Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for the Environment and Heritage (Senator Ian Campbell) to a question without notice asked by Senator Ronaldson today relating to uranium mining and nuclear power.

Senator Campbell has become what can only be described as a wild advocate for uranium mining and nuclear power and tries to suggest that this advocacy will in some way have a positive impact on climate change. He is completely wrong to suggest that climate change can be dealt with by running out nuclear power stations around the world.

Nuclear power is inherently limited in its capacity to protect the climate. The emissions nuclear power directly produces are only about two-fifths of the total emissions associated with it. You need to take into account all the transport emissions, for example. A nuclear power station has to run steadily, rather than varying widely with loads as many other types of power plant are able to do. A nuclear power station’s units are too big for many smaller countries and rural users.

It is also a less helpful climate solution because it is the slowest option to deploy in terms of capacity or annual output. It is also the most costly—it has a higher cost than competitors per unit of net CO displaced, so that every dollar invested in nuclear expansion will worsen climate change because it provides less solution per dollar. If you are serious about climate change then you want to address the problem quickly and in the cheapest and safest way possible. Nuclear power does not do that. Nuclear power is the most expensive option and cannot exist without heavy government subsidies. There is no private sector interest in investing in nuclear power stations because it is not competitive with renewables.

Even if you were to invest in nuclear power stations thinking that that might do something about climate change, they do not come on stream for more than a decade—it is very slow—whereas you can roll out renewables tomorrow. In terms of cost and in terms of speed in addressing climate change, nuclear power is simply not the answer. In fact, if we are genuine about climate change, then buying the fastest and most effective solutions is what we need to do. What that involves is energy efficiency, cogeneration and investment in and rollout of renewables now.

Senator Campbell is trying to suggest that uranium mining has a carbon neutral footprint. That is not so. I would like him to tell us what the carbon footprint is of the Roxby Downs expansion, which he was talking about at lunchtime today. Let me put it to you this way: Roxby Downs will use 120 million litres of water per day. This is in South Australia, which is struggling with water already. It cannot take that water out of the Great Artesian Basin or the Murray River. So where is Roxby Downs going to get 120 million litres of water a day? The answer is a desalination plant; they are going to put in a desalination plant.

What will power that desalination plant? We will have a coal or gas fired power station—there has been no guarantee about renewables. Perhaps Senator Campbell could come back in here tomorrow and tell me the estimated level of CO emissions that will come from the power plant that will fuel the desalination plant to give Roxby Downs 120 million litres of water a day for its proposed operation. Then you need to add to that the CO emitted by all the mining equipment and machinery, plus the freight to get the uranium from where it is being mined to the ports and eventually to its destination in China. When you look at uranium mining, it is far and away not carbon neutral.

Then add to that the ecological costs of uranium mining. Look at Ranger’s spills: 120 spills since it opened in 1981—and that is just one uranium mine in Australia. Think about all the consequences for Kakadu, not to mention the other dangers associated with the exposure of workers. In March 2004, workers drank water contaminated with a level of uranium that was 400 times the limit. That was in Australia. Japan, which has a high energy demand met by nuclear power, has had some of the most terrible accidents in recent times. They are looking at what they can do about that. The UK has just announced that it is not going nuclear. Its main reason for not going nuclear is the uncertainty over the cost of nuclear stations. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.