DEAR News Of The Area,

BEFORE we become too starry eyed about nuclear energy, a bit of information for the proponents of nuclear power for Australia, including a recent regular correspondent.

Let’s look at what is happening in Finland, the United States, the United Kingdom and France and, of course, Ontario, which Peter Dutton has used as an example: Olkioluto 3, Flammanville 3, Hinkley Point C and Vogtle, the four most recent plants completed or nearing completion. Cost overruns at these plants average 300 percent.

Vogtle went from $A22 Billion to $A53 Billion.

Flammanville from $A5 Billion to $A31 Billion.

Hinkley Point from $A30 to $A132 Billion.

Vogtle has been delayed by seven years.

Oikiolutu by 14 years, Flammanville by at least 12 years.

A fifth plant in the US, Virgil C, was abandoned after $A14 Billion had been spent.

All three companies building these five plants, Westinghouse, EDF and AREVA went bankrupt or were nationalised so that taxpayers now have to bear the cost for decades to come.

Ontario: between 2002 and 2015 costs of electricity produced by nuclear power rose by 60 percent.

The power stations built in the late 1990s have all suffered from repeated and unexpected shutdowns due to safety concerns.

Even the relatively new Darlington on the north shore of Lake Ontario has suffered from technical problems, even with newer technology, which has resulted in it still to become fully operational.

The cost of building it also blew out considerably.

None of these costs take into consideration the cost of decommissioning which from experience in Europe is also extremely expensive.

The latest government estimates in Canada are at least $C120 Billion.

And, of course, there is still no known safe way of storing the waste. Current costs of the temporary storage run into billions of dollars each year. The Coalition is quite comfortable to leave this problem to our grandchildren.

If we compare the cost per megawatt hour, modelling done by the CSIRO and respected energy analyst Lazard Ltd, nuclear energy has a cost of $220 – $350 per megawatt hour.

In contrast solar farms and wind which Australia is already building cost between $25 and $45 per megawatt hour.

Adding the cost of battery storage and transmission adds only $25 – $34 per megawatt hour. Therefore, a reliable solution costing one fifth of the cost of nuclear.

Small Modular Reactors are as yet not in operation anywhere in the world, although we may see a roll out in the 2040s.

In the US NuScale planned to have two completed in Idaho by 2030.

To date neither has been started and on-paper costs have already increased to $A189 per megawatt hour.

For countries without the rich resources we have in sunlight and wind, they may still be the best option but why would we choose the most expensive option for us?

I had been open minded about nuclear energy until hearing Dr. Helen Caldicott speak about her concerns when, working as a paediatrician in Adelaide, she needed to research why the incidence of leukaemia in children there is higher than the national average.

They breathe in the air from the Olympic mine and the remnants of nuclear testing in the S.A. desert.

Regards,
Barbara LYLE,
Tea Gardens.