The federal Coalition’s adoption of a policy involving government-owned construction of 7 nuclear power plants around Australia has raised an argument that most people thought was over 30 years ago or more. Labor and the Greens are opposed to it, as are several state Liberal Party branches e.g. the NSW Opposition and Queensland LNP Opposition – soon to be the government again, it seems.
None of that seems to worry federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton. Presumably his polling shows it as an electoral winner in seats he thinks the Coalition can win at next year’s federal election. Whether he’s right remains to be seen.
But does such a policy make sense?
Former Liberal PM Malcolm Turnbull (interviewed for last night’s Four Corners) seems to think Dutton’s stance is just a political stunt, and he’s probably right. But nuclear isn’t quite as silly as last night’s Four Corners made out at least in one respect. Eric Campbell highlighted the fact that the newest AP1000 reactors at the Alvin W. Vogtle Electric Generating Plant in Georgia were 7 years late. No doubt that’s right, but they were still built in 1o years. Snowy 2.0 looks like taking 11 years from commencement in 2018 until projected full operation in 2028.
If a Coalition government could build a nuclear power plant (or rather several of them all over Australia) within 10 years of winning office next year it could probably avert catastrophe as our ageing coal plants close. But that seems very unlikely. First, as noted above they will need to build new plants all over Australia using a technology with which Australia has no experience except with the tiny Lucas Heights research reactor. Secondly, Dutton has promised to conduct a public consultation over 2.5 years. He would certainly need to do so to have any chance of gaining sufficient public support not to mention that of the various state governments. Thirdly, we would need to get thousands of people trained in a very complex and potentially dangerous technology, presumably in the US. Whether that would be possible is very doubtful. The bottom line is that Dutton is unlikely to get nuclear plants up and running before the early 2040’s, which is much too late for Australia to avoid a catastrophe as coal plants close.
Another problem with nuclear is highlighted by Geoff Edwards in the comment box of my “return to blogging” post:
Nuclear power stations are claimed by Dutton and the Murdoch press to be zero emissions, but the claim is false. Large volumes of conventional petroleum-based fuels are consumed in mining and refining the ore; then large volumes are consumed to produce the cement and the steel, copper and other metals necessary to build the reactors. Large volumes of conventional fossil fuels are then supposed to be used in burying the reactors at the end of their life, if that is to be done.
The biggest problem with nuclear, however, is the cost of construction. The latest Vogtle reactor/s in the US cost about $50 billion (Australian). By comparison, Snowy 2.0, which has been asserted to be a complete financial disaster, is projected to cost $12 billion i.e. less thatn a quarter the price of a modern nuclear plant. Other pumped hydro plants will be much cheaper. By comparison, Victoria’s annual health budget is $13 billion. Of course, the AP1000’s $50 billion cost is a one-off, but it’s still an awful lot of money.
Nevertheless, Australia needs to have a much more developed strategy to move away from fossil fuel power towards clean renewables in a timespan that avoids disaster. We could certainly pursue the nuclear road if there was no viable alternative, but that just isn’t the case. My view (supported by many experts) is that the best option for Australia is to rely predominantly on large-scale wind and solar, supported by “firming” in the short term by large batteries and peaking gas plants, and in the slightly longer term (but much sooner than 2040) by pumped hydro.
As noted above, Snowy 2.0 will be operational by 2028, and earlier this year the Commonwealth, Victorian and Tasmanian governments signed an agreement to deliver the Marinus Link cable that will connect Tasmania to Victoria (and thence take large-scalealso expanding its hydro power generation capacity power into the national grid):
Under the agreement, which took effect on 22 March, a new tripartite ownership will oversee delivery of the crucial project. In the new ownership model, the Commonwealth has an equity share of 49%, Victoria 33.3% and Tasmania 17.7%.
Stage 1 of Marinus Link is expected to cost in the range of $3 billion to $3.3 billion and be operational by 2030.
Marinus Link is an underground and undersea electricity cable. It will run 255 km undersea from North West Tasmania to Waratah Bay in Victoria, then a further 90 km underground to the Latrobe Valley.
At the same time the Tasmanian government is also increasing its hydro generation capacity by increasing the peak capacity of the Tarraleah hydropower scheme from 90 MW to 190 MW and building new turbines at the Gordon Power Station. Tasmania is also pursuing a range of pumped hydro projects.
Snowy 2.0 seems to have given pumped hydro a bad name , even among some who should no better. For example the CSIRO’s GenCost report looks in great detail at the cost of a range of renewable power options, but fails to include any details on pumped hydro.
In fact pumped hydro has huge potential, as ANU scientists have been arguing for some years. This article highlights its most recent work (extended quote):
Some 37 suitable sites are located in Australia. They include the Mount Rawdon and Muswellbrook mining pits already under investigation.
There are a number of potential options in Western Australia: in the iron-ore region of the Pilbara, south of Perth and around Kalgoorlie.
Options in Queensland and New South Wales are mostly located down the east coast, including the Coppabella Mine and the coal mining pits near the old Liddell Power Station. Possible sites also exist inland at Mount Isa in Queensland and at the Cadia Hill gold mine near Orange in NSW.
Potential sites in South Australia include the old Leigh Creek coal mine in the Flinders Ranges and the operating Prominent Hill mine northwest of Adelaide. Tasmania and Victoria also offer possible locations, although many other non-mining options exist in these states for pumped hydro storage. …
The Australian Energy Market Operator suggests by 2050, this nation needs about 640 gigawatt-hours of dispatchable or “on demand” storage to support solar and wind capacity. We currently have about 17 gigawatt-hours of electricity storage, with more committed by Snowy 2.0 and other projects.
The 37 possible pumped hydro sites we’ve identified could deliver 540 gigawatt-hours of storage potential. Combined with other non-mining sites we’ve identified previously, the options are far more numerous than our needs.
This means we can afford to be picky, and develop only the very best sites. So what are we waiting for?
I interviewed Professor Blakers more than 5 years ago with a view to publishing an article about the ANU’s work on Club Troppo, but it was a casualty of my enforced retirement from blogging. Better late than never!
Ken glad you’re well,!
Is there that much certainty that snowy hydro will be completed by say 2008? Gather that the geotechnical side of the project prior to announcement was a bit thin on the ground.
And if the costs of connecting it to the grid are included it’s total cost is I understand more like $25 billion.
Would much prefer us to simply have a price or tax on carbon,but that’s too hard.
PS as I understand it the merit of both pumped hydro and nuclear is while they cost a lotv to build, they both last a long time say seventy five Years.
in comparison things like batteries, wind turbines and solar cells need to be replaced several times in seventy five years.
And because all of these options: solar wind and nuclear all involve a fair bit of carbon emissions to build the longevity of what is built can be a significant factor.
Arguments in favour of nuclear:
Reactors can be built on old coal station sites and therefore don’t need expensive new network connections built
At least some of the sites for possible pumped storage could be locally controversial.
New major power line connectors can have local environmental costs and often real world political costs.
If I was ‘king🙂’ I’d simply do some kind of price on carbon , remove the blanket ban on nuclear and leave it to the masses to sort out what suits it best.
Yes, I certainly think the ban on nuclear power should be lifted. Possible energy technologies should be evaluated on their own merits.
For example, the top end of the Northern Territory only has a single feasible site for pumped hydro, and it is a long way from Darwin and Kakadu National Park. There are no nearby powerlines, so it would be quite expensive to build a pumped hydro facility there. A full-scale nuclear plant would not be justified there, because the entire Darwin region only has a population of around 140,000. A smaller modular reactor would be suitable there if and when one is developed and made commercial. In the meantime, Darwin will have to rely on Mike Cannon-Brooks’ proposed huge solar installation, cables from which pass through Darwin on the way to Singapore.
I also agree (as do many others) with your suggestions for putting a price on carbon. That way the best and most suitable energy technology would be implemented in any given area, rather than the current ridiculous situation where blatantly political stunts, like that of Peter Dutton to spruik nuclear power as a magical solution, not be given any credence.
Indeed the true costs vs benefits of all this would be better left to the market to work out. It’s comical that experts think they know better 🙂
However letting markets do the workdoesn’t give nearly as many opportunities for favours to mates and Utopia announcements and nation building etc
So we are stuck with the mess.
PS
It’s only gut feeling but if we had a price I feel we would have gone for smallish gas generators that can be placed close to actual demand, and therefore have low transmission loss plus waste heat can be used for other useful things ,and generators that can switch on of fairly quickly etc.
As for snowy 2 I don’t know what to say about it being announced, before any proper geotechnical survey was done if the tunnel routes, the geology of the region is known to be complex – lots of ancient metamorphic beds tilted up to 90 degrees plus relatively recent lava flows that burried old river valleys and their aquifers etc
The major problem of nuclear is the solar duck curve. If coal power makes no money until the sun goes down how in the hell will nuclear?
When you add the cost and time to build nuke stations it becomes absurd.
The other problem is that nukes have to go 24 hours a day in other words baseload power. That makes no sense when private enterprise owns the assets. They want dispatchable power. That is entirely different.
finally for nuclear even to get somewhere near competitive you would need a carbon price but the Opposition won’t have a bar of that.
Their policy is very Trumpian
The merits of pumped hydro and large DC connectors were debated in two forums held by The Royal Society of Queensland in 2017. The papers have been published on line https://www.royalsocietyqld.org/initiatives/electricity/ and include an overview on renewable energy by Alan Pears and a summary in the form of a policy submission to the Queensland Government. Nuclear was not a prime feature of the presentations because it was regarded as completely non-feasible.
Arguing about the cost of things, when you have years ago excluded puting a transparent Price on things , sums the whole disfunctional mess.
“If nuclear is so uneconomic, why not lift the ban?” I have sent this comment to every federal ALP member whose contact I have, as well as every twitter virtue signaller about how bad nuclear is. Not one single reply.
It would be great politics as well and put the ball back in Dutton’s court.
agreed but there has been no hue and cry about this at all. Make no mistake there would have been analysis done on nuclear energy and like coal power it makes no sense at all and it would need a price on carbon to assist the economics as ross Garnaut has pointed out
I can just see the ALP claiming a dutton tax on all of us that have solar panels if we ever got nuke power
Pioneer-Burdekin has been scrapped
Gather it also was announced without any geotechnical stuff having first been done
From the OZ
“Pioneer-Burdekin was the biggest ever proposed hydro energy storage project in the world. Palaszczuk and Miles trumpeted it as the critical piece of infrastructure that would ensure the lights stayed on when the sun wasn’t shining and there was no wind, with 5GW of stored energy from renewables that could feed the grid for 24 hours.
But what later became apparent was that despite the enormous cost of the project – the initial estimate of $12bn rose to between $25bn and $27.67bn (but was kept secret until this week) – it had little more than a press release to back its worth.
A mostly desktop study, only partly released this year, had identified the Pioneer Valley, near Mackay as a possible site for the mega scheme, and also earmarked the Borumba Dam, near Gympie, for a smaller 2GW pumped hydro project – and together, they would deliver 7GW of stored green power.
It then emerged that the government had committed to the Pioneer-Burdekin project without it first undergoing geotechnical survey work – to determine if the required tunnels and reservoirs could actually be dug – that work is still ongoing.
The project was also without any financial modelling.”
Pumped hydro and nuclear both look like politics as theatre
Smaller gas firming looks real.