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NUCLEAR / ENERGY NEWS ITEMS
18/11/07

Sue Coleman Haseldine Receives Premiers Award for Indigenous Leadership. 
Howard Government Rejects UN Declaration on Rights for Indigenous Peoples
NT Nuclear Dump

Clean Energy
- Storage
- Solar With Storage
- Various
- Biofuels
- Federal Government Announcement
- Wave Power + Desalination
- Clean Energy + Fossil Fuels in NSW
- Energy Efficiency / Inefficiency
- Wind Power
- Green Power Schemes
- Jobs
- Regional

Clean Coal
Climate Change & Nuclear Power: Ian Lowe
Australia Joins Global Nuclear Energy Partnership GNEP
Nuclear Power for Australia
Fusion - Australian Research Lobby

Uranium
- Roxby Downs Expansion
- BHP Billiton, Uranium And Ethics
- Uranium Sales to Russia
- Various

Australia as the World's Nuclear Dump
Lucas Heights Reactor Still Shut Down
Maralinga - Australia's Nuclear Waste Cover-Up
Maralinga Veterans
Depleted Uranium - ICBUW Launches Global Disinvestment Campaign
Nuclear Power for Indonesia
Keep Space for Peace
Plutonium Stockpile in the UK
Nuclear Power Globally
Japan - Nuclear Accidents

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SUE COLEMAN HASELDINE RECEIVES PREMIERS AWARD FOR INDIGENOUS LEADERSHIP. 

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MEDIA RELEASE 
October 16 2007  -
Sue Coleman Haseldine receives the NRM Premiers Award for Indigenous Leadership.  
Kokatha Mula Woman Sue Coleman Haseldine has been awarded the inaugural 2007 Premiers Award for excellence in Indigenous leadership  in the Natural Resource Management Sphere.  
Sue or 'Aunty Sue' as she is respectfully known was nominated for her  extensive work as an activist, cultural teacher and environmental  defender of her homelands in outback Ceduna. This area covers Yumbarra and Pureba Conservation Parks and the Yellabinna Regional Reserve,  part of the largest stretch of stunted mallee woodlands in the world  
"I am so grateful to receive this award, and I am so grateful for the  teachings I've received from my elders Pearl Coleman Seidel (deceased)  and Marcina Coleman Richards, the young ones that thought I was worth  it and all the support along the way. We will keep going, keep  fighting for the protection of our peoples' land and culture" said  Aunty Sue after receiving the award in Glenelg, 800ks from home.  
For many years her work has highlighted the need for protection in the  Ceduna region, that not only holds high environmental value, but  extreme cultural significance. She receives this award at a time when  Kokatha Mula country is in jeopardy from the SA states mineral  exploration boom.  
"We love and respect our country and we do not trust that possible  mining projects in the future will benefit our people or sustain our  heritage, that is why Aunty Sue does the work she does, and we are  lucky to have her in the community taking positive action for our environment" said nephew Simon Coleman Prideaux who attended the award  with other family members.

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HOWARD GOVERNMENT REJECTS UN DECLARATION ON RIGHTS FOR INDIGENOUS PEOPLES

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UN backs indigenous peoples' rights
Article from: Agence France-Presse
September 14, 2007 04:31am
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22416470-5005961,00.html

THE UN General Assembly overnight adopted a non-binding declaration protecting the human, land and resources rights of the world's 370 million indigenous people, despite opposition from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the US.

The vote in the 192-member assembly was 143 in favour, four against and 11 abstentions.

The declaration, the result of more than 20 years of debate at the United Nations, also recognises the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination and sets global human rights standards for them.

Indigenous peoples say their lands and territories are being threatened by such things as mineral extraction, logging, environmental contamination, privatisation and development projects, classification of lands as protected areas or game reserves, the use of genetically modified seeds and technology, and monoculture cash crop production.

Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States, countries with sizable indigenous populations, expressed disappointment with the text.

They said they could not support it because of their concerns over provisions on self-determination, land and resources rights and giving indigenous peoples rights of veto over national legislation and state management of resources.

Among contentious issues was one article saying "states shall give legal recognition and protection" to lands, territories and resources traditionally "owned, occupied or otherwise used or acquired" by indigenous peoples.

Another article upholds their right "to redress, by means that can include restitution or when not possible just, fair and equitable compensation, for the lands, territories and resources which they have traditionally owned or otherwise occupied or used, and which have been confiscated, taken, occupied, used or damaged without their free, prior and informed consent".

Opponents also objected to one provision that would require states "to consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples ...to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilisation or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources".

"Unfortunately, the provisions in the Declaration on lands, territories and resources are overly broad, unclear, and capable of a wide variety of interpretations, discounting the need to recognise a range of rights over land and possibly putting into question matters that have been settled by treaty," Canada's UN Ambassador John McNee told the assembly.

"Similarly, some of the provisions dealing with the concept of free, prior and informed consent are unduly restrictive," he said. "By voting against the adoption of this text, Canada puts on record its disappointment with both the substance and process."

Adoption of the declaration by the assembly had been deferred late last year at the initiative of African countries led by Namibia which raised objections about language on self-determination and the definition of "indigenous" people.

The declaration was endorsed by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council last year.

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Media Release Thursday September 13, 2007

Indigenous Nations sign on to UN Declaration
Howard continues to slash indigenous rights

Today the Aboriginal Tent Embassy and supporters will demonstrate at Prime
Minister John Howard's Sydney office, in response to the Government's
refusal to sign the UN Declaration on Rights for Indigenous Peoples.

Darren Bloomfield of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy says "By refusing to sign
the UN declaration, Howard is condemning Aboriginal Australia to further
dispossession and cultural genocide. We are here to demand an end to the
genocide that began in 1788 and has never stopped.

"This is the 35th year of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy: we are still
occupying the lawns of Old Parliament House in Canberra. During last week's
APEC meeting, we set up a Tent Embassy in Victoria Park, Sydney, exposing
John Howard's unwanted nuclear agenda and shameful Northern Territory
military intervention. We will continue to fight for the sovereignty and
human rights of all Indigenous nations."

Olivia Nigro of the Sydney Nuclear Free Coalition says, "In the past eleven
years, the Howard Government has trashed the human rights of Indigenous
people: expanding uranium mining on Aboriginal lands, undermining land
rights, paternalistic welfare policies, and the recent military takeover of
Northern Territory Aboriginal communities.

"People right across Australia recognise and support the adoption of the UN
Declaration for Indigenous Rights. We recognise the Declaration through our
ongoing community action asserting the sovereignty and right to
self-determination of Aboriginal peoples. We will recognise the Declaration
at the polls at the Federal Election when we vote Howard out."

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NT NUCLEAR DUMP

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Ducking for cover as nuclear waste heads for the Territory
7 November 2007
http://www.crikey.com.au/Politics/20071107-Senator-Scullion-shuns-nuclear-fallout-ducks-and-covers.html (Subscription only)

Natalie Wasley from the Arid Lands Environment Centre, Alice Springs, writes:

After abandoning its plan for a national nuclear dump in South Australia ahead of the 2004 federal election, the Howard government scrambled for a politically expedient location to dump its radioactive waste problem.

Despite an "absolute categorical assurance" from then environment minister Ian Campbell that a site in the Territory would not be picked, the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act (CRWMA) legislation was rammed through federal Parliament in December 2005 and allowed the Commonwealth to override NT laws prohibiting radioactive waste transport and storage.

NT CLP Senator Nigel Scullion had earlier promised his constituents he would work to stop the dump, telling ABC radio on 9 June 2005 that: "There’s not going to be a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory. The people of the Northern Territory doesn’t want anybody else’s nuclear waste in the Northern Territory, I represent them and so, "not on my watch"."

He even promised to cross the floor to vote against the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act (CRWMA) legislation, saying that: "Territorians don’t like having this sort of stuff shoved down our throat because we’re not a state."

However when push came to shove in Canberra, Scullion not only stood by the Coalition’s party line, he even proposed amendments that allowed for the nomination of additional sites in the Territory to be put forward by Land Councils or the Northern Territory Government.

A year to the day after the CRWMA was passed, Nigel played a key role in further amendments which allowed for additional nominated dump sites to be accepted even without the demonstrated consultation and consent of Traditional Owners. These changes also wiped out the opportunity for judicial review on the grounds of "procedural fairness" by any affected group; communities, pastoralists or the Territory Government.

Senator Scullion had meanwhile been reassuring people that none of the originally named areas would be chosen as the preferred dump site, telling the NT News that he "bet a beer" that it would not be at Harts Range, insinuating he was privy to information that a site somewhere else that would be nominated and chosen.

In May 2007 the Northern Land Council officially put forward a portion of Muckaty Land Trust, 120km north of Tennant Creek. The nomination came despite deep -- and continuing -- concern and division from many of the Traditional Owners. Since Muckaty was first proposed last April, Traditional Owners from all of the family groups in the Muckaty Land Trust have written to Federal Science Minister Julie Bishop and the Northern Land Council registering opposition to the radioactive waste dump plan.

Senator Scullion was recently invited by the NT’s largest environmental non government organisation, the Environment Centre of the Northern Territory (ECNT), to attend a Senate candidate forum to answer questions about the federal governments waste dump proposal before the federal election.

ECNT were prepared to offer a range of dates, venues and moderators, but to no avail.

The chest-thumping "not on my watch" before the 2004 election was replaced by a bunker dwelling "not at your forum" of 2007: as an excuse Scullion’s spokeswoman could only tell The Age, "We have little faith the Environment Centre would run a fair and balanced debate."

His refusal is extremely disappointing and builds on his and the government’s evasive attitude to community concerns about radioactive waste management issues. In mid October Scullion said "bring it on" in relation to being put in the spotlight for his nuclear waste backflip. Now it seems he has employed the time honored nuclear avoidance tactic of "duck and cover".

The Howard Government has demonstrated extreme disregard for public opinion since they announced the NT dump plan. Building a federal radioactive dump should involve opportunity for input from affected communities at every stage of the process. Instead we have lacklustre Dave Tollner MP, the CLP federal member for Solomon and Senator Scullion continuing to act with contempt and indifference for people they are elected to represent.

Without a public forum, where does that leave the election debate on this issue? Robust. The Greens and Democrats are vigorously opposed to the dump and Federal Labor has committed to repealing the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act if elected.

There is a continued commitment from people at all of the targeted sites to work together to stop the federal dump plan. The NT government remains strongly opposed, as does the majority of the wider NT community. Many people around the country have indicated they do not support the out of sight and out of mind dump plan and that they do not intend to radioactive waste their vote at the federal election.

So despite Scullion professing the importance of people getting "the right information", it doesn’t appear that NT voters will have the chance to discuss their concerns about the federal dump plan directly with the Senator (who is currently in Queensland).

Maybe that’s for the best? After all, as Ian Campbell said as Environment Minister much earlier in this sorry saga, "... the last people you would need to be choosing what to do with nuclear waste are politicians".

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NT voters urged to 'dump' Tollner
November 5, 2007 - 2:15PM
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/NT-voters-urged-to-dump-Tollner/2007/11/05/1194117936639.html

Voters in the marginal seat of Solomon are being told not to back the Liberal party because a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory could "threaten Darwin harbour".

A leaflet has been distributed by a green group to homes in the electorate which covers Darwin and the satellite city of Palmerston.

It is currently held by the CLP's David Tollner with a margin of 2.8 per cent and is one of the 16 seats that Labor hopes to acquire to win government.

Campaigning by the Environment Centre of the Northern Territory (ECNT) also includes radio and newspaper ads, community polling and information stalls at shopping centres and markets.

The leaflet highlights the possible threats posed to Darwin Harbour from the transport of uranium and the establishment of a radioactive waste dump in the NT.

"The NT radioactive waste dump is the thin edge of the wedge," said the ECNT's Charles Roche.

"Our harbour and our unique Territory lifestyle are all threatened by this plan.

"The election provides an opportunity to send a clear message that out community is not a dumping ground".

The leaflet says highly radioactive waste would be moved through Darwin and Palmerston in ships, trains and trucks.

It also warns voters not to believe government claims that the NT waste dump will not be used to store international nuclear waste.

"Our harbour and community will be used as a toxic corridor for some of the world's most dangerous and polluting wastes," the leaflet says.

The federal government chose the NT, where it can override territory laws, after it abandoned an outback South Australian site in the face of political opposition.

Muckaty Station, about 120km north of Tennant Creek, has been nominated by the Northern Land Council for consideration by the federal government for the national facility.

The proposed 1.5sq km site is expected to be considered along with three commonwealth defence sites, including Harts Range and Mount Everard near Alice Springs and Fishers Ridge near Katherine.

If elected, federal Labor has committed to overturning the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act, which was passed last year and paves the way for the dump to go ahead.

Comment is being sought from the Liberals.

© 2007 AAP

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Dispute flares over nuclear dump site
Lindsay Murdoch, Tennant Creek
October 29, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/dispute-flares-over-nuclear-dump-site/2007/10/28/1193555531569.html

ABORIGINAL owners of land surrounding the proposed site of Australia's first national nuclear dump have changed their minds about allowing trucks carrying waste to enter, as bitter argument rages among indigenous groups in the area about the Federal Government's plans.

"I won't sign any agreement because my mob disagree with building the dump there," says Sammy Sambo, senior elder of the Milwayi clan, which owns the only road to the site on Muckaty cattle station, 120 kilometres north of Tennant Creek.

"We are upset about the way those government fellas have gone about trying to convince us and are confused and worried about what to do next."

Senior elders of two Aboriginal clans owning parts of Muckaty have told The Age they have not been properly consulted, contradicting federal Science Minister Julie Bishop who said last month that potentially affected Aboriginal groups had had "adequate opportunity to express their views".

Ms Bishop also said that nomination of the site "accords with the wishes of the traditional Aboriginal owners of that land".

Milwayi elder Janet Thompson said that most of those present at a recent meeting to discuss an offer of $2 million to allow trucks carrying waste to cross their land did not know what was being proposed. Many of the elders do not speak English as their first language and were not offered translators.

"I walked out," Ms Thompson said. "The process wasn't fair."

Mr Sambo said he and other elders had second thoughts because "they tell us the dump will only be for low-level waste, like gowns and blood from hospitals. But we are worried because we hear it will eventually become a dump for nuclear waste from around the world."

Under a deal secretly negotiated by the Northern Land Council, the 70-member Ngapa clan will receive more than $10 million from the Commonwealth for allowing 5000 cubic metres of nuclear waste to be stored on their land for more than 300 years.

In its only public comment, the Ngapa clan said in May the money would "create a future for our children with education, jobs and funds for our outstation and transport".

Dianne Stokes, senior elder of the Yapa Yapa clan, which owns land on Muckaty, said the dump proposal had put enormous pressure on clan groups, most of whom were unhappy about it.

Ms Stokes was among a group of Muckaty elders taken to Lucas Heights when the deal was being negotiated in 2006. "After four days in Sydney I fell for it … I said I supported the dump," she said. "They showed us videos about how safe it would be."

But Ms Stokes said she became strongly opposed to it when she began to think: "Well, if it is so safe, why don't they put it in Sydney?"

Experts are studying the site to see if it is scientifically suitable for the dump, which would store spent fuel from Australian research reactors and waste from around the country.

Natalie Wasley, an environmentalist with the Beyond Nuclear Initiative in Alice Springs, said that although the Northern Land Council, an indigenous organisation, nominated Muckaty on behalf of traditional owners "there is definitely not unanimous agreement".

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CLEAN ENERGY - STORAGE

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E.ON UK Plans Giant Battery to Store Wind Power
UK: September 14, 2007
Story by Pete Harrison
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/44343/story.htm

LONDON - The British arm of German utility E.ON AG is developing a giant battery using a secret combination of chemicals to store wind and solar power for times of high demand, the company said on Thursday.

The prototype will be the size of four large shipping containers and will contain the power of 10 million standard AA batteries, capable of producing 1MW of electricity for four hours, said E.ON UK.

"This is the holy grail of the wind industry," said a spokesman. "The electrochemical technology is proven but we're using a new mix of chemicals to overcome the difficulties that stopped previous attempts.

"The mix of the chemicals is the hush hush bit," he added.

The battery should be operational by late 2009 and will help solve one of the main problems of wind and solar power, added the power firm, one of Britain's biggest with around 8.1 million electricity and gas customers.

"Green power is only generated from wind farms when the wind blows, and that might not be when the power's needed by customers," said Bob Taylor, MD of Energy Wholesale and Technology.

"By researching and developing this battery we can store the power generated by wind farms any time and then use it when our customers need it the most. A school with solar panels can store the power generated at weekends and use it when the kids are back in school."

E.ON also announced a 40 million pound (US$81 million) research fund for energy storage and other promising energy technologies.

The group plans to spend 1 billion pounds on sources of renewable energy over the next five years, including new onshore and offshore wind power, biomass and wave and tidal power.

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CLEAN ENERGY - SOLAR WITH STORAGE

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Solar takes off with US power supply deal
By Matt Peacock
Posted Tue Oct 2, 2007 8:32am AEST  Updated Tue Oct 2, 2007 8:47am AEST
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/02/2048420.htm

Two of America's biggest power utilities have unveiled plans for a multi-billion-dollar expansion of solar power supply, backing the argument that solar energy can indeed become a viable alternative to coal-fired electricity.
The company at the heart of the development is Ausra. It was started by Australian solar expert David Mills, who left this country for California earlier this year to pursue the further development of his ground-breaking work.
What makes the announcement more significant is that the utilities are confidently predicting that their solar power will soon be providing baseload electricity - that is, day and night - at prices competitive with coal.
Those associated with the project believe it could signal a paradigm shift in electricity generation.
After decades as a fringe player in the energy industry, solar power is finally taking off in the world's largest economy.
Dr Mills says solar power could potentially supply most of the world's electricity.
"My hope, my dream if you will, is that this will become a mechanism not only for the majority of the electricity generation in the United States but the majority globally," he said.
As world leaders gathered in New York last week to focus on climate change, across town at the Clinton Global Initiative, giant US power companies were pledging billions of dollars of investment into solar power.
For Dr Mills, it's vindication of a lifetime's research. Only nine months ago the former Sydney University professor was packing his bags for California's Silicon Valley, where the venture capitalist who made his fortune in IT, Vinod Khosla, was prepared to back him.
The Khosla Ventures founder is enthusiastic about Dr Mills's work with solar power.
"We were very excited about what they were doing and surprised at the lack of support they were getting in Australia," he said.
Dr Mills says the way his innovation is taking off is gratifying.
"This is the culmination of a life's work - I've been at this for 30 years, so you can imagine how I feel," he said.
"It's almost a sense of great relief that finally this problem is being noticed and action is taking place."
Australian technology
The solar technology developed by Dr Mills already exists here in Australia, in the form of small pilot plants attached to the Liddell coal-fired power station in the New South Wales Hunter Valley.
A plant officer explains that the system's emphasis is on simplicity, with near-flat mirrors on giant hoops tracking the sun.
"Sunlight, on a clear day like this, strikes those mirrors and is gathered up onto the tower, and there's an absorber underneath that tower," he said.
Out comes steam, ready to drive a conventional power turbine. This is on a small scale; the new US company started by Dr Mills and Mr Khosla, Ausra, is now planning plants far bigger.
Dr Mills says the first plant size is more than two square kilometres in area and will generate 175 megawatts of power.
"But really we want to aim for gigawatt-style plants, and they're much bigger than that," he said.
Sustainable energy expert Mark Diesendorf, who lectures in environmental studies at the University of NSW, says large solar power plants are the way to go.
"It's important to get a large scale for the development to bring down costs, and the United States offers a magnificent opportunity for large-scale solar development," he said.
Solar power is not new in the United States. A giant photovoltaic plant in the Mojave Desert was built during the oil shock of the 1980s. And more recent concern over global warming has led to other investments into solar thermal plants.
But Mr Khosla notes that the low cost of Ausra's new design is now attracting the big money.
"What's very exciting is major utilities in the US are now starting to believe our story after doing their own independent due diligence," he said.
"They actually believe this is competitive power generation. More importantly it's reliable power generation. We can ship them power when the sun isn't shining, which is what most utilities need."
Assumptions overturned
The coal and nuclear industries have long asserted that baseload power cannot be supplied by renewable energy. That mantra is oft repeated by Australian politicians like federal Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
"You cannot run a modern economy on wind farms and solar powers. It's a pity that you can't, but you can't," he said.
Prime Minister John Howard says solar is "a nice, easy soft answer".
"There's this vague idea in the community that solar doesn't cost anything and it can solve the problem," he said.
"It can't. It can't replace baseload power generation by power stations."
But baseload power supply is just what Ausra is now being contracted to supply for the insatiable US market. It says that within two years it will be able to economically store its hot water for more than 16 hours.
Dr Mills says there is a convenient correlation between humans' power consumption and the sun's power supply.
"We get up in the morning everyday, we start using energy, we go to sleep at night," he said.
"And the presence of the sun, that's natural. And that correlation means that we can get away with a lot less storage than we might have thought."
Dr Diesendorf agrees.
"There's been a lot of nonsense talked about, in Australia and elsewhere, about renewable energy allegedly not being able to provide baseload power, not being able to substitute for coal," he said.
"That's never been true. It's even untrue with regard to wind power, and now with solar thermal power, it's certainly untrue."
Better than coal or nuclear
Dr Diesendorf says the huge US investment into solar will soon make talk of clean coal and nuclear as solutions to climate change redundant.
"Basically, the solar thermal technology will be on the ground, certainly in the United States and many other countries long before so-called clean coal and nuclear power," he said.
Mr Khosla says solar power is developing rapidly and will be cheaper than either nuclear power or 'clean' coal.
"We think we can move much faster than nuclear and on an unsubsidised basis, we will be cheaper than nuclear power, and we should be cheaper than IGCC [integrated gasification combined cycle] coal-based power generation," he said.
Dr Mills says big solar plants will be able to replace nuclear and fossil fuel-fired plants in the US.
"In five years time, we'll have very large plants and I would say gigawatt-style plants already commissioned, able to run 24 hours a day and completely replace the function of nuclear and coal plants," he said.
And as international alarm mounts at the ever-more-obvious signs of global climate change, Dr Mills is not the only one who thinks the switch from fossil fuels is overdue.
"I was talking to a banker the other day and after a series of negotiations he looked at me straight and said, 'I wonder if we're too late,'" Dr Mills said.
"The time has gone for easy action. We waited too long, we've wasted 15 years but now we've got to really, really act quickly."

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CLEAN ENERGY - VARIOUS

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Loyalty to coal takes wind out of clean energy advocates' sails
Wendy Frew
November 3, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/loyalty-to-coal-takes-wind-out-of-clean-energy-advocates-sails/2007/11/02/1193619145340.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

In April last year the future of wind energy in Australia was in doubt after the Coalition Government blocked a Victorian wind farm project to protect the endangered orange-bellied parrot, a bird so rare it appeared never to have flown near the site.

The decision to overturn state approval for the project ostensibly on environmental grounds sparked outrage from green groups and prompted a string of Pythonesque jokes about dead parrots.

The Labor Party made much mileage from the drama but it refused to say how much renewable energy it would aim for if it won government. Meanwhile, both parties continued to support the country's dirtiest industry, assigning millions of dollars to an elusive technology they said would clean the carbon out of coal.

The renewable energy industry watched in despair. Wind turbine manufacturers threatened to quit the country and solar power researchers headed overseas.

Things look very different 18 months later. The two main parties are locked in a battle to prove their green credentials. Opinion polls show voters respond enthusiastically to renewable energy, and to wind and solar power in particular. Ever conscious of the public mood, the Prime Minister, John Howard, in September announced a 15 per cent "clean energy target". That was pipped this week by the 20 per cent target announced by the Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd.

But this is no climate change epiphany, environmentalists warn. They say claims by the Environment Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, that Australia is "leading the world on climate change" ring hollow in light of the latest World Bank figures showing the country's emissions rose 38 per cent between 1994 and 2004, more than the combined increase in emissions from Britain, France and Germany, which have 10 times Australia's population.

Just how little progress Australia has made is clear when the parties' renewable energy commitments are compared with growth in coal-fired power. In the next seven years, coal-fired electricity generation is expected to rise almost as much as the renewable electricity promised by Howard over the next 12 years, according to Greenpeace calculations.

"If we simply have a renewables sector growing alongside an ever-expanding coal sector, we will not stop climate change," said the head of Greenpeace Australia, Steven Campbell.

An analysis by the Climate Institute shows that, under Labor policies, by 2020 greenhouse pollution would still have increased 15.1 per cent from 1990. Under the Coalition, it would have risen 20.8 per cent.

That said, the renewable energy targets fill the gap between now and when emissions trading begins within four years, giving industry the kick it needs to invest in the sector, said the institute's director of policy and research, Erwin Jackson. "Once they start to run these operations, they get manufacturing scale, they find the best sites, they get better at financing the deals, they find better ways to integrate renewable electricity into the grid; it's 'learning by doing'," Mr Jackson said.

The Government this week attacked Labor's 20 per cent target because it excluded so-called clean coal technology, claiming electricity prices would rise and coalmining jobs would be lost.

"He's [Rudd] said to the coal industry, your means of remaining viable in a carbon constrained world is now going to be denied to you," Turnbull said on Wednesday.

Energy experts point out that any switch to less polluting forms of electricity is going to cost money. The emissions trading scheme is intended to make fossil fuels more expensive by putting a price on carbon.

A University of NSW energy expert, Mark Diesendorf, said job losses could be absorbed by not replacing a small fraction of the workers who retired annually from the industry. With 80 per cent of coal shipped overseas, only 20 per cent of the industry would be affected by a domestic target, or about 44 jobs a year over 12 years, Dr Diesendorf calculated.

"On average, the number of annual retirements would be at least 600. This is more than 13 times the estimated annual job losses from renewable energy. And that totally ignores the job gains from renewable energy, which would be several times the job losses," he said.

The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union boss Tony Maher says no net jobs would be lost to growth in renewables because of the projected increase in energy demands.

"It is impossible for there to be any jobs lost," he said.

Not everyone is so sanguine. The chief executive of the Energy Supply Association of Australia, Brad Page, is worried that the renewable energy industry will not cope with the pace of construction. He says it is likely most of the power would come from wind, which could mean building as many as 4500 wind turbines.

"This is a challenging construction task in itself, complicated by the maze of local, state and federal planning and permitting laws and community consultation processes," Mr Page said.

The thought of 4500 turbines is nowhere near as daunting as the 25 nuclear power plants proposed by the Government's nuclear taskforce, said the chief executive of the Clean Energy Council, Dominique La Fontaine. "The industry is very confident we can deliver enough capacity," she said, citing overseas precedents.

Where does this leave clean coal?

Both parties have committed heavily to its development: $500 million from Labor and the bulk of a $500 million Low Emissions Technology Demonstration Fund set up by the Government.

But carbon capture and storage technology remains commercially unproven and needs suitable underground repositories near coal-fired power stations.

The challenges are so great that the project hailed as Australia's most advanced, ZeroGen in Queensland, failed to receive federal funding because it could not attract commercial backing.

It will be at least 20 years before the technology is ready for commercial use, said the president of the Academy of Science, Professor Kurt Lambeck. Even then, it would have limitations in curbing carbon emissions. In an address to the National Press Club in Canberra in September, the Australian National University geophysicist said clean coal could be construed as an oxymoron.

"The sequestration has its limitations; the capture of the CO2 has limitations, and it's never totally clean anyway," he said.

The International Panel on Climate Change said most of the deployment of such technology would not happen until after 2050. That is too long to wait, say scientists and environmentalists.

On top of that, "clean coal" is based on the assumption our energy profligacy can continue, passing up the opportunity to save money and energy by curbing demand and improving energy efficiency. In contrast, emission cuts achieved with renewable energy will be more significant in an environment where less electricity is consumed.

Labor did not get enough praise for its policy of phasing out off-peak electric hot water, said the Greenpeace energy campaigner Ben Pearson. "It will have a much bigger impact than phasing out incandescent light bulbs," Mr Pearson said. "It is an attack on baseload power that really strips back demand for electricity."

Both the main parties have offered rebates to encourage homeowners to install solar or gas hot water, water tanks and insulation, but Mr Pearson said that lets government off the hook.

"Rebates are climate change for rich people. I don't have a couple of spare thousand dollars in my pocket to fund solar hot water on my roof while I wait to get the rebate back," he said.

"And it is still based on a philosophy that people must take individual action on climate change. No. The Government must say, 'Off-peak electricity is a crime against the planet and we are going to ban it'."

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A recipe for a clean and prosperous planet
Fiona Wain
September 19, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/a-recipe-for-a-clean-and-prosperous-planet/2007/09/19/1189881591167.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

AT the APEC leaders' meeting Prime Minister John Howard made significant international progress by getting participating countries, particularly China and United States, to agree to "aspirational" targets for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions cuts.

It is now time for the Australian Government to show further leadership and set clear targets for cuts in GHG emissions for this country. Environment Business Australia's report, Targets for our Future, released last week, calls on the Federal Government to adopt a cut of 60 per cent by 2050 with an interim target of 20 per cent by 2020. It also sets out a plan for doing this while boosting the economy and increasing jobs.

The report concludes that with a strong institutional framework and new policies the next great technological era can be fast-tracked. Australia is well placed to showcase how an energy intensive country can remain competitive and prosperous on the back of clean energy, renewable energy and energy efficiency measures.

A novel approach may be for Australia to "twin" with an energy-intensive developing country such as China, and encourage other major developed economies to have a similar bilateral agreement with a developing country.

In Australia energy efficiency could, by itself, deliver 20 per cent cuts with a 2 per cent per annum compound improvement across the economy. Waste reduction and recycling of materials, embodied energy, methane and soil carbon would achieve a further 10 per cent cuts.

Switching from coal to gas for electricity production could give a further 10 per cent. Moving onto renewable energy sources - solar thermal could deliver 10 per cent; geothermal 2 per cent; wave energy 2 per cent; photovoltaics 2 per cent; and wind 5 per cent. It is also anticipated that the renewable energy contribution would increase by 2030.

The deployment of these existing and near-horizon technologies requires new physical, financial and social infrastructure. This in turn requires a new strategy for transition to a clean energy economy over a 15 to 20 year timeframe. With the Australian community increasingly demanding meaningful action on climate change, the federal government has sufficient "political platform" to embark on the necessary structural overhaul of energy delivery.

As clean coal with carbon capture and storage, hydrogen and nuclear energy are longer-term technologies, the GHG emissions cuts they may deliver can be applied to the 2050 target.

The marketplace needs clear signals which only governments can provide by putting in place emissions trading and complementary measures. These should include outcome focused regulation; tax incentives and penalties; new standards; and mandated energy efficiency, renewable energy, and pollution/waste eradication targets. Such steps will allow the market to discover the price of carbon and help remove the perverse subsidies that give polluters an unfair advantage over companies that strive to remove environmental degradation from their business activities.

Governments must stop downplaying the environmental, economic and security risks of climate change and foster a new competitive advantage for companies (and countries).

A recent report by NASA scientist Dr Jim Hansen has emphasised that action is more urgent than previously thought. Once the planet reaches an average global warming of two degrees centigrade, "positive feedback loops" kick in, intensifying the melting of polar ice caps and glaciers and increasing emissions of methane (23 times more potent than carbon dioxide). Then it will be more difficult to avoid a three degrees rise in temperature, and the ecosystem services that support civilisation will start to break down.

The Australian environment industry employs over 146,000 people in more than 5,500 businesses. It is worth about $A20 billion to the economy and has the potential to double, or even triple, over the next decade if Australian companies can get a fair share of the US$750 billion existing global market and the additional anticipated US$750 billion market in clean and renewable energy.

According to the International Energy Agency in the next 25 years US$20 trillion will need to be invested in new energy.

Engaging the countries in APEC is a major step forward to increase trade in clean technologies that will help all economies become smarter, more efficient, and less polluting. At the same time these rapidly growing markets offer sufficient scope and scale to bring "cleantech" and renewable energies down their cost curve.

Increasing forest cover in the APEC region will not reduce the rate of emissions but is a vital mitigation tool to help deal with GHG emissions until they are brought under control. However, it is not a replacement for firm abatement targets and the technologies that can deliver the necessary cuts.

Fiona Wain is the chief executive of Environment Business Australia

LINK: http://www.environmentbusiness.com.au

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Finding the green solution to global climate crisis
Paul R. Epstein:
The Sacramento Bee
sacbee.com:
September 21, 2007

With weather turbulence turning heads on Wall Street, an emerging
call among evangelicals for "creation care" and a barrage of energy
bills on Capitol Hill, are we about to get serious about climate
change? Trimming energy use 60 percent to 80 percent, while priming
the economy and preserving the environment is the task we face.

California is, as usual, the pacesetter, and can invigorate the
Northeast Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative; and other governors
are grabbing hold of the mainsheets. But we need a national plan,
and may have just months before the next presidential election to
craft a solid one. What follows is a suggested framework for
overarching principles and financial and policy instruments for
implementing the plan.

Comparing life-cycle costs -- health, ecological and economic -- of
proposed solutions can separate safe solutions from those warranting
further study and those with prohibitive risks. Those serving
multiple goals merit a high rating.

Energy conservation, smart growth; a smart grid; plug-in hybrids;
heat capture from utilities (known as cogeneration); green
buildings; plus walking, biking and public transport can get us
halfway there -- and save money.

Distributed generation -- power produced near the point of use --
with solar, wind, wave, geothermal and fuel-cell power can be fed
into existing grids -- and generate income. (And geothermal heat
pumps provide air conditioning.)

Where energy is scarce, such systems can pump water, power clinics,
light homes, cook food and drive development. Clean distributed
generation power improves resilience in the face of weather extremes
(adaptation), reduces carbon emissions (mitigation) and creates jobs.

All fossil-fuel-based methods demand the utmost scrutiny, for their
exploration, extraction, refining, transport and combustion are
taking an enormous toll on human health, and ecological and social
systems. Burning coal and sequestrating CO2 underground may work in
restricted areas; but there are risks of lead and arsenic leaching
into groundwater, and limestone fractures causing leaks and releases
in quantities toxic to plants and animals.

Nuclear power is under consideration for a revival -- even among
some environmentalists and scientists, desperate for a solution, as
Earth's ice cover dissipates and wind patterns shift. But replacing
carbon pollution with radioactive pollution is hazardous. Safety may
be solvable; but security and storage may prove intractable. Meeting
a significant portion of energy needs with nuclear power would
generate enough radioactive waste to fill one Yucca Mountain (the
long-proposed site in Nevada for waste) every 5-10 years; and we've
yet to resolve the first.

Biofuels hold promise. But converting corn to ethanol may yield no
net energy gain, and while sugar ferments without added energy,
large plantations can deplete soils and groundwater. Using range
grasses, farm waste and grease does not displace edible crops, and
recycling garbage helps with disposal. But burning anything organic
produces CO2 and volatile organic compounds, which increases smog.

Green buildings with green environs create a critical syzygy,
aligning clean energy with sustainable forestry and green chemistry;
the last eschewing petrol-based carcinogens in the production of
carpets, paints, fertilizers and pesticides.

For central and regional power -- to complement distributed
generation -- the U.S. Energy Department projects that wind farms in
the Plains, solar thermal arrays in the Southwest and deep
geothermal in the Northwest could power the grid. And while it is
unrealistic to think we can meet our energy needs in the short run
without some fossil fuel use, natural gas offers the cleanest
burning, back-up source during the transition.

To make all this happen, corporations can -- and many have begun to
-- change their products and practices. Financial institutions --
with long-term perspectives -- have a pivotal role to play in
redirecting investments and insurance.

But governments must provide the incentives and the infrastructure.
Credits for clean-tech industries, progressive procurement practices
(e.g., for hybrid and electric car fleets) and tax benefits for
commercial models that defray upfront capital costs for distributed
power generators are among the carrots needed to launch infant
industries and drive market shifts. Aligning regulations and rewards
-- and dismantling financial and bureaucratic disincentives -- can
help erect the necessary scaffolding for the low carbon economy.

Fortunately, forces are converging. Concerned capital is emerging,
with companies worried about escalating damages and missed
opportunities. But the opportunities for building real wealth
(unlike the substantial paper wealth that recently evaporated) are
burgeoning and a stirred polity is demanding cleaner practices,
products and produce.

Finally, we must rejoin the international community and sign the
Kyoto Treaty. In its second phase (post 2012) a Global Fund for
Adaptation and Mitigation (climate stabilization) on the order of 1
percent of world output -- $350 billion a year, as called for by the
authoritative Stern Review -- would be a substantive investment in
our common future, and can make the clean energy transition a
win-win-win for energy, the environment and the global economy.

About the writer:

* Paul R. Epstein, M.D., M.P.H., is associate director of the
Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical
School.

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Greens say some renewable energy double-counted
Posted Fri Sep 14, 2007 3:02pm AEST
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/09/14/2033170.htm

The Greens have warned against the practice of double-counting the production of renewable energy.

They say the South Australian Government's targets on renewable energy should include only power generated and bought by consumers in SA.

State Greens MP Mark Parnell says renewable energy is sometimes counted by both the producer and the buyer, making appear that twice as much green power has been generated.

Mr Parnell says a large portion of Australia's wind-generated power is from South Australia.

"However it's being driven by investors interstate and those investors interstate are the ones who bought the credit that comes from those green power plants so I think we need to make sure that we don't claim credit for things we're not entitled to," he said.

He says, in Western Australia, the Government says its desalination plant is powered by wind energy, but the credits have been bought by another company.

"So when it comes to South Australia's proposed desalination plant, we need to make sure that there is brand new green electricity generated to power that plant," he said.

"If all that we do is claim that we're using green power from somewhere else then really that could lead to double counting and that's dishonest."

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Winds of change blowing through energy policy
Matthew Warren, Greenchip | September 10, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22389316-23850,00.html

AUSTRALIA is in the middle of a revolution in energy policy driven by the threat of dangerous climate change.

Whatever the outcome of the looming federal election, Australia will have a national emissions trading scheme operating from around 2011, based on economic analysis to be completed next year.

But it is generally agreed that trading alone will not be enough to deliver the deep cuts in greenhouse gases required both here and overseas.

Along with the debate over privatisation of government-owned energy generation and retail assets, the next big climate change policy debate confronting Australia will be about shaping a comprehensive industry strategy for energy.

The stakes are high. Energy users have already forecast that up to $75 billion of new-generation infrastructure will be needed by 2030 to achieve emissions cuts and increase supply to sustain economic growth. Business accepts the change, but wants it at the lowest possible cost and has started to weigh in to the debate.

At the heart of the current debate is renewable energy, which holds an iconic status in the hearts and minds of Australians. This has already encouraged the creation of a national mandatory renewable energy target (MRET) of 9500 gigawatt hours or about 2 per cent of national supply. Much of this has been taken up by improvements and expansion of hydro schemes.

The Howard Government decided in 2004 not to go with an independent review recommending a doubling of the target by 2020, saying the expansion would cost the economy $5 billion by 2020.

That's because the cheapest form of new renewable energy - wind power - costs about double that of coal-fired power without any price on emissions. Mandating renewable energy means either subsidising the extra supply until it becomes cheaper, or the introduction of a price on greenhouse emissions levels out the playing field.

As the debate on climate change has warmed up since last year, four state governments have committed to MRETs of up to 15 per cent over the next decade. Labor environment spokesman Peter Garrett said at the National Press Club last week that a Rudd government would "substantially" increase the national MRET, most likely to rationalise this jigsaw of state targets in play.

The renewable energy industry is the big winner from an expanded MRET and there are sites ready to go if the policy changes. But MRET should really be called MWET, because wind is the cheapest and easiest type of renewable energy.

The Energy Supply Association, which includes companies with fossil fuel and renewables, has warned that there are physical barriers to deploying enough capacity by 2020. They estimate a 25 per cent target would need more than 4500 two-megawatt wind turbines and 20 biomass generators as well as 30 new gas-fired base load plants and 12 new efficient coal-fired power stations.

They suggest that not until 2020 will there be sufficient development of low and zero-emission technologies to make the big cuts at the lowest cost.

From the Prime Minister's Task Group to the renewable energy industry, it is agreed that a price on carbon needs to be supported by aggressive strategies to accelerate development and drive costs down in the broad suite of clean technologies including wind, solar, clean coal, geothermal and biomass.

A new coalition of leading Australian companies, the Australian Business and Climate Group (ABCG), has released a paper flagging the need for urgent development of a national Low Emission Technology Strategy.

ABCG comprises a wide range of blue-chip companies including Deloitte, Anglo Coal, BP Australia, Mirvac, Rio Tinto, Santos, Swiss Re, VicSuper and Westpac. They have proposed a diverse range of incentives including capital grants, tax incentives, accelerated depreciation, dedicated funds for research and development and financing for demonstration plants.

Importantly, they did not recommend mandatory renewable targets, instead warning governments not to "pick winners" or adopt technology-specific outcomes.

Their concern is that government assistance to deploy high-cost technologies now is not the most cost-effective way of reducing emissions.

Instead governments would be better placed helping to foster development of all low-emission technologies, including gas and clean coal, to drive down costs and find out as quickly as possible which ones are likely to deliver.

The Howard Government has already spent $500 million on developing a portfolio of low-emission technologies, which are skewed heavily towards clean coal technologies as well as providing a much publicised leg-up for the world's biggest solar power station. It has come under criticism for picking its own winners through this process, although perhaps a fairer read is that the terms of the program were too narrow, with only projects that have reached the demonstration and deployment stages eligible for funding.

From the scale of the challenge ahead, $500 million also looks like a drop in the ocean. It's not going to be cheap. Let the spending begin.

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Green power surges despite the cost
By Wendy Frew
August 13, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/green-power-surges-despite-the-cost/2007/08/12/1186857344146.html

AUSTRALIANS are sending green power sales surging despite a lack of Federal Government support for renewable energy.

Nearly 8 per cent of all Australian households pay more for their electricity to ensure it is environmentally friendly.

For the average Australian family, a 100 per cent commitment to green power could cost as much as an extra $400 a year. Those buying 10 per cent green power, the minium offered by energy retailers, add more than $50 a year to their electricity bills.

Enthusiasm for renewable energy has prevented nearly 4.2 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions entering the atmosphere every year, according to the GreenPower office.

"That's equivalent to taking 930,000 cars off the road and is five times the emission reduction achieved by the Federal Government's phase-out of incandescent light bulbs," said Australian Conservation Foundation campaigner Tony Mohr.

Householders who buy green power are paying for a certain amount of electricity to come from a renewable, clean source.

Mr Mohr warned the Government and the Opposition not to squander the public's efforts.

"The Federal Government needs to catch up with ordinary Australians by committing to 25 per cent green power for Australia by 2020," he said.

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CLEAN ENERGY - BIOFUELS

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Biofuel hot issue in marginals
Save Settings
Mathew Warren | November 19, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22780222-7583,00.html

THEY may not realise it now, but on Saturday the residents of key marginal electorates will be voting not only on the future of the country, but the future of Australia's biofuel industry.
If the election comes down to the wire, a Howard Government will need the support of two independents: Tony Windsor from Tamworth in NSW and Bob Katter from the sugar seat of Kennedy in northwest Queensland. Local and favourite issues will suddenly adopt national significance.

Katter has declared an increase in support for a biofuels industry in Australia as one of his top priorities. The substitution of conventional fossil fuels like petrol and diesel with those derived from crops sounds too good to ignore: a new source of greenhouse-friendly fuel that reduces the Australian economy's reliance on increasingly expensive oil imports, and creates jobs and investment in northwest Queensland along with other parts of regional Australia.

These benefits of biofuels seem obvious, but the costs are less tangible, more remote and generally borne by others. This epic simplicity has lured politicians throughout the developed world, only to see them now moderate their rhetoric when they spot the dark clouds hanging above the silver lining.

The fundamental promise of biofuels is to substitute energy sourced from stocks of finite and depleting fossil fuel reserves for flows of renewable and replaceable energy derived from agricultural production.

Biofuels are fossil fuels, only much less energy dense.

Coal and oil reserves are so lucrative because they contain the energy of millions of years of organic matter in a relatively small space. That means to create a comparable flow of energy every year from biofuels requires a lot of resources: between 1500 and 4600 litres of water to produce one litre of ethanol derived from sugar cane, wheat or corn.

The International Energy Agency estimates 43 per cent of all US crop land would be needed to supply just 10 per cent of its automotive and diesel requirements by 2020. Energy-scarce Europe has mandated 5.75 per cent use of biofuels by 2010, requiring 20 per cent of its crop land to be diverted from food to fuel.

As a result, food commodity prices are now driven by energy prices. On the back of global unseasonal events tightening food supply, about 20 per cent of last year's US corn crop was diverted to make ethanol, sending corn prices skyrocketing and pushing up related food prices.

That's great news for growers but not so good for everyone else. Higher food prices help fuel inflation and interest rates in Australia. That's a pain, but not nearly as rough as households in developing countries which spend up to 60 per cent of their disposable incomes on food.

It's also a problem for the biofuels industry. As it expands it pushes up the price of its raw materials, which means it is no more competitive now against fossil fuels with oil prices at about $US100 a barrel than at half the price. Four biodiesel plants in Australia have suspended production in the past year and ethanol producer AgriEnergy has decided not to proceed with a new plant in Victoria.

Given biofuels are posed as a solution to climate change, the extra demand they place on water and arable land is also counter-intuitive, because these resources will only become more scarce in a warming climate. There are already reports of accelerated land clearing in the high energy yielding rainforests of Brazil and Indonesia to feed this growing demand for fuel crops such as sugar and palm oil.

Biofuels policy in the US is still playing neatly into domestic farm politics and the paranoia about its dependency on the Middle East for much of its energy. The most likely next US president, Hilary Clinton, announced earlier this month her strategy to address climate change, which included lifting biofuel production 10-fold to 60 million gallons a year by 2030.

Last week, the Coalition promised $24 million towards expanding the ethanol industry and finding new plant materials from which to make biofuels. The industry was underwhelmed, wanting mandatory use of biodiesel and ethanol to guarantee markets for its members. Who wouldn't?

Its concern is that Australia risks missing out on exploiting the improved potential of second-generation technology that is under development. This promises to diminish many of the current problems by using non-food biomass such as wood wastes, pulps and grain stalks. There are still likely to be issues of substitution for these markets, and the cost of the new fuels is even more prohibitive. The greenhouse gases generated in the production process are lower than for most current biofuels.

Like the growing suite of other new technologies, there appears to be a strong case for assisting in the accelerated development of these new technologies, which is exactly what has been promised. It's harder to make the case that subsidising current biofuels will help deliver this technology jump, any more than renewable energy targets that drive installation of wind energy will help drive down the cost of solar or geothermal energy.

That's an elegant argument for Bob Katter's constituency, whose best hopes appear to rest on a thrilling election night.

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CLEAN ENERGY - FEDERAL GOVERNMENT ANNOUNCEMENT

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Clean targets lift wind farms
Adele Ferguson | September 29, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22500593-643,00.html

AUSTRALIA'S $2 billion wind farm industry is set for exponential growth following this week's release of higher clean energy targets, with investment plans being dusted off around the country.

Tasmanian-based Roaring 40s yesterday said it would reverse last year's decision to suspend operations in Australia -- in favour of building wind farms in China -- because of a lack of regulatory support.

Roaring 40s told The Weekend Australian it would now invest almost $600 million in two wind farm projects next year in Tasmania and South Australia.

This would create about 300 jobs for both areas, as well as providing a supplementary income to Australia's drought-ridden farms, which can lease some of their land to the wind farm operators.

Companies such as Babcock & Brown Wind Partners and Pacific Hydro now predict the wind farm industry will become a $16 billion industry in the next few years, following the Howard Government's decision this week to lift the nation's "clean energy target" to 15 per cent of all energy by 2020.

Until now, the industry has been floundering as it tried to convince a sceptical investment community of the merits of wind power in Australia, particularly given its cost disadvantage compared to coal-fired power.

But last week's change of heart by the federal Government, promising 30,000 gigawatt hours of zero-emission and near-zero-emission electricity by 2020, coupled with an imminent announcement by the Australian Labor Party on its clean energy policy targets, should put a rocket up the industry.

A spokesman for Roaring 40s told The Australian that the Prime Minister's Clean Energy Target (CET) was a step in the right direction.

"What we are seeing is recognition from both sides of parliament that, along with emissions trading, additional measures are required to support renewable and clean energy technologies in the short to medium term.

"The CET has the potential to provide this type of support. However, further analysis of the detail of the scheme is required to determine what the direct benefits to the industry will be."

The CET involves a penalty to electricity wholesalers if they do not use a certain amount of renewable energy. This gives a boost to the power industry and will trigger new projects.

Roaring 40s will start construction of a $300 million wind farm at Musselroe, in northeast Tasmania, and a $260 million wind farm at Waterloo in the mid-north of South Australia.

Companies including B&B Wind, which is listed in Australia and is the fourth-biggest wind power company in the world, will also take advantage of the decision by both political parties to encourage the electricity industry to use more renewable energy.

Clean Energy Council chief executive Dominique la Fontaine said that under the Howard Government's CET, wholesalers were required to purchase a certain amount of electricity from clean energy sources. A price was set and if they did not purchase clean energy, they had to pay a penalty.

"They pay more for clean electricity, and that gives them an incentive to invest," she said.

The cost of coal is about $35 to $40 per megawatt hour, while the cost of clean energy is about $80 per megawatt hour.

NSW and Victoria will be the beneficiaries of other new wind farms to be constructed by B&B Wind.

The move comes as the Queensland Government formalises a short list of bidders to buy its four wind farm assets. The more favourable environment for renewable energy is expected to increase the asking price of the wind farms by $100 million to about $400 million.

B&B Wind Partners chief executive officer Miles George said that given the regulatory changes, both state and federal, his company could build a $300 million plant in NSW as soon as next year, and there were another three sites around the country that could be developed.

Mr George said B&B leased land for the wind farms from South Australian and West Australian farmers. He said farmers were paid $5000 to $10,000 for each machine, and farms usually hosted at least four turbines over a 25-year lease.

At its biggest wind farm in Australia, Lake Bonney, which is near Millicent in South Australia, it spends about $500,000 a year renting land from farmers.

B&B has three wind farms in Australia, representing 40 per cent of the wind farm market. Mr George said Australia had one of the best wind resources in the world and had the potential to turn into a $16 billion industry.

There are 817 megawatts of installed wind capacity in Australia with another 6785 megawatts proposed. Mr George said: "It is a modest target of 800 megawatts. Australia has the potential to be 10 times that, which is equivalent to $16 billion, but it will take a few years to get to that level."

