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Australia’s Opposition Coalition opposes Australia tripling renewable energy, backs nuclear power pledge at Cop28

Ted O’Brien declares global climate summit ‘the nuclear Cop’ despite only 11% of nations backing the pledge

Guardian Australia, Adam Morton in Dubai 10 Dec 23

The federal Coalition has declared at the Cop28 climate summit that it will back a global pledge to triple nuclear energy if the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, becomes prime minister, but will not support Australia tripling its renewable energy.

Speaking on the sidelines of the conference in Dubai, the opposition’s climate change and energy spokesperson, Ted O’Brien, also said a Coalition government would consider supporting Generation III+ large-scale nuclear reactors, and not just the unproven small modular reactors it has strongly touted.

The statement at the global summit confirmed the Coalition was on a markedly different path to Labor. The Albanese government last week joined more than 120 countries in backing a pledge to triple renewable energy and double the rate of energy efficiency by 2030, but did not sign up with 22 countries that supported tripling nuclear power by 2050.

While only 11% of countries at the talks – mostly nations that already have a domestic nuclear energy industry – backed the nuclear pledge, O’Brien declared “Cop28 will be known as the nuclear Cop”.

“Under a Dutton-led Coalition, at our first Cop in office we would sign Australia up to that pledge, together with our allies and our friends,” he said.

O’Brien’s speech was at a side event hosted by the World Nuclear Association and the Australian group Coalition for Conservation, which flew seven Liberal and National MPs to the summit. About 30 people attended, including Coalition members Bridget McKenzie, Andrew Bragg, Perrin Davey, Dean Smith and Kevin Hogan.

Asked if the Coalition would back the pledge to triple renewable energy by the end of the decade, O’Brien said he would not support Australia acting on it. “What we don’t need is all of our eggs in one basket, we need a balanced mix of technologies, and that includes renewables,” he said.

The Australian climate change minister, Chris Bowen, gave a different vision for Australia’s electricity future in his national statement to the summit, urging countries “not to drift further apart” and said those such as Australia with “massive renewable potential” had a responsibility to share it with others.

Hence Australia’s determination to become a global renewable energy superpower,” Bowen said. “We must look at our future and our fates and redouble our efforts to bring down our emissions and get our world back on track.”

In his speech, O’Brien said the Coalition would advocate for removing bans on uranium mining and exploration because Australia had “a moral obligation” to provide it to the world.

Asked why he did not accept the advice of the Australian Energy Market Operator, which found the country’s optimal future electricity grid would run on more than 90% renewable energy backed by firming support, O’Brien said he had looked at operator’s integrated system plan “in great detail”, but a Cop was “probably not the right place for going through it”.

“Nevertheless, if your question is ‘do we agree with Labor’s plan for 82% renewables in the grid by 2030?’ Well, no, we don’t,” he said.

Some observers questioned how the Coalition’s plan to slow renewable energy expansion would avoid power blackouts as old and increasingly failing coal-fired power plants closed over the next decade. O’Brien acknowledged in his speech that 80% of Australia’s “baseload power” was expected to leave the grid by 2035.

Experts say the country would not have a nuclear industry before 2040 even if the national ban on the technology was lifted now, and nuclear energy is more expensive than alternatives.

New South Wales Liberal MP Matt Kean, a former state treasurer, acknowledged O’Brien’s commitment to reaching net zero emissions but said “obviously nuclear is a long way away” and the country should back renewable energy now.

“Who knows what might be available in another 20 years – we may have flying cars in 20 years – but that doesn’t mean you base your whole transport around it,” he said.

The chief executive of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, Darren Miller, said there would be no room for nuclear energy if the country was headed towards 80% renewable energy by 2030. “It is not a flexible technology that helps you go from 80% to 100%,” he said………………………………………………………………….. more https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/dec/10/coalition-tells-cop28-it-will-tback-tripling-of-nuclear-energy-if-peter-dutton-becomes-prime-minister

December 12, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized