Good sense

PM Kevin Rudd told nuclear is best hope by Rio Tinto | The Australian

MINING giant Rio Tinto has urged Kevin Rudd to immediately begin work on a regulatory regime allowing use of nuclear energy in Australia, arguing the viability of energy alternatives has been dramatically overstated.

The company has advised the government to consider "every option" for power generation because its pledges on reducing carbon emissions and using renewable energy will expose industry and consumers to huge increases in their power bills.

And it says that overly optimistic assumptions on the viability of alternatives such as wind and geothermal power, as well as so-called clean coal technologies, have created a "false optimism" which the government must challenge by commissioning new research.

Of course, the first challenge is to get the Labor Party to change its anti nuclear policy:

....Resources Minister Martin Ferguson emphatically rejected the need for nuclear power generation in Australia, insisting that the nation had ample resources of cheap coal and gas to meet its energy needs.

Mr Ferguson told The Australian he saw no reason for next week's federal Labor Party conference to review the party's prohibition on nuclear energy.

I can't imagine Labor changing its policy any time soon, and even if it did, election predictions on Insiders last week were that the Greens will hold the balance of power in the Senate next time, whether or not there is a double dissolution.

The Greens will doom us if the Senate's co-operation is needed to ensure nuclear power. (I presume it is for the new "regulatory regime".)

Vote Coalition for sensible long term nuclear policy!