At the same time, Australia's largest retail energy supplier, AGL Energy, acquired the development rights to a 71 megawatt wind farm in South Australia. The proposed Hallett Hill project will be located just 20km from the 95 megawatt Hallett wind farm now being built by AGL at a cost of $236 million.

By the end of the decade, AGL hopes to be operating 134 wind turbines in South Australia with a combined capacity of 255 megawatts. And it has under consideration investment in a further 400 megawatts of wind generation.

The imminent boom in wind farms flies in the face of comments by the federal Tourism Minister Fran Bailey earlier this week, who claimed wind power was largely unsustainable and that there was no evidence it was a feasible alternative energy source. She also said the noise levels of wind turbines were "incredibly high".

Mr George described Ms Bailey's comments as "ignorant". Ms Bailey broke ranks with the Coalition the day after it released its clean energy policy, and said wind power was largely unsustainable. She was quoted as saying the farms were "noisy" and "an eyesore".

Mr George said his company used to take busloads of people to Lake Bonney to hear for themselves how quiet the wind turbines were. He also said wind power was part of a global phenomenon, as global warming and clean fuels gained more attention, with oil giants such as Shell and BP becoming two of the world's top generators of wind power.

He blamed most opposition on "ignorance", saying that about 30 per cent of all new generation capacity in Europe in the past five years had been wind-powered.

"And in Australia our wind resource is two to three times as good as Europe," he added.

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CLEAN ENERGY - WAVE POWER + DESALINATION

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New-wave technology offers power from the deep
Conrad Walters
September 3, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/newwave-technology-offers-power-from-the-deep/2007/09/02/1188671797016.html

A PATCH of sea the size of the Sydney Cricket Ground could generate enough power for 25,000 homes, say the backers of a technology that converts the motion of the ocean into electricity.

The system, known as Ceto, uses the energy from waves to harvest power - with zero greenhouse gases - and has been labelled as a potential "holy grail" of renewable energy by the Federal Minister for Industry, Ian Macfarlane.

A Ceto prototype has been operating successfully off Fremantle for several years, and the Carnegie Corporation, which owns the rights to Ceto in the southern hemisphere, was in Sydney last week to discuss funding for a full-scale wave farm on the Australian coast.

"We want to select the first site within three months," the managing director of Carnegie, Michael Ottaviano, said. The company needs up to $500 million to build its facility in 2009.

While most wave systems sit on the water's surface, Ceto collects energy by tethering rows of buoys to the sea floor. As the buoys sway, they pump high-pressure water to shore and spin turbines for power.

And because Ceto sends water - not electricity, as other systems do - it can also be used for desalination, which requires high pressure to force water through the membranes used in reverse-osmosis desalination. If deployed fully for desalination instead of power, a 300-unit Ceto wave farm could produce 50 billion litres of drinking water per year, or about 10 per cent of the annual needs of metropolitan Sydney, Dr Ottaviano said.

The Ceto buoys can operate in a two-metre swell, which bodes well for domestic needs. "Most of the southern half of Australia receive two-metre swells for at least 90 per cent of the time." This is well beyond other renewable energy sources which depend on the sun being visible for solar power or a breeze for wind farms.

So far, the system has held up well under independent scrutiny from the Centre for Water Research at the University of Western Australia. "We've grilled them a couple times about different aspects of the technical side and the environmental side," the centre's deputy director, Jason Antenucci, said.

"We've been pretty impressed. It seems to be robust."

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Trust plan to turn the tide on power from Port Phillip
Peter Hannam, Miki Perkins
October 14, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/trust-plan-to-turn-the-tide-on-power-from-port-phillip/2007/10/13/1191696241449.html

PORT Phillip Heads may become a world-leading test site for tidal power if the managers of historic Commonwealth land at Point Nepean get their way.

Seawater surges in and out of Port Phillip Bay at up to nine knots, making the heads an attractive site for submerged power turbines.

"It's not only establishing some generating capacity here but it's quite possibly establishing … a place that can be an ongoing test bed for the technology," Point Nepean Community Trust chairman Simon McKeon said.

The trust revealed details of the tidal-power concept, as part of a wider plan for the 90 hectares, at an on-site public consultation day at the former quarantine station yesterday. About 120 people attended. The $10 million plan includes Melbourne University's proposed National Centre for Coast and Climate, an aquarium with a public discovery laboratory, a tourist centre and an army-style obstacle course.

Initial surveys indicate the best location for tidal-power turbines may be near the heads, or about three kilometres from the site's main buildings.

The site became mired in controversy in 2003 when the Federal Government decided first to sell, then to lease, it. It sparked a community campaign that forced the Government to abandon commercial plans in favour of turning the site into a national park in 2009.

While the trust is yet to do a detailed financial or environmental study, a turbine with a 100-kilowatt capacity would cost about $700,000, or about the same as a medium-sized wind turbine.

A pilot plant would supply as much as 30 per cent of the trust area's power.

"My dream is that we feed back into the grid, and we're not going to do that with a few bucks," said Mr McKeon, who is also executive chairman of the Melbourne office of Macquarie Bank.

Tidal power was likely to be more efficient than wind power, given the greater reliability of sea currents, said William Hollier, director of applied research institute EnGen Institute. He said research in Canada had also suggested that seven-metre high sea-based turbine blades were less dangerous to wildlife than wind equivalents.

Kate Baillieu, a local community campaigner, was more sceptical, noting that previous trust plans for the area had come to nothing.

The plan also revealed that the site would host a quarantine museum, conference centre and restaurant.

Mr McKeon said some of the facilities would be tendered and run by the private sector, but public access to the site would not be restricted.

"There won't be fences or security guards preventing the free flow of the public … people will be able to meander through this extraordinary historic township," he said.

At the eastern end of the site, six eco-cabins would be built as respite accommodation for carers of disabled people. A benefactor has underwritten the $10 million cost of the cabins.

http://www.pointnepeantrust.org

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CLEAN ENERGY + FOSSIL FUELS IN NSW

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Clean alternatives ignored: green groups
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
September 12, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/clean-alternatives-ignored-green-groups/2007/09/11/1189276719703.html

GREEN groups yesterday despaired at any progress being made to cut NSW's rising greenhouse gas emissions after the Iemma Government's Owen inquiry ignored the potential for energy efficiency and renewable energy to provide NSW's future electricity needs.

They also warned that the inquiry's recommendations to privatise electricity retailers and generators would make it near impossible to curb soaring consumer demand for electricity.

Professor Tony Owen said NSW would need new coal or gas-fired power plants by 2013-14 to meet demand for electricity. He said privatising electricity assets would make it easier for the private sector to invest in new power plants, and recommended the Government remove caps on electricity prices.

Professor Owen's report was a predictable response to a loaded question, said Greenpeace's spokesman, Ben Pearson.

"The choice between coal and gas is a false choice for the climate. If we are to avoid dangerous climate change, we need instead to drive investment in renewables and energy efficiency," he said.

NSW could sidestep the construction of a new coal or gas-fired power station simply by banning the installation of electric off-peak hot water systems in NSW homes, according to separate research done by several universities and the NSW Greens.

The director of the Total Environment Centre, Jeff Angel, also accused Professor Owen of failing to properly evaluate the contribution that could be made by energy efficiency.

"As a result, it is only half a report and wrongly recommends a new baseload power station on an early time frame," said Mr Angel. "A well-funded and strategic energy efficiency program could replace the need for an existing power station and defer the need for another, until greener alternatives are available."

Renewable energy companies also rejected Professor Owen's baseload recommendations.

"Renewable and clean power generation and energy efficiency can provide more than twice our expected growth in electricity needs to 2020," said the chief executive of the Clean Energy Council, Dominique La Fontaine.

"NSW simply does not have to choose between reliable, affordable power and a cleaner environment. We can have both."

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Winds of climate change blow
Matthew Warren | August 27, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22313101-21147,00.html

ON Friday the NSW Government is expected to receive Professor Tony Owen's report on the future of electricity supply in the state.
How quickly the report is made public and what the Government does with it will be critical indicators of the direction of energy and climate change politics in Australia.

Underpinned by a suite of state-owned coal-fired power stations, NSW enjoys some of the cheapest electricity in the world.

Both the Carr and Iemma governments have been prevaricating since 2001 on the future of electricity supply in the state.

Back then, the Ministry of Energy and Utilities issued its Statement of System Opportunities, which dealt with most of the same questions put to Professor Owen.

And in six years of indecision, the state's capacity surplus has been eaten up by growing demand on the back of continued economic growth.

As the National Generators Forum flagged last week, the removal of this buffer in the national electricity market has increased price volatility and amplified exposure of generators to short-term events such as water shortages in a drought.

Solid rains have brought wholesale prices almost back to normal after they skyrocketed in June, but the warning is clear: the good times of stable, cheap electricity prices are over.

Former premier Bob Carr came very close to announcing a ban on new coal-fired power at the ALP's 2005 state conference.

Morris Iemma is more equivocal, but the politics and economics only get harder over time.

In a speech this month, he said the Government faced the choice between new coal or gas base-load investment to avoid future supply shortages.

New coal-fired power will keep a lid on prices but could seriously undermine Labor's image as being more trusted to deal with climate change.

Backing gas will push up wholesale prices by almost 30 per cent, well in advance of any future price on greenhouse emissions, make business hostile and send them looking elsewhere.

Results from government-owned generators Delta and Macquarie Generation, via Professor Owen, have told Mr Iemma to stop being a wimp and build a new coal-fired power station.

They argue new coal will be more efficient and cheap enough to cope with a price on emissions.

New coal generation can also be air-cooled, reducing its exposure to water shortages - but also reducing its efficiency.

Gas will be better placed to handle a rising price on greenhouse emissions because it generates them at about half the rate of coal, but as base-load it will significantly drive up the dispatch price for all electricity.

With the imminent decline of the Moomba gas fields, there are questions about supply that may be allayed by exploiting coal seam methane reserves in Queensland, linked by a $140 million pipeline being built by AGL and Epic Energy.

Mr Iemma said the choice between coal and gas would depend on a future price of greenhouse emissions, which would be determined by the scale of short-term emissions targets to 2020, set in a national emissions-trading scheme.

Although Mr Iemma took a swipe at the federal Government for failing to set these targets, he knows a Labor government has promised the same process and timetable.

The spin of climate change becomes more brazen every day.

Base-load power may be the star of the Owen Review, but NSW Treasurer Michael Costa will not be surprised to discover the review has triggered heated debate about market privatisation and deregulation.

The energy industry and its customers have vented more than a little spleen over the unworkability of existing constraints on electricity markets across Australia.

Retail prices are still fixed by governments, and governments still own almost all generating capacity in NSW and Queensland, and much of it in Western Australia.

Already one small electricity retailer has hit the wall, squeezed between hot wholesale and fixed retail prices.

At one stage, government-owned retailer Energy Australia was losing $10 million a week.

Hedging should minimise the problem, but the industry believes the risks are unnecessary and act as a disincentive to new entrants in the retail sector and new private investment in generation.

The introduction and gradual increase of a price on greenhouse emissions will make life tough for renewable generators early on, and tough for coal later.

The lowest risk and lowest cost solution is to allow energy companies to manage the transition by owning a portfolio of generation assets (some coal, some gas, some renewables) and adjusting its investment over time.

Although untenable on principle to the unions, this would mean selling remaining government-owned power utilities and allowing the market to do what it does best: sort out the detail.

This would serve also to reduce unhelpful and increasingly devious policy competition between energy sectors, and accelerate the eventual clean-out of different renewable-energy targets and other schemes that have flourished in the political vacuum of a national strategy on energy and climate change.

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Washing away the base load myth with solar hot water

Media release: 10 September 2007

The Greens released their analysis that shows that NSW can avoid the
massive cost and greenhouse gas emissions from a new base load power
station if electric off-peak water heating is phased out.

Greens NSW MP John Kaye said: “The Iemma government is being panicked
into electricity industry privatisation and a new, expensive and
polluting base load power station by the supposed threat of blackouts.

“There is no capacity gap that cannot be met by increasing energy
efficiency.

“Using highly conservative assumptions we found that replacing
inefficient off-peak electric water heaters with solar, heat pumps or
gas would reduce base load demand to a level where no new plant would be
needed for many years to come.

“A ban on the sale of off-peak units and providing interest free loans
to cover the increased cost to the consumer of high efficiency units
would be a cost-effective and low emissions way of meeting future
demand.

“More than 70 thousand electric off-peak units fail each year and need
replacing.

“Ensuring that the new water heaters are high efficiency units
including gas, solar and heat pumps would cut base load by more than 109
MW each year.

“After three years of replacing worn out off-peak units with new high
efficiency water heaters, overnight load would be reduced by more than
327 MW which is the 2011 supply gap that the Iemma government used to
justify the Owen Inquiry.

“The total cost to government would be less than $5 million a year.

“Apart from avoiding billions of dollars tied up in an expensive base
load plant, our analysis showed that phasing out off peak hot water
would save at least 537 thousand tonnes of CO2 each year.

“The Iemma government put the wrong questions to the Owen Inquiry and
will get back answers that drive the state to new base load plants and
privatisation.

“The Greens urge the Iemma government to abandon ship on the Owen
Inquiry and work with households to reduce demand and emissions,” Dr
Kaye said.

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CLEAN ENERGY - ENERGY EFFICIENCY / INEFFICIENCY

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Insulation begs for attention
Matthew Warren | October 22, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22625851-21147,00.html

SO far in the bells and whistles election campaign on climate change, it's been all Hollywood. We've been variously promised ratification of Kyoto and bans on incandescent lightbulbs and electric water heaters.
There are very generous rebates on rooftop solar cells and hot water systems, promises of "clean" coal, giant solar power stations and mandatory wind farms slicing up our big southern skies. Distilled into the current election super cycle, the politics of climate change seems to be all about bright shiny new toys and the rhetoric of dynamic action.

In the real world, the first cab off the rank remains the dowdier and less expensive little brother of these hi-tech solutions, energy efficiency.

New modelling released last month by the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics estimates that saving energy by using more efficient technology in industry and households will deliver more than half of its projected total greenhouse cuts by 2050. Earlier this year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change identified changes in energy use in buildings as the biggest potential for mitigation of emissions. The Property Council recently joined forces with the Australian Conservation Foundation to look more closely at this for Australia. The analysis by the Centre for International Economics found that the building sector as a whole could cut emissions by up to 35 per cent by 2050, all using proven technologies, while still allowing for expected growth in building construction.

The biggest savings for households would come from better refrigeration and water heating, while commercial buildings save the most from smarter heating and cooling and more energy-efficient equipment, all delivering long-run cost savings.

Global consultant Mckinsey & Co said that common and garden variety insulation topped the list as the most cost-effective way to cut emissions.

The insulation council represents CSR subsidiary Bradford & Fletcher Building brands ecopink and insulco. They have been pounding the corridors in Canberra to make the case for insulating the remaining 40 per cent of houses in Australia still without it. Deloittes estimates that the cost of the energy saved in these 2.7 million houses would by 2020 pay for the $3 billion needed to insulate them, while eliminating around 30 million tonnes of greenhouse gases. Despite this, the word "insulation" does not appear once in the federal Government's recent "Climate Clever" advertising campaign.

Part of the problem is that no one actually knows where these houses are, which is an issue addressed by a national energy audit of residential and commercial buildings. Educated guesses suggest most of these are rental dwellings, highlighting one of the key problems of reducing emissions from leased buildings: the cost is borne by the owner while the benefits are enjoyed by the tenant.

Last week, the International Energy Agency released a new publication that attempts to define and quantify the extent of this Principal-Agent (PA) problem as a barrier to increased investment in energy efficiency.

They found that the main barriers to driving energy efficiency remain its relatively low priority for most households and companies, compared to the cost of other factors, especially labour, for most firms. Energy costs in Australia are still only about 2.5 per cent of household expenses, 1.6 per cent of commercial expenses and less than 3 per cent of commercial costs.

Owners of buildings and equipment have weak incentives to make their assets more efficient. Blunt regulation like banning technologies such as electric hot-water systems may just encourage owners to switch to another low-cost solution, like LPG tanks, which are cheap to install but expensive to run.

Solutions will need to be elegant and tailored to solve specific problems - for instance, using more transparent market signals like comprehensive ratings for properties and more elegant regulation which addresses the widely different circumstances of every home and building.

But who is going to make the argument? While other sectors in the energy policy debate have formed and re-formed themselves into effective agencies to lobby at an industry level, energy efficiency is poorly defined.

Its supporters range from manufacturers of low-tech building products like insulation and double-glazing to hi-tech companies like Bluglass, which is working to commercialise new super-efficient lighting that uses light emitting diodes (LED). It includes global appliance manufacturers and a handful of fast-growing technical consultants like Energetics and Big Switch driving micro-reform of energy use in larger manufacturing and service companies.

Addressing problems described as pervasive, disbursed and complex looks as if it's going to have to wait until the election is over. Only five weeks to go.

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Climate roadblocks
Tim Colebatch
September 15, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/an-uneasy-drive-towards-energy-efficiency/2007/09/14/1189276986810.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

FOR years, the world has grown increasingly aware of the risks of global warming. Companies, households and governments, you would think, have been stepping up action on "no regrets" measures to improve their energy efficiency, saving money and emissions at the same time.

Not so. The International Energy Agency this week revealed the exact reverse. At least up to 2004, rising awareness that an environmental crisis could be about to hit us had far less impact on the decisions we made than the cattle prod of oil price hikes had in the 1970s and '80s.

Between 1973 and 1990, the IEA estimates, before climate change really entered political debate, the Western world was increasing its energy efficiency by 2 per cent a year. Yet between 1990 and 2004, with climate change increasingly obvious but energy prices comfortably low, our growth in energy efficiency slowed to 0.9 per cent a year, albeit rising towards the end.

In some areas, we went backwards. In the US, for example, the West's most inefficient cars in fuel use became even more inefficient as Hummers and other SUVs replaced Chevrolets in American driveways. By 2004, the average new American car had become the symbol of the nation's obesity, weighing almost two tonnes, and using almost twice as much fuel per kilometre as the average new car in France.

In manufacturing, by contrast, intense global competition helped drive rapid improvements in energy efficiency, especially in the US, Canada, Sweden and Finland.

While manufacturing output rose 31 per cent between 1990 and 2004, in the West generally, energy use rose just 3 per cent and carbon dioxide emissions by just 1 per cent.

The services sector also improved its energy efficiency by 17 per cent over that period. But households and the transport sector recorded very little improvement: 11 per cent for households, 9 per cent for freight transport and just 7 per cent for passenger transport.

The IEA report, Energy Use in the New Millennium: trends in IEA countries, sees this lost focus on energy efficiency two ways: as a lost opportunity in the past, but a big opportunity for the future. Had the West just kept increasing energy efficiency by 2 per cent a year after 1990, it would have saved enough to meet the growth in demand with room to spare. Energy use in 2004 would have been less than in 1990 (and pressures on prices considerably less!). To give ourselves "a realistic chance of achieving a more sustainable future", the report says, we need to get back to what we were doing between 1973 and 1990.

As a stocktake, it does not draw policy conclusions, but the way it presents the facts leaves little doubt. Just as rising oil prices in the '70s put the whip on companies, governments and households to force greater efficiency, so effective carbon pricing is needed to drive a new wave of reforms, such as the emissions trading schemes in place or in planning in Europe, Australia and half the US.

The report was commissioned by G8 leaders at the 2005 Gleneagles summit, when they pledged to transform the way the West uses energy, as a key weapon in the fight against climate change.

As the IEA has frequently pointed out, over the next generation to 2030, energy efficiency is where the big gains can be made. After that, the hope is in new technology.

The report effectively confirms that analysis, revealing huge variations between countries in energy use, showing that big rises in energy efficiency are feasible without driving countries into poverty. For example:

■Americans use twice as much fuel in their cars as Australians and Canadians, three times as much as the Germans, and four times as much as the Japanese, French and Norwegians — all of whom enjoy a pretty good standard of living.

■By contrast, when it comes to space heating, it is the Germans, French and Italians who are the most inefficient. Germans use 167 megajoules a year to heat each square metre of their homes, and Italians 144 MJ. Yet the Norwegians use just 67 MJ per square metre and the Canadians 80. Do the Norwegians and Canadians go cold? No. The IEA attributes the difference to higher building standards in countries where it's seriously cold. "This is partly due to higher levels of insulation, as well as a larger share of central heating, which is generally more energy efficient," it says.

■But efficiency per square metre has to be weighed against the number of square metres each household uses. Americans use 70 square metres per head while Canadians use 48, and the French, British and Japanese use about 36. The trend in every country has been to increase personal space, which will be difficult to match with aspirational goals to halve greenhouse gas emissions, unless energy research makes rapid progress.

■While energy use for space heating, water heating and cooking has remained steady — with rising demand met by rising efficiency — energy-hungry appliances drove the growth in household consumption. The spread of wide-screen plasma and LCD TVs, freezers, dishwashers, personal computers, sound systems and home electronics generally easily cancelled out the significant efficiency gains in the design of refrigerators and washing machines.

■Most IEA countries helped restrain emissions between 1990 and 2004 by moving to less carbon-intensive ways of generating electricity, such as gas, wind and hydro. Australia went the opposite way, and by 2004, a kilowatt hour of electricity generated more carbon dioxide here than in any other Western country: about 840 grams, or 10 times as much as in nuclear-powered France, and 20 times as much as in nuclear and hydro-powered Sweden.

Overall, Australia emerged as the most carbon-intensive country in the West, even more than the US, producing three times as much carbon per dollar of gross domestic product as Norway and Sweden. That is partly explained by its specialisation in energy-intensive resource processing such as aluminium, partly by its dependence on coal, partly by its inefficient use of transport and partly because, on almost every measure, energy is very cheap here, and so it is wasted.

It is an interesting background to the big debate begun in NSW this week on what fuel the state's next base-load power station (if any) should use.

A report to the Iemma Government by Curtin University energy specialist Tony Owen narrowed the choice to gas and coal, but set the hares running in another direction by urging the privatisation of the state's generators and electricity retailers.

But while the IEA was producing its big-picture stocktake in its corner of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development headquarters in Paris, its landlord and big sister was zeroing in on a smaller but increasingly important debate: the future of biofuels.

In a new report — Biofuels: is the cure worse than the disease? — OECD researchers Richard Doornbosch and Ronald Steenblik warn that Western governments could be making a serious policy error in encouraging the conversion of cropland to grow biofuels.

A paper prepared for the OECD's round table on sustainable development, it estimates that in Australia specifically, the federal, NSW and Queensland governments could be spending up to $1679 for every tonne of greenhouse gas emissions avoided by producing subsidised ethanol, and up to $639 for every tonne avoided to subsidised biodiesel.

It argues that while some ethanol and biodiesel technologies work, others do not. Governments should take a hard look at each case to assess whether projects stack up environmentally, economically and on a humanitarian scale when they involve conversion of farmland from food to fuel.

"Among current technologies, only sugar cane to ethanol in Brazil, ethanol produced as a byproduct of cellulose production, and manufacture of biodiesel from animal fats and used cooking oil, can substantially reduce greenhouse gases," it concludes.

"The other conventional biofuel technologies typically deliver greenhouse gas reductions of less than 40 per cent compared with their fossil fuel technologies."

If its sums are right, that's a very expensive way to fight global warming.

http://www.iea.org

http://www.oecd.org.

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CLEAN ENERGY - WIND POWER

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Wind fires desal water plant
Article from: The Daily Telegraph
By Joe Hildebrand, Political Reporter
October 15, 2007 12:00am
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22584625-5006009,00.html

SYDNEY'S controversial desalination plant will be supplied with power from 75 wind turbines from as many as six wind farms to be built across the state.

The $1.7 billion project will demand almost one-fifth of the country's wind-generated energy, providing the biggest ever boost to the state's green energy industry.

Water Utilities Minister Nathan Rees will today issue a request for proposals from energy suppliers to power the 400,000MwH plant.

It follows a briefing by Sydney Water to 22 renewable energy providers earlier this month about supplying green energy to power Sydney's desalination plant.

Mr Rees said proposals would be accepted from any provider accredited to supply clean, green energy to the national energy market: "As I have said repeatedly, Sydney's desalination plant will not produce a single kilogram of CO2 emissions.

"We will purchase 100 per cent accredited, clean, green energy from the renewable energy market to run the plant.

"Such a huge energy buy is probably the single biggest shot in the arm the green energy industry has ever had in Australia."

Concerns were previously raised that the desalination plant would absorb almost all of the country's green power supply.

It has since emerged that it will take only a sizeable chunk - and with renewable energy now a federal hot topic the industry is expected to grow rapidly enough to feed the plant.

There are currently six NSW wind farm projects that are ready to be built - located in Teralga, Crookwell, Woodlawn, Cullerin, Conroys Gap and near Goulburn - but they have not gone ahead because of uncertainty about carbon credits and emissions targets.

Mr Rees said the desalination plant would almost certainly result in most or all of them being constructed soon.

"The plant will require the output of approximately 75 wind turbines when it is running at maximum," he told The Daily Telegraph.

"It's likely that such a huge new customer in the green power market will see more wind farms built in NSW in the near future."

The plant's green energy demand comes on top of Sydney Water's recent announcement that the rest of its operations would become carbon neutral by 2020.

Mr Rees said the agency would have 20 per cent of its energy demands met by renewable sources within two years, thanks to the installation of hydro-electric and cogeneration plants to run sewage treatment plants and water pipelines across Sydney and Wollongong.

