has been through a rigorous negotiation with Australia in terms of the safeguard agreement which we require from every country. And that safeguard agreement not only encompasses the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and the safeguards associated with that but also the safeguard agreements we put in place as a government in 1998. The Chinese have agreed to abide by those safeguard agreements. The reality is that they already have ample nuclear material for their warheads. We can track this material when it goes to China. We can use the International Atomic Energy Agency. We can audit the supplies of it and it will be very quickly picked up if some supplies of uranium are being siphoned off for other uses.

JANA WENDT: Richard Broinowski, do you think we can trust China with our uranium?

RICHARD BROINOWSKI: Jana, I think not. Can I just make one point? The IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, has only three Chinese nuclear plants that it inspects at present, according to the latest IAEA. One is a power reactor and another is a research reactor and another is a uranium enrichment plant. One of the fundamental principles of Australian export of uranium since 1977 has been that not only do we have to have a bilateral safeguards agreement but that we export to countries that has full coverage under the International Atomic Energy Agency. Can you answer that?

JANA WENDT: Ian Macfarlane would you like to �

IAN MACFARLANE: In terms of where the uranium is used, those facilities will be inspected. That is the reality of the agreement.

JANA WENDT: That is a guarantee that those facilities will be inspected?

IAN MACFARLANE: That's right. And whilst we concede that there will be nuclear facilities in China that the IEAA won't be inspecting, under the agreement China has to agree that the facilities where our uranium is being used will be inspected and that they'll be audited.

SUE WAREHAM: Can I comment on that. There is no way that Australian uranium could be kept out of Chinese weapons, and the Australian government more or less knows this. The first port of call for Australian uranium when it reaches China, if this agreement goes ahead will be a conversion facility which is unsafeguarded because it is not safeguarded by the IAEA which has just been stated by Richard. There is no way that our uranium will be safeguarded during that time. That conversion facility is controlled by the Chinese military. Now there are close links between the Chinese civilian and military programs as there are in every nuclear weapons state. And for that reason, we can have no assurance when we send uranium to any nuclear weapons state, that it is going to remain out of weapons.

IAN MACFARLANE: That is contrary to my advice. I have to say that. And I have to say that in terms of some of our best people, ANSTO and the like, and their representation on to the IEAA, that they in fact say that we can track our uranium right through the enrichment facility right into the power station and then be assured of where the waste is reprocessed after that.

RICHARD BUTLER: This discussion started with people I think putting very persuasively — I go along with a good deal of it — that the fact that we have 40 percent of the world's uranium, at least 40 percent in our soil, provides for us a marvellous economic opportunity. This is a valuable resource from which we can make a lot of national money. And I don't think there's any need for us to spend any time arguing about that. That is true. Absolutely. But Jana, there is also another opportunity that our possession of this remarkable material provides. It's an opportunity that we took for 40 years but have now ceased to pursue in the last seven or eight years, which is to use our possession of this resource, which in my view has its unique ability that it can make nuclear weapons. You cannot make nuclear weapons without uranium. So whatever we do about uranium, that has to be at the core, forgive the nuclear pun. But this is the sole material from which you can make nuclear weapons. I would argue from that basis that we have another opportunity. Just as we sell the stuff to make the money that we want, we have an opportunity to insist to the world on nuclear arms control. We used to do that. But we're not doing it now. And Minister, we're not doing it adequately with China. The very idea that we would sell our uranium to India, a non-NPT, a non-proliferation treaty country, would involve departing from 50 years of Australian policy. That is the point I want to make, Jana. We have an ability to influence the crucial business of nuclear arms control by using our uranium under very specific circumstances. I don't hear us doing this.

JANA WENDT: I want to go to Martin Ferguson here. Is Labor entirely comfortable with this? We're talking sales to China, sales to India, BHP talking about selling to Russia. Comfortable?

MARTIN FERGUSON: Firstly we've been able to sell uranium to Russia for years. Richard Butler is correct. It is no longer a debate about whether we export uranium. By 2013 with the expansion of Olympic Dam, we will be biggest exporting nation in the world with the biggest mine in the world. The key to this debate is stewardship. It is about our international responsibilities, using our economic weight — we own the uranium — to actually reshape the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.

That means selling uranium to China at the moment, but not Pakistan, Israel or India. It's about us using our capacity internationally to actually have a huge impact on the nuclear weapons debate. That is the real debate. That is where Australia ought to be heading. Not a debate about whether or not nuclear power stacks up in Australia at the moment. It doesn't, and I'll tell you why. Energy out of Queensland at the moment is 2.8 cents per kilowatt hour. Nuclear power cannot compete in Australia. Use our capacity to internationally influence the processes.

JANA WENDT: Let's talk about the logic of your party's position in relation to mining. It currently has a no-new-mines policy. So that would put an end to your grand plans, I presume.

MARTIN FERGUSON: Our policy at the moment says no new mines. But our policy also means by 2013 we're the biggest exporting nation in the world. In the next couple of weeks, Honeymoon in South Australia will get the final approvals. That means that by 2008 we will potentially have four mines in Australia. My position is clear. There is a national conference in April next year. I believe our policy is nonsensical. How can we have the biggest mine in the world to then say some mine, a pimple on the horizon, can't start up in Australia? It is a ridiculous position, and there is going to be a debate within the Labor Party.

JANA WENDT: It is a ridiculous position, you say.

MARTIN FERGUSON: Absolutely. Because, we, under the Labor Party's current policy will be a nation that by 2013 will the biggest exporting nation in the world with the biggest mine in the world. Richard Butler is correct. Use our economic capacity to play above our weight to actually influence and determine the future of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and can I say, to be fair to the Government, they have actually sought the review. It is about time America understood, go the multilateral process, use the available agencies. Don't try to sidestep them by doing one-off deals with India. Work it out internationally and lock us all in.

SUE WAREHAM: Jana, there is a very point I would like to make in relation to who we export uranium to. Now if Australia is to continue exporting uranium and there are several good reasons why we should not, but if we are to continue exporting uranium, there should a blanket rule, no exceptions. We do not export any uranium to any nation that has nuclear weapons. We cannot justify the export of uranium to nations that create the most destructive, the most inhumane weapons that have ever been created. That should be a blanket rule. No uranium to any nuclear weapons states. That would in fact wipe out a number of our current customers but so be it. In addition we should make another rule — no uranium goes to any nation that will reprocess or allow reprocessing. Reprocessing is the technique whereby the plutonium is extracted and can be used for further purposes.

TONY GREY: Selling to France, the US

SUE WAREHAM: Yes, it would.

TONY GREY: And potentially China.

STEVE SHALLHORN: Article 6 of the non-proliferation treaty, they have an obligation to disarm but they are not doing it. Most of this discussion has just been about the economic benefits. But as Sue has pointed out, there are real problems with nuclear weapons. They are the most horrific weapons that we have ever developed. And we fret when North Korea or Iran are said to be developing a nuclear weapons program. But somehow we don't take any responsibility for the fact that we are one of the major exporters of the uranium. We have to mix our security policy with our export policy and we should not be exporting nuclear — uranium to any nuclear weapons state.

IAN MACFARLANE: The reality is that nuclear warheads are currently being reprocessed to use in nuclear power stations because of the shortage of processed uranium. People aren't accumulating nuclear warheads, they're actually breaking them down.

RICHARD BROINOWSKI: In the US they are creating more fissionable material. They are just e opening a new plutonium pit factory at a cost of billions of dollars to make a new generation in nuclear weapons. This is just not true. Can I also comment that Minister Macfarlane reckons we have a very good bilateral safeguards agreement. We do not. They have been eroded for commercial considerations ever since they were first brought down by Malcolm Fraser in 1977 and they still are being. The doctrine of equivalence means it is absolutely ridiculous to suggest that Australian atoms can be traced through a very complex international system and not be — and that we have a reassurance that they will not be used in weapons.

