Australia needs clean nuclear energy

4. Where to next?

Misunderstanding and/or misrepresenting future clean energy needs have led to overestimating prospects of renewable energy displacing fossil fuels. Today's popular choices for clean energy expansion, solar and wind, will struggle and in my view fail to reach the scale and quality required. All signs are that the less popular choice, nuclear power, will need to be reconsidered.

Nuclear energy has one of the lowest life-cycle emissions. Some 450 nuclear power stations now operate in 31 countries. It is barred in Australia and unpopular elsewhere to various degrees. Yet clean nuclear energy offers the required scale and quality to replace power stations that use fossil fuels. There are many thousands of those power stations in the world now. Many more thousands of clean nuclear power stations would be needed to eliminate fossil fuels. Even then, many innovative technologies would be required by a society based entirely on electrical and heat energy. The pathway will not be simple.

It also requires overcoming one very large barrier – public opinion. Can attitudes shift? I think increasing faith in solar and wind for a clean energy future has been working to strengthen opposition to nuclear. That faith, as shown here, is based on exaggerated claims for the performance of renewables and their ability to meet all future needs. If doubts grow, as they should, the faith will falter and attitudes to nuclear will change. In particular, historic Australian fears of nuclear as well as the more recent "too slow, too expensive" objections will slowly crumble. Nuclear energy will be welcomed as a necessity, not an option.