"Ultimately, Sydney Water will eliminate or offset more than 400,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, the equivalent of taking 100,000 cars off the road," he said.

Sydney Water will be inviting submissions for its request for proposals until October 31.

Following this process, a detailed tender will be issued next month, with a contract expected to be signed in early 2008.

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Huge wind farm for Mad Max country
Wendy Frew, Environment Reporter
October 8, 2007
Ideal conditions … a computer-generated image of the proposed wind farm site outside Broken Hill.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/huge-wind-farm-for-mad-max-country/2007/10/07/1191695739476.html

A GIANT $2 billion wind farm proposed for western NSW could double the number of turbines operating in Australia and provide as much electricity as a large coal-fired power plant.

Epuron, a subsidiary of the German renewable energy group Conergy AG, will today announce plans to build as many as 500 turbines, generating enough electricity for 400,000 homes. They would be built on the ranges that rise around the Mundi Mundi plains, north-west of Broken Hill.

The wind farm would be 10 times bigger than the next largest wind farm approved for NSW and could reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions by at least 3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. It would produce up to 4.5 per cent of NSW's energy needs in a typical year.

The site - not far from the small town of Silverton, which is best known as the backdrop for films such as Max Max II and A Town Like Alice - was chosen following CSIRO research showing western NSW had some of the best wind resources in the country. The low population density was also attractive.

The announcement follows news last month that the Federal Government would set a national mandatory clean energy target of 30,000 gigawatt hours of electricity a year by 2020.

There is also legislation before the NSW Parliament mandating a 15 per cent target for renewable power for the state by 2020.

There is some concern the federal target would result in less renewable energy because it would replace state-based schemes projected to generate almost 41,000 gigawatt hours of energy by 2020.

Epuron was "taking a bit of a gamble" proceeding with the plan in the face of uncertainty about government regulation, the company's executive director, Andrew Durran, said.

"It will rely on strong government legislation to enable us to build it but we have looked at what is going on in the power industry and at the direction governments are taking," Mr Durran said.

The CSIRO found wind speeds in the area were competitive with wind farms in better known wind regions such as Tasmania and South Australia.

It was very exciting to find such a strong wind resource in western NSW, the chief executive of the Clean Energy Council, Dominique La Fontaine, said.

Ms La Fontaine said investors needed clear indications from governments about energy policy and it would be disastrous if state renewable energy schemes were put on hold because of a delay at the federal level.

Epuron has begun negotiations with four landowners in the area to lease land and has held informal talks with state government departments. It hopes construction will start in late 2009.

The operation and maintenance of the wind farm is expected to create between 50 and 100 direct jobs, with an injection of at least $15 million a year into the local economy, the company says.

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$500m connection fee for wind farm
Matthew Warren, Environment writer | October 11, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22566276-30417,00.html

A GIANT wind farm proposed for central Australia will need dedicated new power lines costing about $500 million to connect it to the national electricity grid.

Energy systems consultant Ian Rose said the 132-kilovolt line linking Broken Hill to near Mildura on the NSW-Victoria border would not be big enough to cope with the power surges delivered by a 500-turbine wind farm being proposed for the outback.

He said the 1000-megawatt wind farm proposed this week by renewable energy company Epuron would need to be linked with a new high-voltage line about 500km long to maximise the value of the renewable energy it supplies.

The cost of the new cable, estimated to be about $1 million a kilometre, may be met by government-owned network supplier Transgrid if it can be shown the line is sufficiently profitable.

Otherwise, it will need to be met by Epuron, a subsidiary of the German energy group, Conergy.

"They would be looking to get the best point in the grid where they could get the highest price and that could be either the same location around Mildura area ... or you could go for a more direct line across somewhere near the Sydney area," Dr Rose said.

"The transmission is not going to be the most difficult thing compared to ensuring there is enough wind resource and the capital costs of the wind farm itself."

The announcement by Epuron has been timed to help lock in the introduction of new mandatory renewable energy targets by the NSW Government: 15 per cent of renewable energy by 2020 which can be sourced anywhere in Australia.

There have been concerns within the wind industry that these targets may be allowed to slip following the Howard Government's commitment to similar national targets but starting from2010.

NSW Energy Minister Ian Macdonald this week said the state had allowed the importation of renewable energy, likely to be primarily wind power, because NSW was not a high wind state where you could reliably guarantee efficient wind power into the grid to meet both economic and target needs.

However, a wind expert involved in preparing the confidential assessment of the outback site said the proposed wind farm would need to operate at a much larger scale to help it compete against renewable power from windier sites found along the southern coastline of Australia.

Wind experts regard the west coast of Tasmania and the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia as the best wind assets in the country.

Many senior members of the wind industry are privately sceptical about the Epuron proposal.

The director of CSIRO's wind energy unit, Peter Coppin, said the winds near Broken Hill were "surprising" but not as good as those found near the Roaring Forties on the southern coast.

Dr Coppin said specific local features like hills could push the winds sufficiently to get the electricity generated over the required cost line.

"There are all sorts of weird things that can happen out there on plains out in the outback.

"You can get the jetstreams coming down quite low so you can get a surprising amount of wind," Dr Coppin told The Australian.

"There's a particular set of little hills near Bourke where there is enough enhancement to host a few wind turbines."

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Cool wind blows for investors
Mathew Murphy and Liz Minchin
September 3, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/cool-wind-blows-for-investors/2007/09/02/1188671793924.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

IT'S BEEN a stormy few weeks for Australia's wind industry, with two investors pulling out of wind projects in Victoria.

So BusinessDay asked about a dozen people in the energy and investment industries about the future for wind in Australia. And most of them agreed that while investment uncertainty looks likely to remain an issue for the next few years, the longer-term forecast for wind energy looks more promising.

Three weeks ago, Australia's largest energy retailer, AGL, announced it would not proceed with plans for a 48-turbine wind farm in Dollar, in south Gippsland, which would have contributed 79 megawatts to the Victorian Government's renewable energy target.

Then a week later Danish company Vestas said it was closing its blade manufacturing business in Portland, resulting in the loss of 130 jobs.

Those decisions buck the global trend. Internationally the wind industry has had several years of strong growth, including 32 per cent alone last year with some $US23 billion ($A28 billion) worth of new wind farms added. The fastest growth has been in the United States, followed by Germany, India, Spain and China.

New wind capacity in Australia has grown at only half the global rate, partly because of our significantly lower electricity prices, but also greater investment uncertainty.

Victoria at present has the lion's share of applications for new turbines due to incentives through its state-based Renewable Energy Target scheme, although that ranking may change with NSW about to set up its own scheme.

Wind industry advocates have been quick to blame the AGL and Vestas decisions on a lack of Federal Government support, due to the phasing out of its Mandatory Renewable Energy Target scheme. It required an additional 9500 gigawatt hours to be purchased from renewables by 2010, but this supply need has already been filled.

"Investors are investing in wind energy all around the world but they need the right framework," said Dominique La Fontaine, chief executive of the newly formed Clean Energy Council.

But some in the industry say the reasons behind the AGL and Vestas decisions were slightly more complex.

"Look, there's no doubt that the lack of a national renewable energy scheme played a major part in Vestas' decision, because there are more attractive countries for them to invest their money, but I don't think it was that relevant in AGL's case," said one wind farm developer.

"Gippsland has become a hard place to build a wind farm because the local opposition down there is just so well organised and well connected. If you're as big as AGL and you've got other projects going on in parts of Victoria where the local community is actually happy to have the wind farms, why would you bother?"

Others point to last year's orange-bellied parrot fiasco in Bald Hills — where the Federal Government unsuccessfully tried to block a new wind farm on the grounds of protecting an endangered parrot, despite its own reports showing the risk to the parrot was negligible — as an example of some of the political obstacles still facing the industry.

But some within the industry concede that the behaviour of a few "cowboy" developers has damaged the whole industry's reputation.

"There's no doubt that one of the problems in Gippsland has been that you've had a few companies that really haven't dealt with the community well, and that's brought the whole industry into disrepute," said one energy analyst, who asked not to be named.

Ms La Fontaine said while Australia's electricity grid system could handle about 8000 megawatts of wind power, there is at present less than 817 megawatts of installed wind capacity.

Wind advocates often contrast the growth of wind in Australia to Germany, which despite having a wind resource only half as good as Australia's has become the world's single biggest wind market and one of the industry's main manufacturing hubs, employing about 70,000 people.

German Wind Energy Association policy adviser Claudia Grotz attributes that strong growth to Germany's generous renewables subsidies, with a feed-in tariff scheme and a national renewable energy target.

"That's the secret behind why we've had such strong growth in renewable industries," Ms Grotz said.

But not everyone agrees that wind and other renewables should enjoy special treatment.

Energy Supply Association of Australia chief executive Brad Page argues that a free market should operate and that wind energy should not be propped up through feed-in tariffs or renewable energy targets.

"Companies like Vestas that want to blame the Government for not continuing what effectively is a subsidy program just remind you about all the debates that went about the floating of the dollar, the removal of tariff barriers and the like because they are the same thing and they are a deadweight loss on the economy."

Mr Page is also critical of the patchwork of different state-based schemes, saying Australia needed to adopt a national approach on energy.

Origin Energy is one company that may add wind to its solar and geothermal investments. Chief executive Grant King told ABC's Inside Business that his company "will certainly look at" wind farms being put up for sale by the Queensland Government.

Overseas wind investment is proving a good option for companies including Babcock & Brown Wind Partners Group, which recently reported an annual net profit of $13.8 million, reversing a loss of $16.2 million in the previous year.

Chief executive Miles George said the group was extending its investment in wind after snapping up wind farms in Spain and Germany, preparing to build one in France, and with plans to add to its US operations. While the group does have investments in wind locally, Australia was left off that list.

"We would prefer to invest more money in Australia but while there is no effective renewable energy target, we have to look elsewhere," he said.

Pacific Hydro is another company that has found more opportunities overseas.

Andrew Richards, Pacific Hydro's manager of government and corporate affairs, said the company planned to invest $500 million over the next five years in Victoria because of the VRET scheme, which will boost renewable energy in Victoria by 1000 megawatts by 2016.

"We think we can meet a quarter of that target ourselves but there are other big players in there as well," he said.

"VRET is good but even with that wind is just limping along. Compared to what we can do in places like Chile and Brazil, we are investing $1 billion in Chile over the coming years, $500 million in Brazil, and they are great investments for us, but we want to be more and more involved in Australia — there just aren't the right policies in place."

A senior energy analyst says investment in wind would only pick up strongly in Australia with similar national price mechanisms here.

Liz Minchin travelled to Germany to meet climate change and energy experts courtesy of the German Government.

www.wwindea.org

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CLEAN ENERGY - GREEN POWER SCHEMES

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Electricity customers misled by green spin
Wendy Frew
October 8, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/electricity-customers-misled-by-green-spin/2007/10/07/1191695739489.html

SOME companies are still marketing sources of renewable electricity that have been available to consumers for years as new green energy, says the latest Green Electricity Watch survey conducted by environment groups.

The GreenPower market - government-accredited new, renewable energy sourced from wind, water, waste or the sun - has improved in recent years but some companies are still misleading consumers about the products they sell, the report by the Total Environment Centre, ACF and WWF-Australia found.

Consumers should steer clear of products sold as 100 per cent renewable energy because only "accredited GreenPower" will reduce the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to electricity generation, the report says.

"Non-accredited green electricity is very unlikely to make any difference to Australia's greenhouse emissions or increase the amount of renewable electricity supply," it says.

"This electricity generally comes from schemes which have been part of our generating mix for a considerable time and which most Australians already, unknowingly, buy as part of their regular electricity."

By law, residential GreenPower customers must be offered a minimum of 10 per cent accredited GreenPower but Green Electricity Watch called for this be raised to 20 per cent because the extra cost for consumers was minimal.

It ranked 52 GreenPower products, giving the highest rankings to those that offered 100 per cent accredited GreenPower, did not mislead consumers with marketing spin and did not describe the percentage of non-accredited power offered in any particular product as renewable energy.

To be eligible for GreenPower accreditation, renewable energy projects must have begun after 1997 to ensure they are selling new green power into the electricity grid, rather than reselling renewable energy that has been in the system for years. Only that way can consumers be sure the electricity they are paying for is cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

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CLEAN ENERGY - JOBS

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Carbon debits
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
The government's failure to protect jobs in renewable energy is leaving the industry out on a limb. By Giles Parkinson
http://bulletin.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=303634

State and federal governments would contend that all jobs are valued equally. But it would seem that some jobs might be more equal than others. Or at least that governments go to greater lengths to save them.

In the past two weeks, an estimated 1000 jobs in the new and rapidly growing energy efficiency industry in NSW have been lost. The cause was a dramatic slump in the price of carbon traded in the NSW Greenhouse Gas Abatement Scheme (GGAS), the world's oldest and second-largest carbon trading scheme.

Freddy Sharpe, chief operating officer of Easy Being Green, the biggest and most successful of the companies operating in that space, blames the price fall mostly on the failure of governments to provide certainty to a new market.

It's ironic, he says, because the government had made a large step forward by announcing that the state schemes would be migrated into a new national trading scheme. It's just that it couldn't explain how that would be done, so traders feared the state-based carbon certificates would lose their value, and sold them down accordingly.

Easy Being Green specialised in the installation of energy-saving light bulbs and efficient shower heads in homes. These installations would generate carbon credits, which Easy and other companies such as Neco and Fieldforce would then sell into GGAS. While these carbon credits traded at around $11 to $13 a tonne, this and a handful of other companies doing similar work made good money. When the price slumped to $6, the margins disappeared.

"Easy Being Green showed that it was really easy to engage consumers on energy efficiency," Sharpe says. "We could create and register large volumes of carbon credits. That took the market by surprise. Maybe we were too successful for our own good."

Easy Being Green has all but closed down its home-based energy efficiency business, with the loss of 140 permanent staff and 100 contractors. Neco was forced to sack 55 - mostly in regional areas - of a total of around 90. "It's been a tough ride," says Ben O'Callaghan, Neco's carbon services director. "If the government is serious about this market, then they need to set targets, and be clear on regulation."

This is not the first time this has occurred in the new carbon economy. Governments insist they do not want to "pick winners" in this new regime, but it is clear that they are already making such choices. A decision last year not to meaningfully expand the renewable energy target kicked the stuffing out of what was shaping up to be a successful new industry, and forced many players instead to concentrate their expansion overseas.

However, a pre-election backflip on the issue by the federal government has held out hope of major new developments, and has caused a big leap in the value of the certificates traded under that scheme to more than $40 a tonne. It is hard to imagine any government allowing 1000 jobs suddenly to disappear from the coal industry with such little comment, particularly if it was caused by sudden movements in the carbon market.

Indeed, the government has supported the coal industry with an estimated $8bn to $9bn of annual subsidies - including exemption from diesel excise and road construction. Still, this has not been enough to save the industry shedding almost a third of its workforce in areas such as the Latrobe Valley over the past two decades, mostly due to increased mechanisation. "The idea that climate change is the major cause of job loss in the industry is just wrong," says Tony Mohr, climate change campaigner for the Australian Conservation Foundation.

"Governments tend to be more protective of existing jobs than new jobs. There is a bias about protecting existing industries rather than new ones." But he says if climate change cannot be controlled, job losses will be dramatic. Witness the loss of jobs in the farming sector during recent droughts, or the 54,000 jobs that could be lost if the Great Barrier Reef is destroyed.

The renewable energy industry, Mohr argues, is a heavy employer. In Germany, for instance, more than 200,000 people are employed in the sector. But for that to occur in Australia, policy certainty is needed.

"It's symptomatic of the policy void we have in Australia," says Mohr. "If you want to start a renewable energy business, you want to be able to look with confidence five to 10 or more years into the future, not just the next two."

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CLEAN ENERGY - REGIONAL

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Regional areas realise power of renewable energy
John Martin
September 6, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/regional-areas-realise-power-of-renewable-energy/2007/09/05/1188783320330.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

SOLAR power earning twice the money on the grid. The number of consumers in Australia buying GreenPower from renewable sources doubling in a year. The first of these two events happened in South Australia, where new laws mean people feeding excess power from their solar panels into the grid will be paid twice the price of its fossil-fuel-generated equal.

It's also interesting to note the slow but inevitable rise in consumers turning to GreenPower — power generated from nationally accredited renewable energy sources. GreenPower's quarterly reports show that in the year to June 30, the number of residential customers buying GreenPower more than doubled, from 281,701 to 565, 977. It is not a big number but it is the growth rate that's worth noting.

These developments are signalling a shift to renewable energy that is set to quicken from a gentle flow to a rush as Australia cuts its greenhouse gas emissions.

That's good news for regional communities. The shift to renewables has realised significant economic development opportunities for communities that can see the advantages renewable technologies hold. One example is the biodiesel plant being built at Barnawartha, just out of Wodonga, by a consortium called Biodiesel Producers Pty Ltd. This $50 million investment by ANZ is employing a workforce of about 100. Once completed, it will employ about 30 people in the collection, distillation and distribution of biodiesel made from tallow, waste oils and canola oil.

When La Trobe University's centre for sustainable regional communities and the City of Greater Bendigo began planning a conference to demonstrate the benefits of renewable energy for regional areas, we were inundated with good ideas and examples of projects.

It is evident that options such as solar, wind, waste and geothermal-generated energy are creating significant economic development opportunities rather than cutting jobs and business as was once feared. Most importantly, they're helping cut greenhouse gas emissions.

One thing that characterises renewable energy generation is the level of manufacturing it requires for equipment, and the building of the plants. The economic multiplier for similar manufacturing industries is typically twice the initial investment during establishment.

Renewable energy projects are especially good for regional Australia because they typically involve lots of smaller plants across the country rather than large, centralised fossil-fuel-chewing power plants such as we now have. These smaller plants will help minimise local "brownouts" during high demand, which has happened in recent summers.

And as Australia moves to more cost-reflective pricing in the National Electricity Market, subsidies in place when Victoria's power industry was privatised will be wound back. That's likely to add, by 2020, a further 10 per cent to electricity distribution costs in regional areas. Central Victorian businesses already pay up to 30 per cent more for their electricity distribution costs compared with similar businesses in big metropolitan areas.

Then there are distribution losses. Bendigo, for example, loses 14 per cent of every unit of power generated from power plants in Gippsland. The losses are higher in places further afield such as Mildura. These line losses disadvantage regional businesses. But renewable energy plants such as the $420 million photovoltaic power station to be built near Mildura could reduce line losses and minimise electricity network cost differentials, giving regional areas equal footing when it comes to power costs.

At this stage, there's another economy-boosting component to regional renewable energy projects that should not be overlooked and that's the potential to attract tourists keen to see projects they might adopt in their regions. The proposed $8 million community-owned wind farm near Daylesford, which recently overcame objections, is likely to be a good example.

A local community co-operative plans to sell shares to raise money to build the turbine. After the initial investment and the wind farm is operational, the Hepburn Renewable Energy Association expects people will travel to the area to study its innovative approach. We shouldn't dismiss the tourism offshoot to renewables, for surely this is what happens with early adopters: others flock in to learn how they implemented good ideas.

Professor John Martin is the director of La Trobe University's centre for sustainable regional communities and is a co-organiser of the Renewable Energy and Regional Australia Conference in Bendigo on September 16-18.

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CLEAN COAL

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'Clean coal' - a dirty lie
Renfrey Clarke
26 October 2007
http://www.greenleft.org.au/2007/729/37797

If you’ve sat in front a TV in the past few weeks, you’ll have seen the message: Australians need to get “climate clever” just like the Howard government, which, we’re told, is encouraging and funding new, environmentally friendly technologies such as “clean coal”. In fact, we’re led to believe, the government has put some $3.5 billion in recent years into new methods for combatting climate change.

We’re not supposed to be sharp enough to pick the latter claim as a deception. In fact, $3.5 billion was not invested by the government at all, but by private business, responding to the incentives set in place by the government’s Mandatory Renewable Energy Target scheme.

Nor are we told that, for more than two years until September, the federal government refused to maintain these incentives at a meaningful level. In the meantime, investment in renewable energy has stalled, leading the Wind Energy Association and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy to angrily criticise the government for its inaction.

There’s no doubt, though, that PM John Howard and his government are right behind “clean coal”. A June 19 editorial in Rupert Murdoch’s Australian argued that “Australia and [the world’s largest resource corporation] BHP Billiton have a shared interest in developing economically viable, clean coal technology”.

“Australia is the world’s largest exporter of coal with 30 per cent of the global trade. Not only that, black coal is Australia’s largest commodity export, worth about $24.5 billion in 2005-06, an increase of 43 per cent over 2004-05.”

The paper might have added that the coal trade is the source of vast profits to people who wield immense influence at the top levels of the government and the Liberal Party.
“Whatever we achieve in terms of the reduction of our own minuscule greenhouse gas emissions, which are 1 per cent of global emissions”, the editorial continued, “will be trifling compared to the global reductions that will be possible if we achieve a breakthrough in clean coal technology”.

Renewable energy in Australia, the implicit message runs, is not worth spending money on. The real priority, the Australian argues, should be developing ways of burning coal without releasing greenhouse gases.

The trouble is, avoiding runaway global warming will require drastic cuts to global greenhouse emissions to begin within the next decade. What if technical obstacles mean that “clean coal” will not be a reality for a decade beyond that, if ever? What if electricity from “clean coal” finishes up costing more than energy from renewables? Neither the Australian nor the federal government has tried seriously to answer such objections.

Meanwhile, the swelling flood of cheap Australian coal onto world markets lowers international prices and encourages the building of more coal-fired power plants. Australia’s contribution to world greenhouse emissions might seem “minuscule”, but if coal exports are factored in, this country emerges as a true greenhouse ogre.

With voters increasingly perturbed at Australia’s bad reputation on climate-change issues, Howard is banking on “clean coal” to provide a distraction. As depicted by its image-makers, his government refuses to take merely symbolic steps — such as ratifying the Kyoto Protocol — but prefers to actively promote a new, breakthrough technology.

“Clean coal”, however, still needs to actually deliver — and the central problem that Howard and his ministers face is that coal is inherently a greenhouse gas-intensive fuel. When burned, it produces the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

By contrast natural gas, when it burns, produces mainly water. Generating a megawatt-hour of electricity in a modern pulverised-coal power plant produces about 1000 kilograms of carbon dioxide in the case of the brown coal used in Victoria, or about 800 kilograms in the case of the black coal used in Queensland and NSW. The output of carbon dioxide from a gas-fired plant is about 400 kilograms per megawatt-hour.

As used in public debate, the phrase “clean coal” routinely conflates two distinct areas of technology. One of these involves generating electricity from coal more efficiently, so as to produce less carbon dioxide per unit of power output. The other, referred to as carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), involves taking the carbon dioxide produced by the combustion of coal and isolating it permanently from the atmosphere. Both areas of technology are examined in detail by University of NSW scientist Dr Mark Diesendorf in his recent book Greenhouse Solutions with Sustainable Energy.

In terms of fuel use, the most efficient coal-fired power stations in the world today are a number of pilot plants that employ new and complex Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) technology. No such plants exist yet in Australia. IGCC plants are expensive to build — according to the journal Chemical and Engineering News, around three times as costly as the most efficient gas-fired installations. They are also expensive to run, producing electricity at a cost 20-40% higher than conventional coal plants.

“These are chemical plants”, a coal industry expert quoted in the February 23, 2004 edition of Chemical and Engineering News stated. “You’ve got a cryogenic oxygen plant, a pressurized gasifier, gas cleanup equipment, shift reactors, and a new power system. It’s a whole cultural difference.”

For all their sophistication, IGCC plants still work by taking coal and turning it into carbon dioxide; the reductions in greenhouse gas emissions they allow are strictly limited. Diesendorf, in his book, suggests a greenhouse intensity for them of about 700 kilograms per megawatt-hour — far above what is needed for genuine greenhouse abatement. “The term ‘clean coal’”, Diesendorf concludes, “is essentially a marketing tool”.

If “clean coal” is not to remain filthy dirty, it needs to be combined with carbon capture and long-term storage. In Australia, the coal industry’s research has concentrated almost entirely on geosequestration, which involves capturing the carbon dioxide and burying it underground in depleted oil and gas fields, deep saline aquifers, or coal beds too deep to be mined.

Geosequestration of carbon dioxide has occasionally been practised in the natural gas industry, but is surrounded by a host of unknowns. In order to exist, oil and gas fields must have been covered by impermeable layers of rock. But there are no guarantees that after multiple penetration by drill holes, and operations to increase permeability by hydraulic fracturing, these fields will hold carbon dioxide. Whether the aquifers and coal beds will hold carbon dioxide for many thousands of years is also speculative.

Then there is the question of costs. Carbon dioxide makes up about 14% of the flue gases from conventional power plants. If it is to be removed in order to be stored underground, costly and energy-intensive chemical scrubbing is required. An alternative is to build power plants that burn coal in oxygen rather than air, resulting in exhausts that are more than 90% carbon dioxide. Obtaining near-pure oxygen, however, also involves large additional costs. Unless the power plants are virtually on top of suitable geological structures, gas pipelines must be built. Finally, if drill holes are not already in place in the proposed storages, deep drilling is far from cheap.

In February, the Canberra Times reported that CSIRO carbon capture expert Dr Greg Duffy told a 2006 House of Representatives committee inquiry into geosequestration that carbon capture would double the cost of baseload electricity generation, and reduce the output from a power station by about 30%.