JANA WENDT: I want to return to Labor policy for a moment, Martin Ferguson, your leader says no nuclear power industry for Australia. Does that make sense?

MARTIN FERGUSON: It is an economic issue.

JANA WENDT: Is it?

MARTIN FERGUSON: The issue of exporting uranium from Australia is about economic capacity. The price of uranium at the moment makes it stack up. In terms of nuclear power, there will be a debate. The Labor Party has a view it doesn't stack up economically. I refer to the fact we are producing coal-based energy out of Queensland at the moment at 2.82 cents per kilowatt hour. Nuclear energy cannot compete. I have approached this from an economic point of view.

JANA WENDT: So if it did make sense economically, Labor would be...

MARTIN FERGUSON: Then there would be a debate in Australia at some point in the future about whether or not we could go nuclear, whether or not issues such as waste disposal and the storage are resolved. As far as I am concerned we have to be part of that debate because that is part of the debate about the renewal of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. And we have to rebuild ANSTO.

JANA WENDT: John Smith, economically, it doesn't stack up you think at the moment?

DR JOHN SMITH: It depends on what price you put on the environment, what price you put on CO2 emissions and what price you put on the waste management of the nuclear spent fuel. My view is that we have an obligation as a nation to go down the low-emissions energy path. We are committing to CO2 sequestration for coal power generation.

LESLIE KEMENY: May I make an optimum template for Australia's position in the nuclear world.

JANA WENDT: Please.

LESLIE KEMENY: Australia should export nuclear fuel. It should enrich in this country. It should manufacture nuclear fuel in this country. It should lease it and we should be ready to take irradiated fuel, reprocess it and dispose of it in ways which are economically sensible.

JANA WENDT: Martin Ferguson is very enthusiastic about opening up mines and yet there are Labor Premiers who are saying "This will not happen in my State." Ian Macfarlane, would the Commonwealth be prepared to override the States in this situation?

IAN MACFARLANE: We are not in a position to and I would suspect what the Labor Party will do — which is completely torn to bits on this issue — they don't know whether to go forward, stay where they are or do something of common sense.

MARTIN FERGUSON: A bit like your government on refugee policy.

IAN MACFARLANE: Can I just say that after the next national conference of the ALP I wouldn't be surprised to see some States move to mining and after their respective elections the remaining States move to allow uranium mining because the reality is that uranium exports in Australia will grow. At the moment, only two States will benefit from that. And that's because of some ideological position held by some sections of the Labor Party which fortunately Martin Ferguson doesn't support.

JANA WENDT: Two of the most hotly disputed issues in the nuclear debate are safety and the environment. The nuclear lobby says very few problems have occurred with nuclear power stations over the years. But when they do happen, of course, the results can be disastrous. And with spent nuclear fuel remaining radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years those opposed to going nuclear argue the risks are too great. So before we continue with our debate we'll take a moment to consider our environmental options. Let's suppose for a moment that Australia has decided to turn to nuclear power for its energy needs. What would our nuclear landscape look like?

IAN HORE-LACY: Most nuclear reactors of an economic size that are being ordered around the world now are between 1 gigawatt and 1.5 gigawatts so you would need 20 or 30 of those if you replaced all your coal-fired plant.

HUGH OUTHRED: At the moment, our demand for electricity continues to grow around about two percent to three percent per year. And that really means by about the middle of next century we will have to build roughly 1,000 megawatts per year of what is called base load capacity. That's roughly one nuclear generating unit per year.

JANA WENDT: So what about the costs of setting Australia up to become a nuclear energy state?

