Yet another argument against nuclear

One of the certainties of Australian politics is the periodic re-emergence of a debate about introducing nuclear power generation.  This argument emerges in the context of other contentions around uranium, such as selling it to countries which haven't signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.  The major planks in the Australian argument are safety -- including NIMBY anxiety -- and safety of our resources when sold to other countries.

There is a portion of the business community here that would welcome the opportunity to develop nuclear power.  One should always be skeptical about executives on the make.  The prospect of commercial glory tends to be tarnished instantly when the question of where the industry would be located.  The best option would be somewhere out the back of nowhere, but even that would be in someone's backyard.  The other problem is have an ideological thing in the political parties about the rightness of the market -- in this case, it's actually worked against establishing a nuclear industry, which would require massive government subsidies to establish and maintain. For once, free-market absolutism has actually produced a result most of us would like to see continue.

The main panic about nuclear in the international scene is the apocalyptic scenario of some "terrorist" or "rogue state" coming into possession of enriched uranium.  Ostensibly the fear is that it would be used to make a dirty bomb.

Nuclear security is a serious issue.  The residue of spent fuel rods has an extensive half-life of some thousands of years -- many times the lifetime of an ordinary human being.  The legacy of the last three generations is a highly toxic substance that could yet bring life on this planet to an end.

There is another side to the argument, and one that is frequently ignored.  It has been brought into focus by events in Japan over the last 24 hours.

The biggest threat to nuclear security is climate change and seismic activity.

Whether or not we associate the two, the common factor is that they are natural forces which we are not in a position to control at present.  Climate change contains a large number of variables depending on how the industrialised part of the world manages its carbon emissions, but it too is a natural process -- albeit one that is accelerated by human activity.

Australia is one of the major countries in the world with the most to loose from significant climate change.  We are likely to see an increase in aridity; we have already seen a long drought followed by destructive rains and flooding.  Building nuclear power plants would be a very risky thing to do under these circumstances.  There are a host of other reasons why not to do it, but I think we need to be realistic about the nature of our changing climatic conditions.

So, to look at the issue more ironically, here's a little blast from the past.