A 2005 study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) put the cost of electricity from an IGCC coal-fired plant with carbon capture and geological storage in the range of 5.5-9.1 US cents per kilowatt-hour. This is the same range as for the more advanced present-day renewable energy technologies, and considerably more than the predicted cost of “hot dry rock” geothermal energy.
Using IPCC data and his own calculations, Diesendorf concludes that “the projected costs of CO2-free electricity from fossil-fuelled power stations plus CCS may be higher than the current price of wind power at excellent sites and the cheapest options for bioenergy”.

Moreover, and as Diesendorf stresses, the cost calculations for coal-fired power do not include the massive social and environmental costs of coal mining. These costs, which include strip-mined landscapes, polluted streams and extensive health damage, are borne in large part by society as a whole.

However the most telling weakness of “clean coal” is not its cost, but its time-lines. Diesendorf notes the “immaturity” of “clean coal” technologies, and quotes a 2004 study that concludes that “CCS technologies could take at least several decades to implement on a large scale”.

Pronouncing on “clean coal”, Labor leader Kevin Rudd was quoted by the Melbourne Age in March as predicting that electricity from plants using carbon capture and storage would enter the grid by 2030.

The environment, however, cannot wait until 2030. At present rates of increase, the accumulation of greenhouse gases will very likely tip the atmosphere over the threshold of runaway warming well before this date. All greenhouse abatement measures will then be irrelevant.

The prospects for “clean coal” are dim indeed. It is hard to believe that coal corporation executives and key Liberal Party leaders are unaware of this fact. But Howard has nevertheless provided generous amounts of public money to support “clean coal” research. In the first round of grants last year under the government’s Low Emissions Technology Development Fund, fossil-fuel interests received $335 million of the $410 million allocated. Four of the six grants approved went to the coal industry for projects involving carbon capture and sequestration.

The position of ALP leaders has been ambiguous. Though pledging to increase incentives to the renewables industry, they have been too cowardly to take on the coal bosses in an all-out political fight.

Instead of condemning the federal government for wasting public money on unpromising and probably irrelevant research, Labor leaders have fallen into their habitual “me too” posture. In March, Rudd released plans for a $500 million National Clean Coal Fund, while in April Steve Bracks’s Labor government in Victoria announced more than $9 million in “clean coal” research grants. Commenting on these handouts, Greens Senator Bob Brown remarked, “It’s like putting $100 million into developing low-tar cigarettes”.

Though alarmed by global warming, the mass of Australians are betrayed and misled by an ecocidal government and a gutless “opposition”. It will take a broad political revolt if the country is to escape its present status as prime pusher of cheap coal to an overheating planet.

From: Comment & Analysis, Green Left Weekly issue #729 31 October 2007.

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CLIMATE CHANGE & NUCLEAR POWER: IAN LOWE

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Reaction time: climate change and the nuclear option
By Ian Lowe
September 2007
 
Prime Minister John Howard (centre on bridge) looks into the new Opal nuclear reactor during a tour of the site at at Lucas Heights in Sydney. (AAP Image: Dean Lewins)
There is no objective truth about the future performance, cost and safety of nuclear reactors. There is a range of defensible opinions, as well as some that appear indefensible.
Even when dealing with the history, some people are selective in choosing evidence that seems to support their position.
We are all influenced by our experience, our culture and our values in trying to make sense of complex and uncertain issues. So you should read all statements about the nuclear issue - including this essay - with a critical eye.
The Fox Report of 1977, on the proposed Ranger uranium mine, made the telling point that nuclear power, while it had been relatively safe and clean until that time as a means of generating electricity, had two fundamental problems: it produced radioactive waste that would need to be stored for immensely long periods, and it provided fissile material that could be diverted to produce weapons.
The report argued that it would be irresponsible to contribute to a worsening of these problems without convincing evidence that they had been solved, or were at least likely to be.
After considering these arguments, I accepted that I had been wrong to support nuclear power and became more critical.
I now found that the claims about the economic case for nuclear power were very dubious, usually based on careful selection of the past evidence or heroic assumptions about future costs.
Back in the UK, I was involved in the late '70s debate about a bizarre proposal by the electricity authority for a crash program to build 36 nuclear reactors in 15 years to avert the coming energy crisis.
There was at the time no evidence that an energy crisis was imminent, but when we analysed the demand for concrete, steel and other materials that would be produced by the proposal, we found that it would itself have created a crisis, which the authority would then claim to be solving!
So by the time I returned to a permanent appointment at Griffith University in 1980, I had become very jaundiced about the claims of the nuclear power industry.
Safety
By then it was clear that nuclear power was expensive, but the industry still had a reasonable safety record and could justifiably claim that it killed and injured fewer workers than did the production of coal-fired electricity.
Even this argument was subsequently weakened in 1979 by the Three Mile Island accident; the reactor almost melted down and was effectively destroyed. While good management of the crisis averted a major radiation leak, it is sobering to reflect that the same basic design is used in most of the world's reactors.
We were not so lucky with the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, which spread a swathe of radioactive pollution across Europe from the Ukraine to the western parts of the British Isles. That marked the end of public support for the European nuclear power program.
The level of nuclear power then steadily declined, as old reactors were retired and not replaced.
The Thatcher government tried to prop up the nuclear industry by enacting an obligation for a minimum percentage of power to come from sources other than fossil fuels, but instead this kick-started the UK wind energy industry.
By the end of the 20th century, nuclear power looked like a dying industry.
Re-badging
Then something very strange happened.
A small group in the UK nuclear industry concocted the idea of re-badging it as the answer to global climate change.
This struck me as a very improbable line. The nuclear power industry had previously used every trick in the book to disparage environmental activists, who had been critical of the industry's record.
But desperate times call for desperate measures.
The nuclear lobby embraced the science of global climate change, aligning themselves with their old foes such as WWF and Greenpeace.
The industry embarked on a very clever campaign of briefing journalists and opinion-makers with the new line: global climate change is a serious problem, clean energy is needed, renewables are unreliable so the world needs nuclear power, which they re-defined as being "clean".
Though the claim to cleanliness was dubious, it was seized on by some politicians and journalists.
Their enthusiasm was perhaps a sign of desperation, born of a desire either to cling to the old idea of centralised electricity or to find a "silver bullet" for climate change now that the urgency of the issue was plain.
This campaign had not yet reached Australia when I spoke to the Press Club two years ago, saying that nuclear power was not a sensible solution to climate change, but I was concerned that it might be transferred here from Western Europe.
Not long afterwards, the tide turned on public perceptions of global warming and the studied inaction of the Howard Government was finally shown by its own polling to be indefensible.
Then the Prime Minister returned from Washington in mid-2006 to announce that Australia needed to consider nuclear energy as an option. Interviewed on AM, Howard said:
"What I am saying to the Australian people is: let us calmly and sensibly examine what our options are. Let's not set our faces against examining all of those options and when all the facts are in, we can then make judgments. But I don't think all the facts are in in relation to nuclear, because we've had very little debate on this issue over the last 25 or 30 years, because everybody's said, 'oh well, you can't possibly even think about it.' That's changed a lot."
It wasn't clear at that point that things had changed a lot, but the Prime Minister set about ensuring that they did.
Nuclear by Tuesday
A task force described by John Clarke as "people who want nuclear power by Tuesday" was hastily put together. The process was so rushed that Howard was only able to give the waiting press the names of some members of the taskforce on the day he announced its formation.
In a reminder of the truism expressed by an anonymous American as "Facts ain't given, they're gotten!", the task force seems to have set about finding facts that would show the nuclear industry in the best possible light.
The subsequent report by Dr Ziggy Switkowski and his colleagues was hailed by the Prime Minister and his media cheer-squad as giving the green light for the nuclear industry: "a glowing future" was the Freudian slip in a headline used by The Australian.
That section of the press even rang me to ask if I had been persuaded by the "rational argument" of the report to "move beyond my emotional opposition to nuclear power."
I told them that my opposition to nuclear power was rational and based on both the experience of the last 50 years and a sober assessment of global futures.
Change is coming
Energy is essential for civilised living, but the current approach of basing our energy-intensive lifestyle on fossil fuels is unsustainable. We need to make fundamental changes if our society is to survive.
The nuclear option does not make sense on any level: economically, environmentally, politically or socially. It is too costly, too dangerous, too slow and has too small an impact on global warming.
That is why most of the developed world is rejecting nuclear power in favour of renewable energy and improved efficiency.
We should be a responsible global citizen and set serious targets to reduce our greenhouse pollution, but we should not go down the nuclear path.
The rational response to our situation is to combine vastly improved efficiency with an investment in renewable energy technologies.
Professor Ian Lowe is the president of the Australian Conservation Foundation and author of the latest Quarterly Essay, Reaction Time: Climate Change & the Nuclear Option. <www.quarterlyessay.com>

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Heeding the warning signs
September 7, 2007
Most of the world has turned its back on nuclear energy and now Australia should too, writes Ian Lowe.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/heeding-the-warning-signs/2007/09/06/1188783415604.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

As energy markets have liberalised around the world, investors have turned their backs on nuclear energy. The number of reactors in Western Europe and the United States peaked 15 to 20 years ago and has been declining ever since.

By contrast, the amount of wind power and solar energy is increasing rapidly. In the decade up to 2003, the average annual rates of increase of the different forms of electricity supply were as follows: wind increased by almost 30 per cent, solar by more than 20 per cent, gas 2 per cent, oil and coal 1 per cent, nuclear 0.6 per cent.

The figures tell the real story. Despite the recent pro-nuclear hype, most of the world has rejected nuclear energy in favour of alternatives that are cheaper, cleaner and more flexible. These figures also refute one of the oft-repeated lies about the Kyoto agreement. Most European countries have the same amount of nuclear power now as they had in the Kyoto base year, 1990 (the year against which future emissions are measured). Some have less. Finland is the only European country I am aware of that has commissioned a nuclear reactor this century.

So any carbon benefit flowing from use of nuclear power was already there in the European baseline and does absolutely nothing to make these countries' targets any easier to reach. In fact, it is easier for Australia to reduce its emissions precisely because so much of our energy now comes from coal-fired electricity. We could produce the same amount of energy while releasing less carbon, just by moving from coal to gas.

Second, nuclear power is far too slow a response to the urgent problem of climate change. Even if there were political agreement today to build nuclear reactors, it would be at least 10 years before the first such reactor could deliver electricity, while some have suggested that between 15 and 25 years is a more realistic estimate. We can't afford to wait decades for a response given the heavy social, environmental and economic costs that global warming is already imposing. If we were to start today expanding the use of solar hot water in Queensland to cover half the households in that state - a similar level to the Northern Territory - we could save about as much electricity as a nuclear power station would provide, and do it years before any reactor would be up and running.

The third problem is that nuclear power is too dangerous. Not only is there the risk of accidents such as at Chernobyl, there is also an elevated risk of nuclear weapons proliferation or nuclear terrorism. As far back as 1976, the Fox report - the Ranger Uranium Environmental Inquiry - warned that exporting uranium would inevitably increase the risk of nuclear weapons being developed. Since then the situation has steadily worsened, with nuclear weapons having been developed by a range of countries. The experience of Iraq, being invaded by the US and its coalition of the willing, is clearly spurring on Iran and North Korea to develop their own nuclear deterrents. Dr Mohamed ElBaradei, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told the 2005 review conference on the nuclear non-proliferation treaty that "fears of a deadly nuclear detonation … have been reawakened".

Nuclear power necessarily produces radioactive waste that has to be stored safely for hundreds of thousands of years. After nearly 50 years of nuclear power, the world has produced more than 250 million tonnes of radioactive waste - 10,000 tonnes of it highly radioactive - yet nobody has found a permanent solution to the storage problem. In the absence of such a solution, expanding the rate of waste production is irresponsible.

Fourth, nuclear power is not carbon-free. Significant amounts of fossil-fuel energy are used to mine and process uranium ores, enrich the fuel and build nuclear power stations. Over their operating lifetime, nuclear power stations release much less carbon dioxide than does the burning of coal, but in the short term they would make the situation worse; building nuclear power stations would actually increase greenhouse pollution.

A fifth, and related, problem is that high-grade uranium ores are limited. On best estimates, known high-grade ores could supply present demand for about 50 years. If we expanded the nuclear contribution to global electricity supply from the present level - about 15 per cent - to replace all coal-fired power stations, the high-grade resources would last only about a decade. There are large deposits of lower-grade ores, but these require much more conventional energy for extraction and processing. Total life-cycle analysis has concluded that fuelling nuclear power stations from lower-grade ores actually releases more carbon dioxide per unit of delivered energy than burning gas. These calculations are disputed by pro-nuclear activists, but there is no doubt that the fuel energy, consequent greenhouse emissions and the dollars needed to produce uranium all increase as the ore grade declines.

Appropriate comparison is critical. It is sometimes claimed that exporting more Australian uranium will slow the rate of global climate change. It would have that short-term benefit if the only result were to cut the number of coal-fired power stations. On the other hand, I believe that it is now clear to any responsible decision-maker that we should not be worsening the problem by burning coal. So the real choice is between nuclear power and a mix of renewable energy technologies combined with efficiency measures. If that is the choice, it would take creative arithmetic to make a case that our uranium is doing anything at all to save the world from climate change. I would be more impressed by the integrity of those arguing for us to export uranium to slow global warming if they were also calling for us to reduce our coal exports. Australia could do much more to help the global atmosphere by cutting our coal exports than we could by the most fanciful estimate of the potential benefits from our uranium. Of course, many of those urging uranium exports are also in the vanguard of calls to export even more coal than we do today. This shows that they are actually more interested in the short-term economic benefits of mineral exports than in any effect on the global environment.

A few technocrats have steadfastly advocated that Australia should mine and export uranium, enrich it for export, build nuclear power stations and (in some cases) even offer to take in the world's radioactive waste. These people had their day in the sun when John Howard assembled his taskforce in June last year. While the Switkowski report, Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy - Opportunities for Australia?, was hailed by some as a green light for the nuclear industry, a detailed reading shows that it is a very lame endorsement of the nuclear option.

The whole exercise was of doubtful merit. The taskforce was picked by the Prime Minister, certainly giving the appearance that the members had been chosen to give the result he wanted, while the terms of reference limited the study by excluding consideration of emerging renewable energy alternatives and limiting environmental considerations to the possible reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. But the facts, even if carefully chosen, still speak for themselves. Despite the brave show made by Howard on releasing the report and some of the media commentary, the fine print shows that nuclear power is an expensive, slow and dirty way of making very little impact on the problem of global climate change.

A crucial political consideration is the public hostility to reactors. In Europe and the US, this has caused protracted delays in construction. Since there is similar hostility in Australia, it is naive or dishonest to base economic assessment on the assumption that reactors could be built in three years.

At a recent Adelaide conference, the editor of the industry journal Nucleonics Weekly gave a paper warning on excessive optimism about construction times and costs. Mark Hibbs said Westinghouse had lost "several hundred million dollars" on a new reactor project in Finland, while the design for two proposed reactors in Taiwan is only about 65 per cent complete, 11 years after the signing of contracts with two US firms.

Some of the delays can be attributed to political divisions and consequent legal battles, but the costs of some components have increased by as much as a factor of six. Hibbs warned that the designs for new reactors are still on the drawing board, so there is real uncertainty about the actual costs.

He also said it is unclear whether manufacturers would even be interested in building one or two reactors in a country with no infrastructure or past experience of nuclear power. In other words, it may not even be possible to interest the commercial nuclear industry in building an Australian reactor; even if a reactor were feasible, no one can really say how expensive it would be. By contrast, we have experience of building wind turbines and installing solar hot water systems, so we have both the necessary skills and confidence in the economics.

The Switkowski report says at least 10 and possibly 15 years would be a realistic time scale for building one nuclear power station in Australia. It would take more time still to "pay back" the energy used in construction and fuelling, so it would take 15 to 20 years for any such station to make any contribution to cutting greenhouse pollution.

Fifteen to 20 months is a more realistic time scale for large-scale renewables. Global warming is an urgent problem that demands a concerted response now, not a half-baked response after 2020.

Besides, the scale of the potential effect on our greenhouse pollution is not impressive. The most aggressive pro-nuclear scenario analysed by the report projected 25 nuclear reactors dotted around the nation, but this would only have the potential to reduce the growth in our greenhouse pollution by between 8 and 18 per cent.

Even the higher figure would be a miserable attempt to meet our greenhouse responsibilities. The science shows we need to cut greenhouse pollution by at least 60 per cent, and probably by more like 80 to 90 per cent. Also, the nuclear option would involve a massive release of carbon dioxide in the next few decades, building and fuelling reactors, just at the time we should be cutting back. It doesn't make sense as a response to climate change.

The Switkowski report accurately concludes that disposal of high-level waste is "an issue" in most countries using nuclear power. Until the problem is resolved, it is irresponsible to produce more waste. It is contributing to a problem that currently does not have a solution, dumping it on future generations to resolve. On these grounds, it fails one of the tests of sustainability: inter-generational equity. Such an approach would not be morally defensible, even if we did not have alternatives; but we do.

We should also worry about the possible effect of our choices on proliferation of nuclear weapons. The report claims that "increased Australian involvement in the nuclear fuel cycle would not change the risks", but this seems naive. Iran's neighbours are nervous about an energy-rich country that clearly does not need nuclear power embracing this technology, suspecting its real motives.

It would be equally understandable if our neighbours drew the same conclusion. Any agitators wishing to spread the idea that Australia was planning to build nuclear weapons would find enough historical urgings from nuclear technocrats to make their case appear credible.

The former head of the then Australian Atomic Energy Commission, the late Sir Philip Baxter, was an unashamed advocate of developing a nuclear weapons capacity. If our Government were so foolish as to go down this path, it would dramatically increase the risk of proliferation in our region. Visiting Australia recently, the former US vice-president Al Gore observed that every problem of weapons proliferation during his eight years in the White House arose from a civilian nuclear program.

In our area China, India and Pakistan all developed nuclear weapons in association with nuclear energy. The same could be said of Israel, while in Britain the nuclear energy industry began as a smokescreen to conceal the real agenda of building bombs. The more countries have nuclear weapons, the more certain it becomes that one will become deluded enough or desperate enough to use them.

This is an edited extract of Quarterly Essay 27, Reaction Time (Black Inc, $14.95) by Ian Lowe, the president of the Australian Conservation Foundation.

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AUSTRALIA JOINS GLOBAL NUCLEAR ENERGY PARTNERSHIP GNEP

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Panel dashes hopes of nuclear fuel plan
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 2, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/panel-dashes-hopes-of-nuclear-fuel-plan/2007/11/01/1193619059268.html

THE US has been advised to dump an ambitious nuclear energy plan that involved countries such as Australia supplying other nations with reactor fuel and reprocessing their nuclear waste.

The Prime Minister, John Howard, is a strong supporter of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and the push to expand the civilian use of nuclear power. However, the US National Academy of Sciences told the US President, George Bush, on Monday the plan relied on reprocessing technology that hadn't been proven.

The 17-member panel expressed deep reservations about the partnership's ability to address nuclear waste disposal and found "no economic justification" for pursuing the technology on a commercial scale.

The aim of the technology was to recycle spent nuclear fuel without separating plutonium, the material used in nuclear weapons.

"While all 17 members of the committee concluded that the GNEP research and development program, as currently planned, should not be pursued, 15 of the members said that the less-aggressive reprocessing research program that preceded the current one should be," the academy said in a press statement.

The panel said the partnership carried "significant technical and financial risks".

Until recently, Mr Howard had promoted nuclear power as a possible climate change solution because, once built, nuclear power plants release little greenhouse gas.

However, public polling shows most Australians remain wary of the nuclear industry and the Federal Government has steered clear of it during the election campaign.

The Government declined to comment on the academy's recommendation.

"The minister does not have anything he particularly wishes to say about it," said a spokesman for the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer.

Previously, Mr Downer, expressed "no problems" with Australia working closely with the US on the plan. "I think it makes good sense to get into negotiations. Where those negotiations would lead and what sort of an agreement we would conclude at the end, I don't know. But I have no problems with it," he said.

In August, the Herald reported Mr Bush had invited Australia to be part of a plan aimed at guaranteeing future energy supplies. The global nuclear partnership would drive a research effort to develop a new generation of fast-cycle reactors producing far less hazardous waste than conventional nuclear reactors.

Its broader aim was to secure the entire fuel cycle and confine production and reprocessing to the group, with smaller countries effectively leasing nuclear fuel from the partnership and returning waste to it for reprocessing.

The academy said the partnership research was taking money and focus away from other nuclear research programs and efforts to speed the construction of new nuclear power plants.

The US Energy Department claims the program would eventually reduce the cost of commercial reactor waste disposal and remove the need for additional underground waste repositories beyond a proposed waste dump in Nevada.

The science panel disagreed, saying the opposite could be true.

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Australia stakes its claim to uranium enrichment
Katharine Murphy
September 6, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/australia-stakes-its-claim-to-uranium-enrichment/2007/09/05/1188783321096.html

AUSTRALIA is reserving its right to enrich uranium in the future despite signing up to a controversial global partnership of nuclear players that aims to limit the number of nations producing enriched fuel.

Australia has taken its first step towards joining the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) in a new bilateral nuclear collaboration agreement announced in Sydney by Prime Minister John Howard and US President George Bush.

Australia's participation will be formalised at a meeting of nuclear officials in Vienna in mid-September, but the Government has made it clear it will sign up only on the basis that Australia does not take the world's nuclear waste and that it reserves its right to enrich yellowcake in the future.

But green groups are warning that despite those poli- tical assurances, Australia is taking its first defining step towards becoming a nuclear waste dump for the rest of the world by joining the partnership.

The Wilderness Society said yesterday the Government had already passed legislation clearing the way for radioactive waste to be brought from overseas.

The Australian Conservation Foundation said joining the partnership would provoke suspicion in the region. Foundation spokesman Dave Sweeney said: "Australia's neighbours will be very concerned about Australia being a nuclear reactor developer and a nuclear weapons fuel exporter — it will inflame existing regional insecurities."

But in a sign of the Government's increasing political nervousness over its ambitions to develop nuclear energy, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer played down the idea that Australia would enrich uranium.

He also said Australia had made it clear in all the discussions over its participation in the partnership that it would not take radioactive waste. "We won't agree to do that and we have always made that clear," he said.

Mr Downer told reporters at Sydney's APEC summit that it would take considerable persuasion to convince countries such as the United States that Australia should develop a local nuclear fuel manufacturing industry.

Uranium enrichment "would have to be commercially viable and I am advised that quite apart from having to work pretty hard to persuade the United States that Australia should enrich uranium … it would take some persuading to convince other countries to feel comfortable with that", he said.

"I'm not sure that (enrichment) would be commercially viable either. Quite apart from the political obstacles, I think there are a lot of commercial obstacles as well."

But despite Mr Downer's efforts to play down the immediacy of enrichment, senior government officials confirmed that Australia reserved its right to develop an enrichment industry in the future.

Mr Howard's nuclear agenda also won praise from Mr Bush.

"If you believe that greenhouse gases are a priority, like a lot of us, if we take the issue seriously, if you take the issue seriously, like I do and John does, then you should be supportive of nuclear power," he said.

But Wilderness Society acting director Virginia Young said Mr Howard had taken the first step towards an international nuclear waste dump in Australia.

"The entire purpose of GNEP is for countries to take back nuclear waste," she said. "It is simply not believable for the Government to claim that we could join GNEP but rule out an international nuclear waste dump.

"The United States desperately needs somewhere to put their nuclear waste after public opposition stopped their proposed dump at Yucca Mountain.

"The Australian Government has already rushed through legislation that for the first time allows Australia to import radioactive waste."

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Nuclear recycling plan condemned by US scientists
By Brendan Trembath
November 2, 2007
ABC Radio - 'PM'

The top scientists who advise the US Government have poured cold water on a key element of a nuclear energy plan actively supported by President George W Bush and allies like Australia's Prime Minister John Howard.

The plan involves shipping nuclear fuel to energy-hungry developing nations.

To prevent spent fuel being used for weapons, the fuel would be returned for reprocessing, but US scientific advisers have a problem with the cost and the technology involved.

Recently Australia was invited to join a small but influential club founded by bigger nations, including the US.

The club is known as the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and its members hope to increase the use of nuclear fuel, but without that fuel falling into the wrong hands.

Nuclear scientist Leslie Kemeny explains.

"This partnership envisages countries with significant commitment and investment in nuclear power technology or alternatively countries which have rich uranium resources, such as Canada or Australia, to help each other handle the global nuclear fuel cycle," he said.

The partnership wants to reprocess spent fuel without separating the weapons ingredient plutonium.

But that is not a simple process. The scientists who advise the US government have reviewed the reprocessing research and development program and they are not convinced it is worth the effort.

A National Academies Committee says the technologies involved for achieving the partnerships goals are too early in development to justify the rush to build commercial plants.

The scientists have noted the US Department of Energy's view that the program will save time and money if it is done on a commercial scale. But the committee says the opposite is likely to be true.

Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer was not available to discuss the implications of the setback, but he has previously spoken in favour of the plan.

The US scientists have also said the US Department of Energy should work harder to get new nuclear power plants built. This recommendation is backed by Australia-based nuclear scientist Leslie Kemeny, who says Australia has to get moving too. "It's my own enthusiastic belief that the best Australia can do in any partnership is to get its own domestic nuclear power program or energy production program going," he said. He says Australia is wasting a lot of time, and warns it could be up to 12 years before the first of 25 scheduled nuclear power stations come online.