DR IAN SMITH: We're talking about a capital cost of somewhere around, I guess: $2.5 billion per 1,000-megawatt station. Now that, of course, is a lot of money, but you should realise that in nuclear: 60 percent of the cost of the power is servicing the financing. So it's an interesting thing, that the money has to come in upfront to build the station and then you get your returns for the next 50 or so years.

JANA WENDT: Before we go down the nuclear path, what about the waste? Do we know how to safely store both spent fuel and the waste associated with the decommissioning of reactors?

BRUNO COMBY: Well, in the case of nuclear energy, we consume almost nothing, a very little amount of uranium only. To give you an idea of this, just take a look at this small pellet here. This is the amount of vitrified nuclear waste which is produced by a typical French family over an entire year.

PETER GARETT: Disposal of waste for the longer term is clearly probably the most important and the most difficult issue for nukes. It's never been solved really as a problem. No credible commentator coming onto your program or anywhere else can provide cast iron guarantees about what will happen to the geophysical structures of the earth for the next 10,000 years.

JANA WENDT: With Chernobyl behind us, we are assured that today's power plants, at least in the Western world, are safe. But how safe?

BRUNO COMBY: What happened at Chernobyl is something like driving a very old car with no brakes, very old tyres at 200km/h on a bumpy mountain road with a sick and drunk driver. If you do that, of course, you will have an accident in the end. But if the reactors are well-designed, well-managed, then it is a very safe source of energy.

JANA WENDT: But could we be having entirely the wrong debate?

PETER GARETT: We can meet our energy needs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by harnessing existing energy sources that we have abundance of, including solar, clean coal — and certainly we do need to clean coal up—and an expanded renewables sector.

BRUNO COMBY: But these are very dilute and they are also intermittent. Wind does not blow all the time, and the sun does not show during the night and when the weather is cloudy.

IAN HORE-LACY: Nuclear gives you a continuous, reliable supply of electricity on a large scale. And renewables like wind simply cannot do that.

JANA WENDT: So could the environmental benefits of nuclear energy outweigh the environmental costs?

IAN HORE-LACY: The dollar cost of petroleum and oil- and gas-based power has gone up enormously in the last few years. And the environmental cost of such power is being realised. You combine those two together and many people see nuclear as the best option for us to generate the power that this world needs.

PETER GARETT: This is an industry that talks big, but when you get down to the details that's where the devil lives.

BRUNO COMBY: The environmental groups which oppose nuclear energy in fact are mistaken. They are merchants of fear and they are trying to drive us in a direction which is not correct. In fact, in doing so, they are making a great mistake and they are not serving the environmental cause because the result is that we would be turning as a major energy source to the other source of energy which is massively available, but unfortunately very polluting for the atmosphere, which is coal. And this would be very, very bad, and harmful for the planet and for global warming.

JANA WENDT: Bruno Comby, a leading French environmentalist finished that piece there, pleading with Australia to cut back on its use of coal and to go nuclear. Steve Shallhorn, do you accept that being an environmentalist and being pro-nuclear is no longer a contradiction in terms?

STEVE SHALHORN: I think it is a contradiction in terms because I think what we've been having so far is a false debate as to whether the answer is between coal and nuclear. Really what we should be doing is looking at new technologies to first of all reduce the amount of electricity that we use, energy efficiency, that's the low-hanging fruit we can address right away, that's relatively cheap. Then we can deliver a certain amount of electricity through renewables such as wind and solar.

JANA WENDT: But to get back to my original point — a contradiction in terms to be pro-nuclear and be environmentalist these days?

STEVE SHALHORN: Certainly at Greenpeace we've looked at the economics of nuclear power and we are convinced more than ever that it is a contradiction, that the environmental answer is not to go with nuclear power.

JANA WENDT: Harley Wright, you belong to the same organisation as Bruno Comby, the French environmentalist we just heard from. You would regard yourself as an environmentalist?

HARLEY WRIGHT: Absolutely, yes.