But there is no convincing some long-time opponents of nuclear power, like Dr Jim Green from Friends of the Earth. But he still agrees with the US scientists' main finding.

"I think it's logical and I think they're giving voice to a sentiment which exists even within the nuclear industry," he said.

"These proposals to establish fast neutron reactions and reprocessing in the US are highly ambitious. They're taking money and energy away from other aspects that might better be addressed, such as finding a solution to the radioactive waste management problem in the US."

Dr Green says reprocessing poses problems because of the weapons proliferation risks and so-called 'fast neutron' or 'breeder' reactors. "They're some of the most dangerous reactors around," he said. "They can potentially consume plutonium, but they can also potentially produce more than they consume so they're also highly problematic."

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NUCLEAR POWER FOR AUSTRALIA

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ABARE still vexed on climate change
Crikey 28/9/07
Failed public servant David MacCormack writes: 
When it comes to the greenhouse effect, the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics has always been an enthusiastic advocate for the primary industries and agriculture sectors.
Its efforts to first deny global warming, then to predict economic disaster if anything was done about it, suited the mining and agricultural industries perfectly. It also ensured that this notionally independent research body worked hand-in-glove with the Government trying to downplay the impact of our carbon addiction. If there was ever a "greenhouse mafia" of global warming denialists, ABARE was the dodgy accountant cooking the books behind the scenes.
Now ABARE's at it again. Just before an election, when the Government is desperately playing catch-up on global warming, it produces another report, loyally advertised by The Australian, to bolster the Prime Minister's claim that we can kick back, turn the airconditioning on and wait for gee-whiz new technologies to halt what increasingly looks like a runaway greenhouse effect.
What are these magical technologies? ABARE lists quite a few, including clean coal, biomass and carbon capture. All of them are described as "promising" or "emerging" technologies, which "have potential" or are "in development". But you can tell it really means nuclear power. In particular, ABARE likes these you-beaut new "Generation IV" reactors (unfortunately, still - you guessed it - "in development").
They're the ones that presumably produce waste that is only deadly for fifty thousand years, rather than the usual hundreds of thousands. But with all these new technologies, ABARE says, carbon emissions growth will be half of what it would otherwise have been. Right. Well that's greenhouse sorted. Phew. It had us all worried there for a moment.
Really, if ABARE wants to continue to represent the interests of the mining and agriculture industries, it would have a shred more credibility if it gave up downplaying global warming and started spruiking all the positives of our reliance on carbon. And there's plenty of them. Everyone enjoys Spring coming a few weeks earlier than it used to. The geopolitical problem of failed states in the Pacific will be fixed as they are submerged under rising sea levels.
Many of our flagging tourism destinations will be able to rebadge themselves as tropical holidays. Land clearing removes large numbers of obstacles that our birds might fly into -- and it makes the countryside look so NEAT. ABARE should be researching all these benefits, not issuing rubbish-in/rubbish-out modeling based on the adoption of perpetual motion machines and cold fusion.
Or it could explain the reality that our lifestyles require too much energy for the good of the planet. But that's not the sort of message that would go down well with ABARE's political or industry masters.

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FUSION - AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH LOBBY

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Australia left behind in fusion race
Leigh Dayton, Science writer | September 05, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22364165-30417,00.html

SCIENTISTS claim the nation has fallen further behind in the quest for safe cheap energy, as yet another international fusion project took a major step forward without Australian participation.

It was revealed on Monday that a British proposal to lead the next phase of the High Power Laser Fusion Research facility (HiPER) has been given the thumbs up by peer-reviewers for the European Commission (EC).

Fusion is the nuclear process that fuels the Sun and stars. If harnessed, it promises millions of years of cheap energy, with no greenhouse gas emissions, low levels of radioactive waste and no weapons proliferation potential.

This week's EC decision paves the way for a seven-year, £500 million ($1227 million) program to construct an experimental fusion reactor within two decades, probably located in the UK.

The HiPER project is a consortium of seven European nations, including the UK.

“Either the rest of the world is stupid or Australia is missing something,” said Matthew Hole, a physicist with the Australian National University in Canberra.

He said HiPER followed the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project, a collaboration of seven partners - Japan, China, India, South Korea, Russia, the US and the EU - working to build a trial electricity-generating fusion reactor in France within the decade.

Boyd Blackwell, director of the Australian Plasma Fusion Research Facility at ANU, claimed HiPER developments highlighted the need for Australia to explore a “variety” of forms of alternative energy.
“I think the problem in Australia is we've focussed solely on obvious alternative sources like solar energy and conventional nuclear fission,” he said.

Discovered in the 1930s by Australian physicist Mark Oliphant, fusion promises more energy than is needed for the nuclear reaction driving it. That involves fusing atoms of deuterium and tritium - types of hydrogen - under temperatures of about 100 million degrees C.

The Australian ITER forum, chaired by Dr Hole, was set up in 2004. It represents more than 130 scientists and engineers and is supported by seven universities, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation and the Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering.

Last month, the group launched a plan calling for $63 million over 10 years to allow Australian scientists to participate in the ITER consoritum.

According to Dr Blackwell, roughly $10 million would go towards the design and construction of instrumentation critical in monitoring the fusion reaction. Dr Hole added that benefits would spin-off to other areas of physics.

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URANIUM - ROXBY DOWNS EXPANSION

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Olympic Dam project may go offshore
Jeremy Roberts | September 14, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22414530-643,00.html

BHP Billiton is considering offshore prefabrication of smelting equipment for its planned expansion of the Olympic Dam uranium and copper mine, potentially diluting employment and the local investment dividend.

The option is the latest to emerge as the mining giant reviews its options to transform Olympic Dam, 570km northwest of Adelaide, into the world's largest open-cut mine and biggest uranium producer.

The company is running the ruler over plans to construct sections of the plant and equipment overseas and ship them into Australia due to concern about the skilled labour shortage, The Australian understands.

The idea comes after BHP Billiton revealed in July a development option to downgrade on-site processing in favour of exporting uranium-infused copper concentrate direct to China.

South Australian Premier Mike Rann and federal Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane have each called on the company to retain processing at the site so as to secure jobs and investment in Australia.

Yesterday, Mr Macfarlane said that he was unaware of the pre-fabrication plan, but re-iterated his plea to BHP Billiton not to export jobs from Australia.

"My position now is unchanged," he said.

"I have serious reservations about a plan which reduces the number of Australian jobs created from the mine expansion."

BHP Billiton spokesman Richard Yeeles said the company was examining pre-fabrication as part of the pre-feasibility work on the proposed expansion.

"We are looking at the construction of plant offshore and shipping modules to Australia," he said.

The plan would be a "refinement" of a plan to do all copper smelting at Olympic Dam.

He said if adopted the plan would avoid "labour availability" problems in Australia.

News of the further option comes after speculation has mounted since mid-year that BHP Billiton's plans for Olympic Dam were being pushed back by up to six months.

South Australian government sources revealed last week the company was asked in June to carry out further work as part of its environmental impact statement.

Government agencies wanted BHP Billiton to perform its own modelling and measurement of conditions in the fragile Upper Spencer Gulf, where the company wants to build a massive desalination plant to move water to Olympic Dam.

And it was understood the Department of the Premier and Cabinet recommended to the company it revise its plans for power supply to include much more renewable energy.

Mr Yeeles denied the EIS has been delayed, but said the company had been exploring "offshore processing ... and until we have a project configuration we can not complete and EIS".

He admitted there had been "comments going backwards and forwards between the government and the company".

However, public statements last year from Mr Yeeles and BHP Billiton's EIS consultants, Arup/HLA, clearly pointed to the release of a draft EIS in the first half of 2007.

"We will prepare the EIS and at this stage we're looking at publishing a draft EIS in early 2007," Mr Yeeles was reported to have told ABC News on July 10, 2006.

That time-frame has since been dropped, with the company now pointing to an open-ended pre-feasibility process.

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BHP BILLITON, URANIUM AND ETHICS

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BHP Billiton shareholders call for moral stand on lucrative trade

Jan Mayman in Perth
Monday October 1, 2007
The Guardian
http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,2180673,00.html

The world's biggest mining company is facing a revolt from shareholders who want the group to stop excavating uranium.

Activist plan to use the annual meeting of BHP Billiton, which last year made record-breaking profits of $13.4bn (£6.7bn), to force the company to take a "moral stand" and pull out of the highly profitable trade in uranium, which has soared in price as demand for nuclear fuel has grown in the past decade.

Article continues
Led by John Poppins, a retired engineer whose family controls more than A$1m (£434,000) worth of stock in the company, the BHP Billiton Shareholders for Social Responsibilities group hope to enlist support from conservationists, churches and unions on the shareholder register.

Mr Poppins has 60 of the 100 signatures he needs to get the issue on the agenda of the AGM in Adelaide next month, with more pledged. "BHP Billiton's outstanding commercial success and market pre-eminence carries an equally large moral obligation to provide leadership on issues of uranium production and nuclear proliferation," he said.

BHP Billiton's profits have boomed 27% in the past year from burgeoning sales of iron ore, copper, aluminium, manganese and natural gas, and it owns the world's biggest known deposit of uranium, at its Olympic Dam mine in South Australia.

Figures from BHP Billiton say it contains more than 2m tonnes of uranium oxide. With recent prices reaching as high a $68,000 a tonne, the value of the deposit is more than $1bn.

BHP Billiton has long-term contracts for the sale of uranium oxide concentrates to the UK, France, Sweden, Finland, Belgium, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Canada and the US. "There are major strategic tensions between some of these countries, along with Israel and Pakistan, all of which have the capacity to manufacture nuclear bombs," Mr Poppins said.

He is concerned that the Australian government has recently declared its support for uranium sales to Russia and India. And the notion that uranium was a clean fuel was wrong, he said. "Claims that uranium is 'carbon-free' completely ignore the substantial carbon costs of its mining, processing, power station construction, protection and disposal," he said.

Mr Poppins was an engineer in computing and aviation before retiring to take up ethical investment issues.

BHP Billiton said that shareholders were free to raise any issues at AGMs.

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BHP denies delays at Olympic mine
Jeremy Roberts | September 08, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22382128-5013404,00.html

BHP Billiton has delayed the release of a crucial environmental impact statement into the expansion of its vast Olympic Dam copper and uranium mine, in a further indication that it is recasting one of the nation's most crucial resources ventures.

At least four agencies of the South Australian Government, including the Department of the Premier and Cabinet, have told the company it has failed to address key environmental concerns in a draft environmental impact statement.

According to government sources who took part in talks with the company, the agencies want to see more detail on the possible effects of a planned desalination plant on South Australia's Upper Spencer Gulf, from where BHP Billiton wants to supply fresh water to the expanded Olympic Dam mine.

The company has since done field work to measure the possible effects of brine, which would be released at the top of the gulf.

The Upper Spencer Gulf has been identified by state and federal governments as among the most fragile marine environments in the country.

It is understood the Department of the Premier and Cabinet suggested the company source more power for the project from low-carbon emissions sources.

The Rann Government's environmental concerns partly explain the delay in the company's EIS, originally scheduled for release in the middle of the year.

The project has faced mounting uncertainty since the company admitted in June that it had started exploring a radical redrawing of the expansion plan to downgrade on-site processing in favour of exporting uranium-infused copper concentrate direct to China.

News of the so-called OptionB sparked angry responses from Mr Rann and federal Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane -- both keen to secure the jobs and investment in down-stream processing.

The company has not publicly backed Option B, calling it one of a number of schemes being considered.

But outgoing chief executive Chip Goodyear this week said BHP should concentrate on mining ore and leave "to others the skill set of processing that material".

A company spokesman yesterday denied Olympic Dam had been delayed, claiming it was never scheduled to appear in a specific timetable.

"We are in a pre-feasibility phase where several options are being examined," he said.

"If you write that the EIS is delayed, then you would be wrong."

However, according to a "fact sheet" prepared by BHP Billiton's EIS consultants, Arup/HLA, which appeared on a dedicated Roxby Downs EIS website as late as August last year, the draft EIS was to be released in "mid-2007".

The fact sheet has since been rewritten, and now has no date for the release of the EIS. Mr Rann referred to the release of the EIS this year, telling parliament in March: "I am told the EIS is likely to be made public later this year in an effort to contribute to the state's greenhouse gas emissions target".

According to government sources, environmental concerns were raised with BHP Billiton in June as part of a whole-of-government response to sections of a draft EIS circulated by the company.

The agencies that recommended further work were the Department of Primary Industries and Resources, the South Australian Research and Development Institute, the Environmental Protection Authority, the Department of Environment and Heritage and the Department of the Premier and Cabinet.

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URANIUM SALES TO RUSSIA

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AUSTRALIAN CONSERVATION FOUNDATION
MEDIA RELEASE

7 September 2007

Russian uranium deal: Trust us. Forever.

The ‘safeguards’ relied on in the Australia-Russia uranium deal, signed today by John Howard and Vladimir Putin, are paper promises and cannot guarantee that Australian yellowcake will not fuel future Chernobyls and nuclear weapons.

The Australian Prime Minister and the Russian President today signed an agreement that will see Australian uranium exported to Russia, a nuclear weapons state that is building nuclear reactors in Iran and Burma.

“Russia’s nuclear facilities are old and under performing,” said the Australian Conservation Foundation’s Dave Sweeney.

“Civil society watchdogs that monitor the nuclear industry in the West – like the media, environment groups and unions – are under-resourced and under pressure in Russia.

“Although Russia is a signatory to the United Nations’ nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) it is actively breaching the treaty’s obligations.

“Russia recently changed its domestic laws so new nuclear reactors can be built without facing environmental impact assessments.

“Safeguards cannot guarantee that Australian uranium will not end up fuelling a nuclear accident or a nuclear weapon. The only thing that can be guaranteed is that it will end up as long lived radioactive waste.

“The safeguards mean Australians have to trust the current Russian regime – as well as every future Russian regime – to do the right thing. Politicians come and go; radioactive risks remain.

“The safeguards are paper promises that provide nothing more than an illusion of protection.

“Australia should be helping Russia, a country that continues to suffer from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster, build a truly sustainable energy future with safe renewable energy,” Mr Sweeney said.

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Howard's uranium sales policy goes bananas
Crikey 7/9/07

Australian Democrats leader Senator Lyn Allison writes:  Yellowcake under Mr Howard has become just another trade commodity - no more special than bananas. With a federal election around the corner which is likely to oust an increasingly unpopular government, just how reasonable is it for the Prime Minister to be striking a deal this week that will utterly and finally reverse Australia’s once-cautionary approach to who gets our uranium?   
After India and China, Russia is the next customer, even though it still has a stockpile of 10,000 nuclear weapons and an appalling record on nuclear safety and human rights. This nuclear colossus hasn’t yet ratified the International Atomic Energy Agency additional protocol, meaning it would be subject to even less stringent verification procedures than those that apply to China.
Russia cannot seem to break with KGB-style assassinations as the nasty death by radioactive poisoning of dissident Alexander Litvinenko shows. Neither does it take criticism lightly as 14 journalists already killed under the Putin regime would indicate. The Kremlin has, according to Russian pro-democracy leader Garry Kasparov, “zero obedience to the rule of law”.   
Let’s be clear. Russia is a regime riddled with corruption that's not going to take Australia's namby-pamby safeguards agreement too seriously.   
Russia doesn’t need our uranium for its power generation. Even if it were to build 30 new reactors in the next 30 years, none will be using our uranium for at least 15 years. More likely, our uranium will be used to downgrade the 700 tonnes of highly enriched uranium stockpiled from the early round of dismantling for on-selling to the United States where most of it has gone so far, or to Syria or Iran.   
Since there is no way of guaranteeing that our uranium would be used for peaceful purposes, our test of fitness to receive it should be based on disarmament and proliferation. On both counts Russia fails. Like all other nuclear weapon states, Russia is actively engaged in nuclear re-armament. “Modernisation” is the euphemism it prefers.   
In the post-Cold War world order, Russia’s nuclear weapons program still generates a great degree of international instability. President Putin recently announced that his long-range bombers would resume, for the first time since the 1980s, their routine flights around the globe. And plans are afoot to double combat aircraft production by 2025, with more nuclear missiles.   
There is a build-up of nuclear weaponry around the world and Russia’s dismantling of a few thousand obsolete nukes in favour of newer, nastier but fewer bombs is no comfort to the rest of the world. Russia, like all other nuclear weapons states, flouts the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty every day.   
Russia is either unwilling or unable to stop nuclear material getting into the wrong hands. From 2001 to 2006, there were 183 reported trafficking incidents involving nuclear materials in the former Soviet Union.   
Most discussion about a nexus between nuclear trafficking, organised crime and terrorism has focused on the former Soviet Union, particularly Central Asia and the Caucasus. According to the US-based Arms Control Association, these regions house a large number of “insufficiently secured” nuclear facilities in close proximity to trafficking routes for drugs and small arms.   
Most trafficking is in low-grade nuclear material from medical and industrial facilities abandoned by the military. However, 10 of the known trafficking incidents from 2001 to 2006 involved highly enriched uranium. On three occasions, the uranium had an enrichment level greater than 80% -- suitable for making a nuclear bomb.   In 2002, Chechen rebels stole nuclear material from a Russian nuclear power plant, and in 2003 two individuals attempted to acquire 15kg of uranium allegedly for use in a radioactive bomb to be detonated in St Petersburg.
Admittedly, proliferation-significant cases -- where kilogram-level quantities of weapons-grade materials are trafficked -- have dropped off since the 1990s. But the absence of evidence of more recent cases is not evidence of absence.
Investigations of trafficking incidents usually focus on the seller of the uranium with no attempt to uncover wider networks. Communication among governments in the region is poor, and many borders are unprotected because of internal disputes. Most customs officials aren’t trained to realise the significance of trafficking in nuclear materials.   
These realities are well known to our Government. It cannot claim ignorance. The deal to Russia carries grave risks that no responsible government should find acceptable.
Mr Howard seems mystified that the polls show him losing the next election. Perhaps the gay abandon with which he hands out favours to mining companies and untrustworthy governments has something to do with it.

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PM warned: Russia may divert uranium to Iran
Marian Wilkinson and Craig Skehan
September 4, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/pm-warned-russia-may-divert-uranium-to-iran/2007/09/03/1188783158743.html

A LEADING Russian environmentalist is calling on the Prime Minister to delay signing a new uranium deal with the country's President, Vladimir Putin, during APEC summit, saying Australia cannot be sure Russia will not divert the material for military purposes or send it to Iran.

The call, from Grigory Pasko, who spent four years in prison for reporting that the Russian military had dumped radioactive waste in the Sea of Japan, coincided with a warning from an expert on international law, Dr Don Rothwell, that Australian uranium sold to Russia could end up in nuclear reactors in Iran.

Mr Pasko is speaking in Sydney today at a forum highlighting human rights violations in Russia. He is hoping to draw attention to the uranium deal just before Mr Putin arrives for the APEC leaders meeting.

"Russia is telling us loud and clear that Australian uranium may easily find its way into Iran's hands", said Mr Pasko.

He questioned Australia's ability to verify that Russia had, as it promised, introduced a strict separation between its military and civilian nuclear programs.

Mr Pasko, an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience before he was freed in 2003, said: "Politicians and businessmen who want to have dealings with today's Russia need to always remember that they are working with a country in which human rights are being trampled on and the principles of democracy are being violated."

Dr Rothwell, from the Australian National University, warned yesterday that Russia had not ratified the key International Atomic Energy Agency "additional protocol" despite having signed it seven years ago.

This meant Russia was not bound by the protocol's requirements on the provision of information about handing of nuclear materials to the agency as well as greater access and rights for agency inspectors.

"Australian-sourced uranium could be funnelled from Russia to Iran if appropriate safeguards are not in place," Dr Rothwell told the Herald yesterday.

Last month the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, indicated that the Prime Minister, John Howard, would sign a new deal with Mr Putin during this week's summit.

He rejected criticism by the Greens senator Christine Milne that Australian uranium could end up in Iran saying, "it would be a breach of international law".

"I don't think Russia will want to become a rogue state," Mr Downer said.

Dismissing the Greens concerns as "a scare campaign", Mr Downer pointed out that Australia already exported uranium to Russia. These exports were on behalf of third-party countries who needed Russia to process the uranium for use in their civilian nuclear power stations.

Last year Mr Putin decided to massively expand Russia's civilian nuclear power program. Russia is due to run out of its own viable uranium reserves in the next decade and is looking to Australia for supply.

Senator Milne will join critics of Mr Putin at tomorrow's Summit of Russia. They will include the lawyer representing the Russian energy boss Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who is serving a 10-year sentence in a Siberian jail for fraud and the theft of state property.

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Dining on yellowcake with the devil
Grigory Pasko
September 4, 2007
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/dining-on-yellowcake-with-the-devil/2007/09/03/1188783156839.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

Russian nuclear power stations account for 16 per cent of the country's electricity production. Last year the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, demanded the proportion be increased to 25 per cent by 2030. These ambitious plans have already raised a storm of indignation from environmentalists in Russia. First and foremost because Russia is doing practically nothing to develop alternative power sources, following a path of least resistance and imperial desire to develop an industry that will be useful for military purposes as well.

Meanwhile, the press has already reported that economically viable reserves of uranium in Russia are enough to last only until 2015. To fulfil exports and to supply its own nuclear plants, Russia has to buy uranium from other countries.

The founders of Atomenergoprom, the state atomic holding company, do not rule out partnerships with Western investors to develop uranium deposits in Russia. In their opinion it is possible that companies such as Japan's Mitsubishi, Canada's Cameco, and Australia's BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto may eventually become minority shareholders.

Vladimir Smirnov, the head of the nuclear import-export company that forms a part of Atomenergoprom, has already reported to the media on negotiations with the Australians, confirming meetings were held during a visit to Australia on October 13 to October 20 last year. Smirnov underscored that there was great interest by Australian companies in working with Russia.

A working group has been created in Australia under the leadership of the Prime Minister, John Howard, to conduct an analysis and prepare a report on the prospects of developing nuclear energy in Australia. The Russians have proposed Australia take part in the work of the International Centre for the Enrichment of Uranium in the Siberian city of Angarsk. The first participant, with Russia, is Kazakhstan.

So Australian intends to sell uranium for the Russian nuclear power industry. In the words of the Australian Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, the countries have achieved "substantial progress" in negotiating the agreement. In fact Howard and Putin are expected to sign the deal this Friday.

How should we react to such agreements? If we look at them strictly from a business aspect, then our reaction should be positive. After all, Australia possesses one of the richest deposits of radioactive minerals in the world, but does not have its own nuclear power plants.

But we cannot allow ourselves to forget that Australia is dealing with not just any country, but with Putinite Russia. Those politicians and businessmen who want to have dealings with today's Russia need to always remember they are working with a country where human rights are trampled on and the principles of democracy are violated. If this does not faze the Australian gentlemen, then I suppose they have the right to do business with anyone they please, even with the devil himself.

One argument heard in favour of a possible deal is that Russia has split up its military and civilian nuclear programs, and has placed its peaceful nuclear facilities under international monitoring. Downer says this has become decisive in influencing Australia's decision to conduct new negotiations with Moscow.

Who will verify this separation between military and civilian programs on the ground and how? Australian law bans the sale of uranium if it can be used for military purposes. Is Australia absolutely sure that Russia will not use Australian uranium in its weapons programs?

I have grave doubts about Angarsk being "totally civilian". At any rate, journalists are not allowed there, just like before. I tried to arrange a visit to this "open" enterprise, but got nothing beyond promises. Even when I actually travelled to Angarsk, I was not allowed beyond a "prohibited" sign on the road well before the entry gate to the plant. As for nuclear waste, how exactly is it going to be processed and disposed of?

Russia can also export the uranium it buys. Where is the guarantee it will not sell uranium to Iran? Nowhere. Instead we have a statement by the deputy head of the Federal Atomic Energy Agency, Nikolai Spassky, about how Iran "has the right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes". He said: "Any country, according to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, can develop potential in the realm of the peaceful atom. Iran, after settling its problems with the [International Atomic Energy Agency] and answering all questions, also has this right".

After all this, are Australian politicians and officials still not concerned about the imminent deal with Russia?

Grigory Pasko is a Moscow journalist and environmentalist. He was named an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience after being jailed for treason in 1997. He will address the Sydney Summit on Russia today.

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URANIUM - VARIOUS

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Sweeteners to ease uranium objection
Katharine Murphy, Canberra
October 9, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/sweeteners-to-ease-uranium-objection/2007/10/08/1191695823709.html

INDIGENOUS communities will be offered sweeteners to help pave the way for a dramatic expansion of uranium mining under a plan being considered by the Howard Government.

The Age understands the Government is considering options for a new royalty regime to apply to uranium mines in the Northern Territory, which would return profits to communities on Aboriginal land.

A high-level uranium advisory group is also developing plans to remove impediments to new uranium mines, and pressing ahead with options designed to relax restrictions on transporting uranium ore on roads and through the nation's ports.

The Age has been told the group has also discussed whether strict federal environmental approvals — like those required of large-scale developments such as the BHP Billiton Olympic Dam expansion in South Australia — should apply to smaller-scale uranium mines.

The group, led by uranium industry executive Mark Chalmers, was appointed by the Government early this year to provide advice on how to speed up the industry's expansion.

Over the past few months the Government has toned down its rhetoric in favour of more uranium mining and its support for the industry recommended by the landmark Switkowski review.

But the Coalition is continuing to lay the groundwork for reforms that will smooth the path for new uranium developments and nuclear power. Prime Minister John Howard has signalled he will legislate on key nuclear issues if he wins the election.

Four working groups have developed options to cut regulation covering the industry, provide economic incentives to indigenous communities, make it easier to transport uranium products and expand the skills base of the industry. Options put forward include:

■A new national radiation dose register covering all workers employed by uranium mining companies, and a safety course starting in 2008 to train radiation workers.

■A communications strategy to help Australia's uranium mining companies explain their proposals to traditional owners.

■New measures to encourage companies owned by indigenous people to engage in exploration and uranium mining.

A project is also under way to map all the transport links covering mine developments and identify barriers to moving ore to ports for export.

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AUSTRALIA AS THE WORLD'S NUCLEAR DUMP

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Crikey 6/9/07
Australia: mine one day, nuclear dump the next
Sophie Black writes:
Alexander Downer has denied that Australia will take radioactive waste as part of the deal to join the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), but try telling that to the Australian Nuclear Fuel Leasing (ANFL) company who have so far invested $45 million dollars in the prospect.
Today the Foreign Affairs Minister again assured the public that Australia won't be taking any waste. "We won't agree to do that and we have always made that clear," he said today.
But you can't have your yellow cake and eat it too.

“Under the GNEP... you sell uranium on the basis that you take the waste back... being part of the deal is absolutely contingent on taking high level radioactive waste back,” Wilderness Society acting director Virginia Young told Crikey.
Downer's denial doesn't stack up if you take the time to connect the dots.
On June 2 the Liberal Party Federal Council voted to support the development of a "Global Nuclear Waste Dump" in Australia.
And last year the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Legislation  Amendment Bill 2006 and the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 was passed.
This package of legislation was "aimed at making it easier to site large-scale nuclear waste dumps in Australia," Greens Senator Christine Milne told Crikey. "This included removing the rights of traditional owners to be consulted in the siting of waste dumps, removing procedural fairness and preventing traditional owners from appealing any decision to site a dump on their land."
"At the heart of the package was legislation enabling Australia to take nuclear waste from overseas that it hadn't generated itself," says Milne.
And then there's the money trail. Along with his colleagues, the chairman of Howard's Uranium Industry Framework and head of the Australian waste company Global Renewables, Dr John White has spent $45 million creating the Australian Nuclear Fuel Leasing (ANFL) company.
It's all there in the August 2006 submission to Ziggy Switkowski's Uranium Mining and Processing and Nuclear Energy Review:
The leased, Australian owned, spent fuel will be moved from the NPP (Nuclear Power Plant) reactor to the site of cooling spent fuel storage. ANFL will arrange for spent fuel to be stored for approximately 27 to 30 years in Australia and then be transferred to a co-located spent fuel geological disposal facility...
....Under the concept described in this submission, the Australian Government would facilitate the return to Australia of spent fuel derived from Australian uranium.
...Research conducted by the principals in NFLG shows that Australian geology provides the opportunity for the creation of a repository which would not only set world standards in containment and hence safety, but would also be low cost compared to other repositories worldwide. This would make Australian-origin leased fuel sufficiently attractive to make the repository self financing and profitable. These profits can only be realized if the repository is located in special “High Isolation” sites that can be found in large but restricted areas of South Australia and Western Australia. It should be noted that there are no known areas occurring in any other state or territory of Australia. Those known in South and Western Australia are the world’s best. Further, Australia would be gaining value by making use of these natural resources that would otherwise be of no benefit other than as a geological phenomenon...
ANFL also makes the point that it's Australia's responsibility to take ownership of the uranium that it is willing to export -- we must claim ownership of our waste:
It is incumbent on Australia, as a major global supplier of uranium, to consider a “life cycle” stewardship of the material. Australia is host to world’s best practice mining and geology expertise and applications, and has the most stable geology in the world for reclamation and storage. There is a strong environmental and ethical rationale ensuring that nuclear material from Australian sources is handled safely and responsibly and does not contribute to unresolved environmental problems in countries that need nuclear energy but are less well equipped to deal with the legacy of their energy production either due to the size of their programme or their geological assets...
...An essential element of the nuclear fuel leasing business as described would be the availability of a final storage solution for the spent fuel. The ultimate responsibility for an Australian based repository site and its contents would inevitably rest with the Australian government. The Australian government would need to acknowledge and accept this responsibility. For it to do so, it would have to be convinced of the safety case for such a site. Further given the characteristics of spent fuel and the leasing business from energy, commercial, safety, environmental and security perspectives, operations will inevitably need to be subject to important government regulation and oversight.
"The Foreign Minister and the rest of the Government are ...making mistakes and forgetting what they've previously said," Milne told Crikey. "Alexander Downer's denial that his Government has considered siting an international nuclear waste dump in Australia is just the latest example of this bizarre behaviour."

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Nuclear Politics: Taking the A Train
By: Alison Broinowski
Monday 1 October 2007
http://www.newmatilda.com/home/articledetailmagazine.asp?ArticleID=2498&HomepageID=221

APEC leaders ate Sydney seafood and drank Grange in early September, taking in views of the harbour from the Opera House, while behind them, downtown was barricaded as never before. Small businesses complained about losing money but local madams reported enthusiastic trade. Some of Sydney’s police, became badgeless, and took their irritation out on a few demonstrators and a press photographer.

As was predicted by columnist Peter Hartcher in The Diplomat, nothing earthshaking, region-transforming, or climate-changing happened during APEC. But quietly, during the summit, Australia agreed to sign on to George Bush’s Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), and to sell uranium to Russia.
GNEP claims that it will ‘accelerate clean and safe nuclear energy.’ A select bunch of nuclear weapons states — plus non-nuclear Japan and Australia — went to Vienna after APEC and signed up to GNEP. Their aim — or their pious hope — is to control the distribution and reprocessing of nuclear fuel in the world. But it’s when they get to the storage of waste that all eyes turn to Australia, whose official line is to allow the export of uranium, but not to import nuclear waste. In Vienna, Australia agreed to ‘expand nuclear power to help meet growing energy demand in a sustainable manner and in a way that provides for safe operations of nuclear power plants and management of wastes.’

Thanks to Fiona Katauskas
No-one in Sydney or Vienna mentioned a line of dots glowing in the dark. It starts from Lucas Heights (where, by the way, Australia’s only nuclear reactor has malfunctioned and been shut down for more than three months). It leads westward to Adelaide, then north to the Olympic Dam uranium mine, on through the desert past nuclear waste sites, military bases, and Aboriginal land, to the port of Darwin. The line completing the circuit and connecting the dots is the new north-south railway. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer calls speculation about a secret plan to import nuclear waste ‘wacky’ — another good reason to look more closely at it.

Always considered uneconomic, the rail link from Alice Springs to Darwin was suddenly found to be viable in 1999. A government/business partnership undertook to build it for $1.3 billion. FreightLink, a consortium of foreign and local investors that owns the railway, with a 50 year contract to run its freight operations, is a joint venture between 11 participants including Kellogg Brown Root (KBR, 36.2 per cent), Barclay Mowlem (13.9 per cent), and John Holland (11.4 per cent).

The sole tender for construction of the line was KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton, the US company that Dick Cheney headed before he became Vice-President. Cheney visited Australia in the late-90s to negotiate the deal with South Australian Premier John Olsen and Prime Minister John Howard. Defence contracts won by Halliburton and its affiliates were worth $2.5 million in 2000; that amount increased to $18 million in 2003; and in the following year they secured more than 150 State and Federal Government commissions.

Just after the railway line opened, a leader in the Australian freight business predicted that the railway’s return on capital would be ‘smaller than a tick’s testicles.’ The company reportedly lost $17.7 million in its first half year (2004), $53.54 million in 2005, and a similar figure in 2006. To their initial $740 million, the stakeholders added $42 million, and later promised to invest an additional $14 million over three years.

In August 2007 FreightLink’s business was reported to have made ‘a slow start’. The company recorded its fourth annual loss in a row, having tried and failed a year earlier to sell a majority stake in the railway for $360 million.

The consortium transports iron ore from Frances Creek, manganese from Bootu Creek, and uranium from the Olympic Dam site at Roxby Downs. But there must be more to it than that — and investors’ hopes of transporting copper from Prominent Hill in 2008 — for them to remain interested.

The north-south railway passes between the largest uranium deposits in the world. In late 2006, just as Howard endorsed a report advocating nuclear power for Australia, a consortium of mining industry leaders announced their intention to build a nuclear power plant near Port Augusta, northwest of Adelaide. One of them, Howard admitted, had discussed it with him six months earlier. The railway would presumably be a vital link, carrying uranium ore to Darwin for export and processing overseas, and bringing it back to Port Augusta as nuclear fuel. The spent fuel could then either be transported to Darwin for export or carried south for disposal at a waste site in central Australia.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, which proposes to control the export and processing of uranium and disposal of waste through a multilateral arrangement, has identified sites in South Australia as geologically the best in the world for disposal of nuclear waste. But no State government will take it. Downer said he wouldn’t want it near his Adelaide electoral office. Having promised before the 2004 election that the Government would not dump waste in the Northern Territory, Howard declared in 2006 that he would override Territory law and use Commonwealth land there for nuclear waste if he wanted to.

In April this year he promised to amend his own law prohibiting ‘nuclear activity,’ to allow for nuclear power, enrichment, and reprocessing of waste. He would also remove restraints on the mining and transportation of uranium ore. In June, the Federal Council of the Liberal Party endorsed the proposal for an international nuclear waste dump in Australia.

A survey found three ‘suitable’ sites under Federal Government control in the Northern Territory, two north of Alice Springs and one near Katherine. In November 2005, the enabling legislation to establish a ‘safe and secure facility’ had been pushed through Federal Parliament. Further changes enacted late in 2006 appear to remove the rights to procedural fairness of Indigenous people living there. In May 2007, Howard revealed a deal negotiated in secret for two years that would enable his government to store nuclear waste on a 1.5 square kilometre site on Muckaty station for 200 years, for a payment of $12 million to the Ngapa people.

At Muckaty, north of Tennant Creek, close to the Stuart Highway and the railway, Parsons Brinckerhoff are reported to be exploring for a waste site. The Minister for Science, Julie Bishop, does not call it a nuclear dump: it is to be a ‘radioactive waste management facility.’ But because no proven technology for permanent, secure disposal exists, how and where to dump nuclear waste are two questions that remain unanswered.

A third is: whose waste? If a nuclear power industry is set up in Australia, it will be Australian waste, which should be more methodically collected and more safely stored than it is now. But the US clearly has interests in Australian nuclear policy and in the railway. Given unresolved problems with three nuclear waste sites in the US, it could well be American waste too.

Some critics of Howard’s nuclear policy point out that power plants are 10 to15 years off, and doubt that he intends them to be built at all. Instead, Australian observers like journalist Julie Macken and the Wilderness Society’s Imogen Zethoven speculate that Howard’s real interest is in processing and exporting nuclear fuel and developing a world nuclear waste storage in Australia.

Dr John White, who has advised Howard and heads Australian Nuclear Fuel Leasing, told Macken the United States would be the biggest customer for storage, and would be so appreciative of access to the dump that Australia would never again be obliged to send troops to join American coalitions.

But for now, Howard’s nuclear plans are all over the place. He has reversed his statement that commercial considerations would alone dictate the site of nuclear power plants, and says he will hold local plebiscites first. But he has said nothing about any plebiscites on nuclear waste, and Julie Bishop still says she is considering four dumping sites, including Muckaty. Ian Macfarlane ruled out nuclear power stations in August, but Ziggy Switkowski said a re-elected Howard Government would legislate for them.

More speeches from Howard are likely, leading up to the election, about Australia being a ‘global energy superpower’ that is traveling on the ‘energy superhighway.’ Some Australians will feel good about that, as well as about their country’s part in defending freedom. But on and around the Adelaide-Darwin railway, a lot more is happening than we will find in the election slogans.

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LUCAS HEIGHTS REACTOR STILL SHUT DOWN

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(Won't reopen til 2008.)

More delays for new reactor
September 3, 2007 2:51 PM
www.theleader.com.au/2007/09/more_delays_for_new_reactor_1.php
By Mark O'Brien

The OPAL research reactor at ANSTO's Lucas Heights facility will be out of action longer than expected.

A fuel assembly fault forced an expensive shutdown of the reactor last month and it was estimated the problem would take eight weeks to fix.

Chief of operations Dr Ron Cameron said the process was time consuming because several steps needed clearance from the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency.

"At this stage, ANSTO cannot give a firm time as to when the reactor will be back to full power and producing neutrons for research,'' he said.

"It is a frustrating time for everyone, particularly our scientists who are keen to start using their state-of the-art neutron beam instruments which are ready and waiting.''

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MARALINGA - AUSTRALIA'S NUCLEAR WASTE COVER-UP

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Maralinga - Australia's nuclear waste cover-up
September 2, 2007
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/ockhamsrazor/stories/2007/2019647.htm#transcript

Robyn Williams: Isn't it fascinating to contemplate how the world changes. Twenty-five years ago we saw the first CDs replace those large vinyl discs we used to call LPs. Fifty years ago the space age really began with the launch of Sputnik, the first satellite, followed by Laika the dog. And at about the same time, out in the desert in South Australia, the British were exploding bombs, atomic bombs, something that may come as a surprise to younger listeners.

Alan Parkinson has written a book about all this and about what happened next. It's called 'Maralinga, Australia's Nuclear Waste Cover-up'.

Alan Parkinson: Most people living in Australia today probably do not know that twelve atomic bombs have been exploded on Australian territory.

Seven of those bombs were exploded at Maralinga, in South Australia, in the 1950s. Following those explosions, Britain conducted a series of experiments in which they exploded another 15 bombs in a manner which precluded an atomic explosion. Those experiments spread plutonium and uranium over hundreds of square kilometres of the South Australian landscape.

Before they abandoned the site, the British conducted a final clean-up in 1967, and the Australian government accepted their assurance that Maralinga was clean. In the mid 1980s, scientists from the Australian Radiation Laboratory surveyed the site and found it was far from satisfactory.

In 1989, I prepared estimates for some 30 options for cleaning the site, ranging from simply fencing the contaminated area to scraping over 100 square kilometres of land and burying the contaminated soil. The Federal government agreed with the South Australian government and the Maralinga Tjarutja to implement a partial clean-up.

This partial clean-up was to be in two parts: the first was to scrape up and buy the most contaminated soil. The second part was to treat 21 pits containing thousands of tonnes of plutonium-contaminated debris by a process of vitrification, which would immobilise the plutonium for perhaps a million years.

In 1993, I was appointed a member of the Maralinga Rehabilitation Technical Advisory Committee whose purpose was to advise the Minister on progress of the project, and a few months later, I was appointed the government's representative to oversee the whole project.

By the end of 1997, the collection and burial of contaminated soil was nearing an end. However, as that soil was scraped up, we found the state of the 21 debris pits was not at all what we had been led to believe from the British reports.

The pits were very much larger than the British reports told us, with about three times as much debris as we had expected, and therefore treatment by vitrification would clearly cost a lot more.

By then we had completed a three-year program to match the vitrification technology to the Maralinga geology, and a company called Geosafe had built the equipment ready to use it to treat the pits. Unfortunately, when the department signed the contract with Geosafe, they failed to include that most basic feature of any contract: a statement of what had to be achieved.

The equipment was tested in Adelaide before being taken to site, and those tests, which I witnessed, showed that the technology was going to be just as successful as we had hoped.

It was at this time that the department held three meetings with a company that had no knowledge at all of the vitrification technology; they had not been involved in the three-year development program, and nobody from that company had even seen the full-size equipment. Similarly, the two attendees from the department had no knowledge of the technology, or any project management experience. Add to that, nobody in those meetings had any nuclear expertise or experience in the disposal of nuclear waste.

Even though I was the government's representative overseeing the whole project, I was excluded, as was Geosafe.

The department then proposed to appoint this company as project manager and project authority over the vitrification part of the project. I resisted this and advised them not to proceed along this path. Geosafe also objected, telling the department several times in writing and face-to-face that the company was not qualified to take over the project, having no knowledge at all of what was involved. The department persisted and against all advice, appointed the company. For my pains I was removed from the project and the advisory committee. I was sacked.

So the world's experts in the vitrification technology found themselves contracted to the department but reporting to a company that knew nothing about the technology. In turn, that company reported to people in the department who were similarly ignorant of the technology, had no nuclear expertise and no project management experience. From that point on, the project was almost certainly likely to fail.

Within a few weeks of being appointed, the new project managers put forward a proposal that some of the pits should be exhumed and their contents buried, claiming this would be cheaper. The department accepted the suggestion and introduced what they called the hybrid system, a mixture of dubious practice and the best available technology. And I maintain they did this merely to save money, in fact later when Mr Peter McGauran inherited the project, he tried to defend the saving of over $5-million.

Vitrification of some pits continued until, as treatment was nearing completion on one pit, there was a huge explosion within the pit. The steel hood over the pit was extensively damaged, and molten glass was spewed some 50 metres from the pit. Fortunately, nobody was injured in the incident, but it gave the government an excuse to cancel vitrification altogether.

They then exhumed all the pits, including those that had been vitrified, and placed the whole lot in a shallow grave and covered it.

In March 2000, Senator Minchin visited Maralinga and declared the site was safe, and could be returned to the Aborigines. He was accompanied on that visit by Dr John Loy, the Head of the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, ARPANSA.

Dr Loy went on to claim that the shallow burial of plutonium contaminated debris was world's best practice. Three years later, on 25th March, 2003, Mr McGauran tabled the government's final report of the project in parliament. In his speech, he said, 'The project achieved its goals and a world best practice result', oblivious to the fact that a partial clean-up cannot, by definition, be world's best practice.

It would be a pity if the only record of the project was that published by the government. That final report contains so many incorrect statements that it cannot be said to describe what really happened on the project.

And now, seven years after the government claimed the project a success and four years after Mr McGauran's declaration, it is time to put a few things into perspective and look back on how the project was managed and what it bodes for the future.

In this I am mindful of the Prime Minister's push towards nuclear power. Dr Switkowski's inquiry drew attention to three things that are relevant to the Maralinga project.

The first is for there to be an independent nuclear regulator. The Maralinga project was half way through its final phase when ARPANSA was born.

The second is the need to recruit scientists and engineers with experience in the nuclear industry. The last phase of the Maralinga project was managed by a company with no nuclear expertise, reporting to a client similarly devoid of nuclear experiences, and in some cases, no technical knowledge.

And the third is the problem of nuclear waste disposal. The Minister and the Chief Nuclear Regulator claim the shallow burial of plutonium to be world's best practice. So why does the rest of the world not follow suit? Why do they insist that long-lived nuclear waste, such as that at Maralinga, should be disposed of in a deep geological facility?

In August 2003, I visited Sellafield in Northern England; that is where the plutonium now spread over a huge area of South Australia originated. There, people with far more experience in dealing with plutonium place plutonium-contaminated material in stainless steel drums and store those drums in an airconditioned building on a guarded site, awaiting permanent deep geological disposal.

It is the same story in America where trials similar to those at Maralinga were conducted, except on a much smaller scale. In their clean-up, the Americans bagged the contaminated soil and debris and transported the whole lot over 300 kilometres to a nuclear waste storage facility on a guarded site.

Those countries clearly do not agree that burial of plutonium in a shallow grave with no packaging and in totally unsuitable geology is world's best practice.

In July 2001, the government published a document called 'Safe Storage of Radioactive Waste' which says that long-lived low and intermediate level waste is not suitable for shallow burial. And yet that is what has been done at Maralinga and claimed to be world's best practice.

And the government puts similar spin on other features of the project.

In his speech to Parliament Mr McGauran said the clean-up would 'permit unrestricted access to about 90% of the 3,200 square kilometre Maralinga site'. But there was unrestricted access to 90% of the site before the project started. The only additional area in which there is unrestricted access is half a square kilometre. Admittedly another 1.6 square kilometres have been cleaned, but that is within the area to which access is restricted. And one part of that restricted area is 300 times more contaminated than the clean-up criteria.

In truth, after spending $108-million, less than 2% of the land contaminated above the clean-up criteria has been cleaned. I am not criticising that, it was what was planned, but let us keep it in perspective.

Anybody listening to the government's statements might be under the impression that the whole site is now clean and all the plutonium used in those British trials has been buried. In fact, almost 85% of the original 24,000 grams of plutonium remains on the surface.

In 24,000 years time, half of that plutonium will still be there, but in about 400 years from now, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to detect it.

On my last visit to Maralinga in September 1999, I was farewelled with, 'Well, see you in February for the handover'. I have heard many times that the site will be returned 'later in the year', or 'in the next few months', and seven years later I am still waiting for that event.

Will the Aborigines accept return of their land?

If they do, then for thousands of years, they will have to rely on the Federal government to honour any agreements they might enter, in full knowledge that only a few years ago, the government unilaterally broke their agreement to clean the site using the best available technology and then failed to do so.

Robyn Williams: Nuclear Engineer, Alan Parkinson, who lives in Canberra. His book, 'Maralinga, Australia's Nuclear Waste Cover-Up' is published by the ABC.

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MARALINGA VETERANS

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Maralinga medallion misses the mark
PM - Friday, 26 October , 2007 18:42:00
Reporter: Lindy Kerin
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2007/s2071938.htm

MARK COLVIN: Australian soldiers who served at nuclear test sites more than five decades ago are less than impressed with the medallion they've just received from the Federal Government.

The medallions have been arriving in the post, without any ceremony and without any more concrete recognition of what they've been through.

Many of the survivors are angry that they've got a medallion rather than a medal, and that they're not getting the same health care entitlements as others who served in hazardous circumstances.

Lindy Kerin reports.

LINDY KERIN: During the British Nuclear Test Program in the 1950s and '60s, as many as 11,000 Australian soldiers and civilians were exposed to atomic blasts.

Brisbane man Robert Fowler was 19 when he was sent to Maralinga in South Australia's outback, the most well known testing site.

ROBERT FOWLER: When the tests were being carried up, you were told to get on this truck, you'd drive to the site, off the truck, virtually line up, not regimentally but just a rough line. Face this way, briefing then, at the given time you were told to turn and they would count down, and then you're certainly close enough to see a flash and feel the pants, the clothes, whip around you, you know.

LINDY KERIN: Mr Fowler says at the time he and his army mates didn't question their role in the operation.

ROBERT FOWLER: But on reflection now, I do feel we were guinea pigs because the Brits were very - they wouldn't test them in their own country.

LINDY KERIN: For years, members of the defence force have been lobbying governments to formally acknowledge the dangers the soldiers faced during the testing program.

Now, five decades on, about 5,000 Australian soldiers and civilians will receive a medallion honouring their service.

Terry Toon from the Atomic Ex-servicemen Association also served at Maralinga. He says in military terms, a medallion isn't ranked as highly as a medal, and he's not happy about receiving the token in the mail.

TERRY TOON: Not really, but whatever they give you, you take. All the fellows wanted a service medal; New Zealand gave their fellows two medals for their duties out in the Pacific with the bomb testing.

The only reason that the Minister gave us this medallion was after he heard about the Labor Party conference agreeing to implement the Clarke review recommendations, and that gives us hazardous service for our involvement.

LINDY KERIN: The Clarke review in 2003 also recommended that soldiers from the test sites be given a gold card, which entitles them to free health care.

Chips Ross from the Atomic Ex-servicemen Association is outraged that the Federal Government is still refusing to adopt the recommendations.

CHIPS ROSS: I'd like Mr Howard to answer a couple of things. One, why he doesn't call it a hazardous operations and get it over and done with and let these blokes get on a pension. They want the gold card; the gold card will look after them and their families. I mean, they've all got cancer; they're all paying for it.

LINDY KERIN: But Veteran Affairs Minister Bruce Bilson says the gold card is unwarranted.

BRUCE BILSON: The vast majority of people involved in the nuclear test program don't have cancers that are related to radiation exposure. What the Government's done in responding positively to that finding is to make sure that even if the cancer is caused from other factors, the treatment is available because I know many have been concerned.

LINDY KERIN: Mr Bilson has also justified the decision to award a medallion rather than a medal.

BRUCE BILSON: It's important to remember that it wasn't only military people involved. There were quite a number of public servants, civilian contractors and the like, and the medallion in the mail is a nation conveying its appreciation for people's contribution.

LINDY KERIN: The Opposition's spokesman for veterans affairs, Alan Griffin, says he understands how the ex-soldiers feel. He says a Labor government would reassess the situation.

ALAN GRIFFIN: To review the recommendations of the Clarke review that weren't implemented by this Government and there's quite a few of them. We've specifically mentioned two recommendations of which the situation of our nuclear vets is one.

I actually met with a senior representative of the nuclear vets just the other day on the central coast and talk to him about the fact that we would examine what's occurred, look at some of the overseas studies that have taken place in the meantime and reconsider the matter when we get elected.

MARK COLVIN: Labor's spokesman on veterans affairs, Alan Griffin, ending Lindy Kerin's report.

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DEPLETED URANIUM - ICBUW LAUNCHES GLOBAL DISINVESTMENT CAMPAIGN

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On November 6th 2007 ICBUW member organisations launched a global disinvestment campaign against investments by high street banks and investment companies around the world in the manufacturers of uranium weapons. Read on to find out how you can get involved and download the report - Too Risky for Business.

http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/en/a/143.html

Report:

http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/en/docs/32.pdf

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NUCLEAR POWER FOR INDONESIA

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Nuclear reactor plan on shaky ground
October 14, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/climate-watch/nuclear-reactor-plan-on-shaky-ground/2007/10/13/1191696239293.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

With Indonesia planning to build nuclear power plants in an area prone to earthquakes, many are worried about the risks to Australia and the region. Tom Hyland reports.