JANA WENDT: And you would regard yourself as pro-nuclear?

HARLEY WRIGHT: Yes. Not as a situation that we must go nuclear in Australia but it should be sensibly considered as one of the options to use. And it's not for us or even this government inquiry on nuclear energy to work out whether nuclear is the preferred option because it will be one of many. There will be many options that we could and should consider. We should have a full suite of these options available because you'll never know what the technology or the price will be. And so to rule one out on sort of political grounds is a ludicrous approach. It is a matter of keeping all options available and determining the appropriate one for the price at the time.

JANA WENDT: Greg Bourne, the Government opens up a debate on the issue, it sets up this inquiry, this valuable inquiry, according to Harley Wright. You're asked to participate and you decline. Why would you not want your voice heard?

GREG BOURNE: Jana, the problem with this debate is it's what I would describe as a "look over there debate". It is a seeking a magic bullet debate. And it's a business as usual debate. It is a pure economic debate. Whereas the real debate is we are in a climate-changing world where we have to reduce our emissions — in developed countries, 60 percent by 2050, this is reductions. Now reductions will happen through energy efficiency and through cleaning up our coal. By doing that we're actually going to put off having to put in new plant, whatever it comes out to be. By admissions of folks around the table a lot of this is 15 to 20 years off and yet the reductions we have to have are now. So as far as I can see the Government is happily having a "look over there" debate to avoid the real debate about global warming and climate change.

JANA WENDT: But why would you, as a conservationist, as an environmentalist, why would you not want to be heard in an inquiry such as this one?

GREG BOURNE: Because the terms of reference are so narrow, they are about the economics of nuclear power.

JULIE BISHOP: We've not had a review on nuclear power for some 20 years and it is time that we had a scientific, comprehensive objective look at the advances in technology that have been made over the last 20 years and most certainly the impact of the accelerating rate of greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. The terms of reference that the Prime Minister has announced cover the whole spectrum, including environmental and health issues. Now there is a growing body of evidence out there that demonstrates that nuclear power is a convincing response to the concerns about environmental and health aspects of burning fossil fuels. And if you are concerned about greenhouse gas emissions, if you are concerned about the environmental and health costs associated with it, you would welcome a debate that is looking at diversifying the energy sources within Australia.

JANA WENDT: Greg Borne?

GREG BOURNE: Jana, the terms of reference read to me 1.5 hours before the Prime Minister wanted to announce me as part of the program, talked a little bit about health and safety, and environment was a codicil. It really was an economic debate and therefore it was very, very easy to refuse to be part of this terms of reference. However...

JULIE BISHOP: But clearly he has not seen the published terms of reference. Clearly he has not read the published terms of reference.

GREG BOURNE: Clearly when asked one should see the terms of reference.

JANA WENDT: Greg Bourne, this is obviously a terribly sensitive issue because you yourself got into considerable trouble with some of your environmental colleagues when you acknowledged the inevitability of Australia's involvement in the mining and export of uranium, didn't you?

GREG BOURNE: I put those points on record back in November in a public speech which was broadcast on the radio. It was basically saying there is an inevitability, as we have heard, under both governments, that uranium will be exported. We need to that we use and wastes being managed safety...

JANA WENDT: No no, I just want to get to the point of the sensitivity in your own ranks because arrows rained down on you when you stated what seems to be the obvious, as you acknowledge. For instance, the Wilderness Society called on to you go back to industry where you came from, and toe the line or leave. Why is this such an emotive issue, stating the obvious?

GREG BOURNE: I think it is an emotive issue. But the fact is that governments in the past and governments in the future are going to export. That was just a straightforward acknowledgement. And therefore, what do we need to do? What do we Australians need to do? We need to demand that it is being used safely, that the waste is being stored, it can't be used for proliferation purposes. Those are the sorts of things Australians need to demand both of the government, whoever is in power at any time...