IT WAS, in a way, a case of taking the mountain to Muhammad — the mountain being a dormant volcano that looms over the planned site of Indonesia's first nuclear power station.

Last month, 100 clerics and scholars from one of the world's largest Muslim organisations, in the heart of the country with the world's largest Muslim community, met near Mount Muria in Java for two days of deliberations.

The unprecedented gathering considered Indonesian Government plans to build four nuclear power plants at the foot of Mount Muria, on the world's most populous island.

It also sits on the Pacific "Ring of Fire" that is prone to devastating earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

The scholars, members of the 30-million strong Nahdlatul Ulama, met in the town of Jepara, where they heard from the Research and Technology Minister, the ANU-educated engineer Kusmayanto Kadiman, who urged support for nuclear power.

So did the head of the national atomic energy agency and other government experts.

They heard a different story from non-government groups, environmentalists, and representatives from the village of Balong, the proposed site of the nuclear plant.

At the end of their deliberations, drawing on Islamic traditions of jurisprudence, the scholars issued a fatwa, a religious legal edict, declaring the Muria plans haram — forbidden.

They declared Islam neither forbids nor recommends nuclear power. Their edict, instead, was specific to Muria, where they ruled the likely benefits were outweighed by the potential damage. Their main concern was safety.

"As far as we can tell, it's the first time there's been any mainstream Islamic expression of opposition to nuclear power, anywhere," says Richard Tanter, an Australian academic who observed the gathering.

Despite the fatwa, and a chorus of other critics, the Government is pressing ahead. It wants to let the first tender next year, with construction to start in 2010, and the first station operating by 2016.

Unease over the plan is not confined to Indonesia. Its neighbours are watching closely.

Australia's position is ambivalent. Indonesia is a potential market for Australian uranium and under the 2006 Lombok Agreement the two countries are committed to peaceful nuclear co-operation.

At the same time, Australia is concerned about potential risks, with studies showing a disaster in an Indonesian reactor would send massive fallout across northern Australia.

Earlier plans by Jakarta to go down the nuclear road were finally killed off by the financial crisis that brought down the Soeharto regime in 1998.

Now it's back on the agenda, backed by powerful and inter-connected business and political interests, including Vice-President Jusuf Kalla. Proponents argue Indonesia needs to diversify sources of energy for its 224 million people, more than half of whom are crammed onto Java, an island roughly half the size of Victoria.

Electricity demand is growing by about 10 per cent a year, while supplies of oil, its main energy source, are dwindling.

Indonesia has the backing of the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency, whose director, Dr Mohamed El Baradei, endorsed the plans on a visit to Jakarta last December. He pointed out that Indonesia was a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and was committed to safeguards.

Global warming and the need to cut carbon emissions are also being used in support of the nuclear option — although most of Indonesia's emissions, the world's third highest, come from clearing and burning forests.

Government experts insist the Muria site is stable and that modern reactors are earthquake proof.

Such arguments have not silenced opponents, who point out that only last year an earthquake in southern Java killed more than 5000 people.

Critics also point to Indonesia's poor safety record in industry and transport, a lack of transparency in Government decision-making and the potential for corruption in a project worth about $US10 billion ($A11.1 billion).

Japanese and South Korean companies are keen for the contract. The Indonesian firm Medco Energi Internasional, which has links to Vice-President Kalla, has already signed a preliminary deal with Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co Ltd to build the plant. Details of the deal are secret, adding to unease in a country where corruption remains endemic.

While the Government has decentralised power to provinces, the nuclear plant remains the last of the Soeharto-era big projects, imposed from above.

If it goes ahead, the local administration will have little say and no capacity to manage it, says Dr Tanter, senior research associate with the Nautilus Institute, a think tank that focuses on security and sustainability.

"At the local level the impact would be like a kid playing in the middle of a freeway with an 18-wheeler barrelling down on top of them," he says.

Safety is it at the heart of public anxiety, according to Rizal Sukma of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Jakarta think tank.

"To be precise, there is strong doubt — even distrust — that whoever administers the nuclear plant will have the ability and absolute commitment to ensure the safety of a nuclear plant," he wrote in The Jakarta Post.

This doubt is shared by Indonesia's near neighbours, who already resent the choking haze they endure each year from the burning of Indonesia's forests.

At a seminar in Jakarta last month on energy and nuclear safety, Dr Sukma was joined by Simon Tay, chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs, in declaring that the nuclear option was a regional issue.

"In addition to harm at the local and national level, nuclear energy plants can potentially cause trans-boundary harm to neighbouring states," they said.

The potential harm was highlighted by research by ANU experts, who warned in a 1998 report that a failure in a reactor on Java "could be a disaster" for northern Australia, Papua New Guinea and South-East Asia.

A failure during the summer monsoon would send radioactive gas across northern Australia within days, the report said. The north of Western Australia, the Northern Territory and Queensland would be at "substantial risk" of receiving potentially devastating fallout.

Critics of the Indonesian plans stress there is no evidence Jakarta wants to develop nuclear weapons. But some observers do see a long-term risk of nuclear weapons proliferation in the Indonesian project.

What they fear is an "A.Q. Khan scenario" — a reference to the founder of Pakistan's nuclear program who set up a secret network to supply nuclear technology to Libya, Iran and North Korea.

The fear held by some US analysts and officials is that a group of Indonesian technical experts could form a similar network, outside the control of the Jakarta Government and working with experts from Iran, which has launched a diplomatic offensive aimed at building ties with Indonesian nuclear researchers.

This is a nightmare scenario for Australia, given the mutual suspicion that complicates relations between the two countries.

This suspicion has been compounded by Prime Minister John Howard's call for a "full-blooded debate" on Australia developing its own nuclear industry, and his refusal to rule out uranium enrichment.

"The consequences of Indonesia and Australia pursuing their somewhat non-rational approaches to the nuclear fuel cycle could have very negative consequences for people who are already suspicious of each other," says Dr Tanter.

Even so, he says climate change and the nuclear issue present an opportunity for greater co-operation between environmentalists, scientists and non-government groups in the two countries.

"These are issues where Australia and Indonesia have common cause, where it's in our shared interests to encourage both governments toward less risky, less threatening energy alternatives. We are in the same boat on this one," he says.

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OPINION: Indonesia straddles a nuke power tightrope
AMY CHEW
2007/09/20
http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Thursday/Columns/20070920074738/Article/index_html

Plans for a nuclear power plant in Muria peninsula in Indonesia's Central Java have stoked widespread apprehension, raising safety and security concerns particularly in the aftermath of last week's devastating quake, writes AMY CHEW.

THE powerful 8.4 earthquake which struck Indonesia's west coast of Sumatra last week was the strongest to occur anywhere in the world this year - hundreds of houses and buildings collapsed like packs of cards.

The disaster is another frightening reminder of Indonesia's vulnerability to seismic upheaval - it is located in the Pacific "Ring of Fire", a zone of earthquakes and frequent volcanic eruptions encircling the Pacific Ocean.

It reinforced the people's fears over the government's plans to build a nuclear power plant in Jepara, Central Java, to meet the country's burgeoning energy needs.

"The recent earthquakes show that the risks are very high in building nuclear plants in Indonesia," says Fabby Tumiwa of the Institute for Essential Services Reform (IESF).
To date, the government has identified Muria peninsula in Jepara as a potential site for the nuclear power plant, worrying villagers in the vicinity.

Jepara is less than 180km from Yogyakarta, where an earthquake killed more than 5,000 people last year.

"Central Java is prone to earthquakes," says Muhamad Suhud, energy co-ordinator for the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). "The government's argument that the area (Jepara) is safe from earthquakes is not 100 per cent true."

Tumiwa says recent studies have indicated a fault-line at the Muria site.

"This makes Muria a high- risk site. The possibility of an earthquake occurring there is very high."

Environmentalists warn that earthquakes can cause serious damage to nuclear plants, resulting in radioactive leaks or, in a worst-case scenario, an explosion like the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

"An earthquake can damage the structure of nuclear reactors and cause radioactive leaks. It can also disrupt the cooling system and cause the plant to explode," says Suhud.

If that happens, IESF's Tumiwa says, the radioactive fallout would be massive.

"It could spread to Malaysia and Singapore. It will be like the Chernobyl disaster where the radiation went as far as England," said Tumiwa.

In 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded and burned for 10 days, releasing a cloud of radioactive material over much of Europe. The World Health Organisation estimated that up to 9,000 people would eventually die from exposure to the radiation.

Under the Indonesian government's blueprint for national energy management, nuclear energy is expected to supply two per cent of the country's electricity needs.

Opposition to the government's plan has been growing. In a rare situation, politicians, environmentalists and ulama joined the people in opposing the government's plan.

"My party opposes this plan for nuclear power plants," says Yenny Wahid, secretary-general of the National Awakening Party (PKB), the country's third-largest.

"We cannot put a power plant on Java, Sumatra or anywhere else in the country because we are so prone to earthquakes."

A legislator from the country's largest party, Golkar, also disagrees with the plan.

"I can tell you, not many politicians support this nuclear plan. Only a handful of people from certain political parties and perhaps one government minister are for it," says Joeslin Nasution, a Golkar member of parliament.

On Sept 1, thousands of people living in remote villages gathered together and began a 35km trek under the cover of darkness to Jepara. Husbands and wives marched with their children; elderly grandfathers and grandmothers joined the crowd.

The villagers arrived at their destination the next day at 10am. They rallied at the provincial legislature to protest the government's plan.

"This is not the first time the people have protested. On Aug 17, thousands of people also came out to voice their opposition to the plant to me when I visited Jepara," says Yenny.

The following day, ulama from the country's largest Muslim organisation, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), issued a fatwa declaring the development of the power plant haram.

"The nuclear power plant is sure to produce radioactive waste, and we doubt the government's ability to ensure safety in the handling of the waste," NU says in a statement.

The government is scheduled to put the nuclear plant project out to tender next year. Construction is expected to begin in 2010 and the plant is expected to be up and running in 2016.

However, Research and Technology Minister Koesmayanto Kadiman says the government has not made any decision on the plant in Muria.

"The government is conducting research on the techno-economic, socio-political development of the nuclear power plant, including researching sites for the plant," says Koesmanyanto in a text message to the New Straits Times. "Peninsula Muria is one of 14 sites being looked at."

Last year, the local press quoted government officials as saying that the Muria plant would go ahead. Environmentalists and politicians say the country has vast reserves of alternative energy sources.

"We still have lots of coal and geothermal energy," says Wahid. "Why do we need to have a nuclear plant?"

Indonesia has the second-largest abundance of geothermal energy after New Zealand, according to WWF.

"Geothermal is clean in terms of emissions and waste," says WWF's Suhud. "It is also safer and less expensive."

Nuclear energy costs 10 to 15 US cents (35 to 52 sen) per kilowatt to produce; geothermal, 5 to 6 US cents per kilowatt. Indonesia's standing as one of the most corrupt countries in the world also worries activists, who fear safety will be compromised for money.

"Big projects like nuclear plants will be prone to corruption," says Tumiwa. "And whether you like it or not, safety will be compromised. The plant may not be built to the standards required because of corruption. You really cannot afford this when you are dealing with nuclear power."

The lack of a safety culture is another concern, he says. "People here are so laid-back about safety. Even for the handling of low-level radioactive waste, like that for radiography in hospitals, is not done properly."

Finally, nuclear power plants could also be targets for terrorists. Golkar's Joeslin, who sits on Commission I, which oversees security and foreign affairs issues, puts it bluntly: "There are terrorists in this country. Having a nuclear plant means we have to have very high security.

"As you know, our capability for preventive security measures is zero."

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KEEP SPACE FOR PEACE

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KS4P WEEK

WILPF Statement in support of Keep Space for Peace Week

From October 4 to 13, WILPF is co-sponsoring international Keep Space for Peace Week in cooperation with Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space. We, and dozens of organizations around the world, seek to educate on the dangers of weaponizing space, and to protest the promotion of space militarization and warfare for profit by the global military-industrial complex. This is an urgent matter as it is much easier to prevent the weaponization of space than to disarm space in the future.

Fifty years ago, on 4 October 1957, the launch of the Sputnik satellite changed the world forever. A new era of political, military, technological, and scientific developments began as the world entered the space age. Sputnik roused fears of an arms race in outer space.

Ten years later, on 10 October 1967, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) welcomed the Outer Space Treaty (the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies), which sought to ensure the peaceful uses of space for the benefit of all humankind.

On the 40th anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty, WILPF reaffirms that treaty's goals. We welcome the progress made in cooperation for peaceful purposes, and in the development of space law as reported by the third United Nations Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UNISPACE III) conference.

Since then, however, one country, the United States, has rapidly and unilaterally proceeded to militarize its own considerable space assets. It has utilized space to fight wars on Earth, to develop a prompt global strike capacity, and to launch satellite-controlled bombs in Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Its proclaimed goal is "full spectrum dominance [1]" in land, sea, air, and space, and seizing the ultimate military "high ground." This same nation is developing missile defense systems which, though as yet malfunctioning, many believe are intended as shields for offensive use of nuclear weapons, and have dual applications as offensive space weapons.

These provocative policies, just sixteen years after the Cold War's end, are already instigating a new arms race in space that will devour resources needed for sustenance of human life, bring death and devastation, and very possibly lead to global war more devastating than any Earth has yet known. The weaponization of space will lead to an increase in geopolitical tensions, a decrease of transparency and international security, and the proliferation of space debris, which, after 50 years of space activity, already poses a considerable hazard to spacecraft.

We must stop this military madness! The world has had enough of war and destruction! Where are the visions of the UN Charter to prevent future generations experiencing war, and the call for general and complete disarmament? Will we let the web of human rights and disarmament treaties unravel, and the institutions of peace we've built together collapse? Space must be demilitarized, and space weaponization must not proceed.

Within the United Nations, general agreement has developed that an arms race in outer space must be prevented. On this fortieth anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty, WILPF calls on all nations and peoples to cooperate in negotiation of new and stronger terms to keep space for peace.

WILPF calls on the governments of Norway, Australia, Japan, Canada, Britain, Poland, the Czech Republic, and others, to cease cooperating with space militarization, to deny use of their space assets for military purposes and to reject "missile defense" or radome bases on their territories. Instead, they should recognize that their own citizens oppose the diversion of human and economic resources into schemes that that will enrich a handful of corporate investors, while seriously undermining human security, human rights, and sustainable development.

The Conference on Disarmament (CD) has been stalled for 11 years, and on the issue of the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS), the US is blocking progress. It is difficult to imagine that the rest of the international community will be able to prevent the weaponization of space without the full cooperation of the US, given that the US has the largest number of space assets and commands the greatest control over outer space resources. We call on the citizens of the United States to join us in insisting that their country use space assets only for peaceful purposes, and not for the destruction of life, or of other lands and cultures.

There may be other ways to move forward on PAROS outside of the CD. The Fourth Committee of the General Assembly (Special Political and Decolonisation) has discussed issues related to preserving outer space for peaceful uses and could initiate PAROS negotiations. The Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS), established in 1959 is also capable of negotiating legal instruments, including treaties. Whatever the source, the monitoring of space law and negotiations to strengthen this law must move forward with new vigour.

Let us together keep both Earth and space for peace in our lifetimes and for our descendants in the generations to come.

The Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) is the oldest women's peace organization in the world, established in 1915 to oppose the war raging in Europe. It has been working ever since to study, make known, and abolish the causes of war, and to support human rights and general and complete disarmament.

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PLUTONIUM STOCKPILE IN THE UK

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Royal Society studies UK plutonium stockpiles
The report says that the UK's civil stockpile of separated plutonium now totals over 100 tonnes and has almost doubled in the past ten years.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
by World Nuclear News
http://www.energypublisher.com/article.asp?id=11221

The Royal Society, the UK's national academy of science, has published a report on the options available to deal with the country's stockpile of reactor-grade separated plutonium.

The report says that the UK's civil stockpile of separated plutonium now totals over 100 tonnes and has almost doubled in the past ten years. The stockpile is largely the by-product of commercial reprocessing of used nuclear fuel from UK power plants.

According to the Royal Society, the potential consequences of a major security breach or accident involving the separated plutonium are so severe that the government should urgently develop and implement a strategy for its long term use or disposal. The report recommends that such a strategy should be considered as an integral part of the energy and radioactive waste policies that are currently being developed.

The report suggests that the best current option is to convert the stockpiled plutonium into mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel, which can then be used as fuel in nuclear power reactors. It suggests that the plutonium would then be harder to steal due to the higher radioactivity of used fuel, which would require reprocessing in order to obtain weapons-usable plutonium.

The Royal Society says that if the government decides to construct a new generation of reactors, then the entire stockpile could be burnt as MOX fuel in those units. However, if no new reactors are built, a small proportion of the plutonium stockpile could be transformed into used fuel by adapting the Sizewell B pressurized water reactor (PWR) to burn MOX fuel. The report recommends that the remaining separated plutonium should then be converted and stored as MOX fuel pellets.

In the long term, the report suggests, the best option of disposing of the separated plutonium stockpile would be to bury it deep underground in the form of used fuel or, less ideally, MOX pellets. It is essential that the government's strategy for developing such a repository for nuclear waste includes an option for the disposal of separated plutonium and materials derived from it. However the report stresses the urgency of the government developing a strategy for dealing with separated plutonium in the meantime since, according to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), disposal sites for high-level waste may not ready until around 2075.

The UK is committed to maintaining reprocessing and MOX fuel production at Sellafield to fulfil existing contracts to reprocess used fuel from overseas light-water reactors (LWRs), the report says. The THORP reprocessing plant will require approximately three years of operating time to complete these contracts, but it is not currently operating due to waste discharge problems. The restart is scheduled for late-2007 and closure for 2010. Reprocessing in the Magnox plant is scheduled to end in 2012, after which the UK will have no capability to separate additional plutonium, thereby placing a cap on the size of the stockpile. The government has concluded that waste management plans and financing for any new nuclear power stations that might be built in the UK should be based on a once-through cycle in which used fuel will not be reprocessed. The stockpile of separated plutonium should therefore slowly decrease after 2012 as its overseas-owned material is converted into MOX fuel and repatriated to its owners.

The Sellafield MOX Plant (SMP) was built to convert the plutonium separated by THORP into MOX fuel. All plutonium from overseas reactors is scheduled to be returned in this form. The first MOX fuel was returned to overseas clients in Switzerland in 2005. SMP was designed to produce some 120 tonnes of MOX annually, but is not expected to achieve a production rate of over 40 tonnes. As a result, conversion of plutonium into MOX for foreign customers may continue until around 2022-2023.

Professor Geoffrey Boulton, chair of the report's working group, said: "The status quo of continuing to stockpile separated plutonium without any long term strategy for its use or disposal is not an acceptable option. The Royal Society initially raised concerns about the security risks nine years ago and we have not seen any progress towards a management strategy. Furthermore, the stockpile has grown whilst international nuclear proliferation and terrorist threats have increased."

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NUCLEAR POWER GLOBALLY

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Who Will Foot the Nuclear Power Bill?
UK: September 11, 2007
Story by Jeremy Lovell
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/44255/story.htm

LONDON - Nuclear power may be close to a revival after two decades in the shadow of the Chernobyl reactor accident as governments search for clean sources of power to beat climate change.

But ask the industry who is going to foot the potentially massive bill and it becomes coy and mutters about governments, public/private partnerships and equity financing.

"There is a lot of talk about the nuclear renaissance, but in reality only China is really building," says Steve Kidd, director of strategy at the World Nuclear Association (WNA). "No one wants to go first."

According to the WNA -- the nuclear power industry's umbrella organisation -- there are 439 reactors operating globally, generating 371,000 megawatts of electricity or about 16 percent of total demand.

A further 34 are under construction, with 81 planned and 223 proposed -- 88 of which are in China.

The WNA estimates nuclear power could double over the next 30 years but, given the forecast surge in population and demand, it will still only account for about the same percentage.

Cost estimates vary depending on location and number of plants -- with economies of scale -- but the ballpark figure is around US$2 billion for a standard 1 gigawatt nuclear plant.

"The first one will cost more than that. But get an order for three or four and the price drops sharply," said Kidd. "The best is 10 or more."

"The fact is that once it is running, a nuclear power plant is like a cash machine. Yes, six to eight years of pain because of the high initial capital costs, but then 60 years of almost pure profit because of the low running costs," he said.

WHO WILL TAKE THE LEAD?

So why, ask the doubters, is no frantic nuclear construction activity already underway, given it is a low-carbon emitting technology and seems to fit the global warming bill perfectly?

"We are on the cusp of action. Everybody has been waiting for someone to lead," Thomas Meston of reactor builder Westinghouse, which has just sold four of its AP-1000 plants to China, told Reuters at the WNA's annual meeting in London.

Britain is contemplating a new generation of nuclear power plants to replace its existing fleet, all but one of which will be closed due to old age within two decades.

As nuclear provides 18 percent of the country's electricity, the issue is urgent.

The government has repeatedly said nuclear power should be part of the energy mix but that it will not give public money.

It is conducting a public consultation on the issue that is largely a public relations exercise as there is no legal block other than cumbersome planning regulations -- which are being cut -- to utility firms going ahead with a new plant.

The utilities say they are interested as long as certain regulatory issues -- like who pays for decommissioning and storage of toxic waste -- are sorted out.

But potential financiers decline to discuss the matter, saying on one hand that they won't talk about hypotheticals and on the other that they can't betray client confidentiality.

It is a game of brinksmanship, with the utilities holding out for the best deal they can get from government -- particularly any price guarantees they may be able to extract.

The problem centres on public acceptability.

China and Russia may now be building nuclear plants, but neither has a strong record on safety -- which is why what happens in Britain, which does, could be a global catalyst.

France, which now gets 80 percent of its electricity from atomic power, is already firmly set on a nuclear path.

"Britain is seen as a springboard for nuclear expansion," said Kidd. "The utilities will finance it. The challenge is to make sure all the risks are allocated to the people who can best bear them.

"I am optimistic that is will happen, but maybe not in the 10-year timeframe some people are talking about," he added.

IS IT WORTH IT?

Scientists predict that global average temperatures will rise by between 1.8 and 4.0 degrees Celsius this century due to carbon gases, bringing climatic and humanitarian catastrophe.

Nuclear proponents say atomic power is the answer, but environmentalists say that not only have the nuclear waste, proliferation and security issues not been resolved, but nuclear power will not significantly cut carbon emissions anyway.

Electricity generation accounts for some 20 percent of global carbon emissions.**

Given that even under the WNA's most optimistic outlooks nuclear will only account for 18 percent of electricity demand, the amount of carbon foregone comes in at just four percent.

And that, says the environmental lobby, is simply not worth the risk entailed in the mooted new nuclear age.

(** That figure usually estimated at 22-30%. In Australia it is about 37%. JG)

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JAPAN - NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS

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Small Radiation Leak at Japan Nuclear Power Plant
JAPAN: September 5, 2007
(Additional reporting by Chikafumi Hodo)
Story by Osamu Tsukimori
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/44137/story.htm

TOKYO - Water containing a small amount of radioactivity has leaked from a nuclear power generation unit in Japan, owner Kansai Electric Power said on Tuesday, adding to a long line of problems in the tarnished industry.

Kansai Electric Power Co Inc, Japan's second-biggest utility, said 3.4 tonnes of water had leaked from the 1,175-megawatt No.1 generating unit at its Ohi power station, but none had made it to the environment and it would stop generating electricity from the affected unit by around 11 p.m. (1400 GMT)

The problem at the Ohi plant, in Fukui prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast around 320 km (200 miles) west of Tokyo, follows years of scandals in Japan's nuclear industry involving cover-ups and fudged safety records that have tarnished public faith in the sector.

Only this year, Kansai Electric restarted commercial operations at another nuclear power unit following Japan's worst-ever nuclear plant accident more than two years ago, in which five workers were killed after being sprayed with steam and hot water from a broken pipe.

Kansai said it had discovered the problem at its Ohi plant on Monday evening and the leak was stopped that evening.

It said it would begin inspection of the affected unit after manually shutting down the plant around 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday (1530 GMT Tuesday).

A Kansai spokesman said the shutdown will not have an immediate impact on the firm's power supply in September. He said Kansai still had supply capacity of 32,000 megawatts after the shutdown of the unit, an 8.5 percent surplus over expected peak demand.

The spokesman did not know how long the shutdown would last.

The power output loss will be offset mainly by firing thermal power plants, the spokesman said, but the company did not know how much its fuel purchases would increase as a result.

The extended shutdown of the No.1 unit could hurt the firm's profits for the business year to next March.

In July, Kansai forecast its nuclear power plants to operate at an average 80.5 percent of their capacity in 2007/08. Every 1 percentage point fluctuation in the nuclear run rate would affect costs such as fuel by 6.4 billion yen (US$55.28 million), Kansai said.

In July, there was a minor radiation leak to the environment at the world's biggest nuclear power station, Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, after a major earthquake.

TEPCO, which services the Tokyo area, was forced to indefinitely shut down the plant, causing it to struggle to provide enough power to Tokyo during the sweltering, humid summer months when electricity consumption soars. (US$1=115.77 Yen)

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