STEVE SHALLHORN: I think Greg made the right decision by not going on the inquiry because the inquiry terms of reference are too narrow. We should be looking at technologies that are available in the next 10 to 15 years right now, such as energy efficiency, such as renewables.

HARLEY WRIGHT: But this inquiry — I have read the terms of reference and the media release — is a very good approach to try and unravel this. And I think the process is particularly important. I don't think the timeframe is sufficient but I think the terms of reference are sufficient. If it follows due process, takes in inputs from all sides, has interrogation, testing of that evidence, and comes out with a reasonable report, I think that's a very good way to put information into the public domain. We have a panel of experts, experts in this country, who will be able to pull together the scientific evidence, the facts, take the emotion out of this and get some objectivity into the debate.

JANA WENDT: Is it possible to take the emotion out of this particular topic?

JULIE BISHOP: That's what we have tasked them with. Once a draft report has been prepared it will be international peer reviewed. The chief scientist, Dr Jim Peacock, has a role to play. Then the draft report will be made public and we can seek responses and views from across the spectrum. So it is an open, objective process. And it's high time we had it. And I believe it's time that instead of the scaremongering and the emotion that's going on let's look at what has happened in the last 20 years. Nuclear has a solid safety record.

JANA WENDT: It is the word 'nuclear' that provokes a certain response in the community, doesn't it?

JULIE BISHOP: Precisely. And you see scaremongering in relation to one of the most valuable medical research facilities in this country that is saving lives. And yet people can still start scaremongering in relation to Lucas Heights when all it is is in relation to the handling and management of radioisotopes.

JANA WENDT: Let's suppose that Australia is going to set up a nuclear industry, a nuclear power industry, Martin Sevior, how practical is it? In what timeframe might it happen?

MARTIN SEVIOR: It couldn't possibly happen within the next five years.

JANA WENDT: Within the next 10 years?

MARTIN SEVIOR: It would be very difficult and extremely challenging to do it within 10 years.

JANA WENDT: What would be required?

MARTIN SEVIOR: For a start, we would, in my personal view, is we should wait to see what the next generation of nuclear power plants, how they develop, things like the Westinghouse AP1000 is on the drawing board now. They promise, Westinghouse promises, this will be substantially cheaper than the $2,500 million that was on the video. It would be great to see if that was true. We won't find out if that's true for five years. So I would say wait at least five years to see that.

JANA WENDT: And then?

MARTIN SEVIOR: And then, if it is cheap and it's safe, which I have read the NRC review of this and it appears to be as safe as Westinghouse promises, then it would be a likely candidate for us to deploy.

JANA WENDT: But there is a lot of waiting time built in there. Mark Diesendorf, what do you think about the practicalities of this?

MARK DIESENDORF: Well, I think first we have to address the myth that nuclear power will always be free of carbon dioxide emissions. Every stage of the nuclear fuel cycle except the operation of the reactor, emits greenhouse gases. Now currently, with high-grade uranium ore, the energy inputs, the fossil fuel inputs, are relatively small, but high-grade uranium will only last a few decades. And once it is gone, once we have to mine and mill low-grade uranium, the carbon dioxide emissions from the fossil fuels used in those processes become quite large. So it is a complete myth to claim that nuclear power is free of carbon dioxide emissions. It has been very hard to actually get this debate into the public because the nuclear industry has made such enormous efforts to suppress it. But the truth is that...

LESLIE KEMENY: Mark is so wrong that if you give me a chance I will answer that question.

MARK DIESENDORF: I want to finish this. You've had lots of time, Leslie. The nuclear industry has certainly contradicted this. But they've not been able to produce a detailed study to refute this case at this stage.

MARTIN SEVIOR: I have done so, Mark.

MARK DIESENDORF: You have not produced it yet.

MARTIN SEVIOR: I have!

MARK DIESENDORF: I haven't seen it yet.

MARTIN SEVIOR: Mark, I will give it to you after this show. I was talking to you about it.

MARK DIESENDORF: So people can have an idea, we are talking about, to get one kilogram of yellowcake, we're talking about mining and milling 10 tonnes of rock. That's what's involved. And that's why the stuff about comparing it with coal is so misleading. All the coal that is dug out of the ground goes straight into the power station. But you have this huge concentration factor that has to be taken into account with uranium mining.

JANA WENDT: John White, do we have any reason to believe that the nuclear industry would be any better at managing risk than, say, the coalmining industry?

DR JOHN WHITE: My observation is that the nuclear industry in the West sets world-class standards which could actually inform the other power-generating sectors. The other thing I would say is that on the issue of spent fuel, and proliferation, really, as simple as it is, the idea of nuclear fuel leasing is a technology breakthrough that actually gives us a new way of managing the issues of proliferation and the environmental consequences of the waste. So as a major producer of uranium going forward, regardless of whether we one day find it economic to have nuclear power, should look at providing that service to the world.

STEVE SHALLHORN: The world, John? What happens if you lease to a country and there is a government change or the security situation changes and says we're not going to send the stuff back? Are you going to invade them to get the fuel rods back?

DR JOHN WHITE: When you are exporting uranium yellowcake almost anything can happen to it. When you are exporting fabricated fuel pellets or rods, which can be embedded so that they can be tracked every second of every day, you know what is happening with them. You know where they are. And you do not provide more if they do not just in time arrive back. And you can then inspect them in a hard-wire transparent fashion.

STEVE SHALLHORN: I think it lowers the chances of diversion but it does not eliminate it. You have to accept it does not eliminate the possibility of the material being diverted into a weapons program. Yeah, we'll know about it, but the question is — what are we going to do about it? Are we going to invade because we think they are about to build nuclear weapons? It is like the situation with North Korea.

DR JOHN WHITE: You would put into place the protocols and the actions that can be put into place and it would dramatically reduce the risk, environmental, and from a terrorism point of view.

JANA WENDT: Tony Grey, economically, do you think it would make sense to store the world's nuclear waste?

TONY GREY: Huge sense, yes I do. I think we do have the right geology. I think there's no question of that. The technology has been proven. It has been proven for decades that it can be dealt with in a safe, long-term fashion. The only reason that there isn't yet any place where long-term storage is working is because of the political situation. People are just too frightened of it. Yes, it will be alright in your backyard but not in mine, that sort of thing. If we could get over that fear and look strictly at the science and technology we could do the world a service and make some money along with it.

JANA WENDT: Can I ask you — what about the morality of it? Is there perhaps even a moral obligation if we are an exporter to store the stuff?

TONY GREY: Yes, you could almost reach that far, yes, you could.

LESLIE KEMENY: Jana, may I say categorically....

DR JOHN WHITE: May I just make a point that there are people in France, the United States and in Japan, to my certain knowledge, who are looking at ways to destroy waste. That is a long way off. Last March I looked at a timeline which went up to 2050 in this project. Enormous investment. The first stage of the investment is US$1.3 billion. They are talking about is reducing the 100-year lifetime by a factor of 100. Now if people could actually understand that something would disappear in 100 years it would be much less of a problem than it disappearing in 10,000 years. That is way off, but it is something which I believe Australia should be firmly involved in.

LESLIE KEMENY: Jana, generation four gas-cooled reactors will have no waste problems at all. But may I say this, that the hydrocarbon industry has a far greater waste problem, including greenhouse gases, than the nuclear industry has ever had, by a hundred-fold greater. And we've accepted it because we've been with it and living with it for 200 years. That's all.

JANA WENDT: I think that's going to have to be the last word. Thank you very much. I'm sorry to have to call an end to that but this is obviously a debate that will play out across the country so thank you for giving Sunday the benefit of your insights and experience and expertise. Thank you very much.

Source : http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/cover_stories/article_2007.asp