Science and expert advice does not favour the creation of a nuclear power industry in Australia

 

Since 2018 the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in collaboration with the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has produced an annual report updating the costs of electricity generation, energy storage and hydrogen production, titled GenCost.

The report encompasses updated current capital cost estimates commissioned by AEMO and delivered by Aurecon, a design, engineering and advisory company, with the aim of providing projections of future changes in costs consistent with updated global electricity scenarios which incorporate different levels of achievement of global climate policy ambition.

This year the 131 page 2023-24 final report was released on 22 May 2024 and its Executive Summary opened with these words:

Technological change in electricity generation is a global effort that is strongly linked to global climate change policy ambitions. While the rate of change remains uncertain, in broad terms, world leaders continue to provide their support for collective action limiting global average temperatures. At a domestic level, the Commonwealth government, together with all Australian states and territories aspire to or have legislated net zero emissions (NZE) by 2050 targets.

Globally, renewables (led by wind and solar PV) are the fastest growing energy source, and the role of electricity is expected to increase materially over the next 30 years with electricity technologies presenting some of the lowest cost abatement opportunities.

Under Outcomes of 2023‐24 consultation was this interesting observation:

GenCost received the highest volume of feedback to the consultation draft in its history with 45 written submissions and many participating for the first time. This input has led to several changes, the most significant of which being the inclusion of large‐scale nuclear in the report for the first time. GenCost has also increased wind generation costs and developed a revised approach for including solar thermal generation costs on a common basis with other bulk supply technologies.

Consultation continues to be a valuable way of improving the quality of the report given that no single organisation can cover the breadth of technologies explored. Feedback can take the form of suggestions and questions. Given the volume of feedback it has not been possible to individually address every question raised in the body of this report. However, we have now added Appendix D which addresses the major common questions and answers.

The report noted: A majority of submissions to the 2023‐24 consultation process requested the inclusion of large‐scale nuclear in addition to nuclear small modular reactors (SMR) that had been included in GenCost since its inception in 2018.

It would appear that the Leader of the Opposition & Liberal MP for Dickson Peter Dutton and Coalition's Shadow Minister for Agriculture & Nationals MP for Maranoa David Littleproud, may have rallied the troops in the hope of fashioning the final report into a useful tool to deploy during the next federal general election campaign due to kick-off sometime between January - April 2025 for a May election date.

Based of the report's Appendix D Frequently asked questions the likely aim of some submissions received appears to have been to create a more feasible future for nuclear energy electricity production and supply than was contained in the earlier draft report. Along with refurbishing the reputation of coal-fired electricity generation.

With admirable restraint, considered and detailed answers were given to all of the following queries:

1. Why does GenCost not immediately change its report when provided with new advice from experts?

2. Why are disruptive events and bifurcations excluded from the scenarios?

3. Why is no sensitivity analysis conducted and presented?

4. Why did you use the capital cost of a single failed project in the United States for your representative nuclear SMR cost (the UAMPS Carbon Free Power

Project)?

5. Do you assume Australia continues to rely on overseas technology suppliers or are you assuming Australia develops its own original equipment manufacturing capability?

6. Why does GenCost persist with the view that technology costs will fall over time when there are many factors that will keep technology costs high?

7. Why is the uncertainty in the data not emphasised more?

8. Why include an advanced ultra‐supercritical pulverised coal instead of cheaper, less efficient plant designs?

9. Why is the economic life used in LCOE calculations instead of the full operational life?

10. Coal and nuclear plants are capable of very high capacity factors, why do LCOE calculations not always reflect this?

11. Why do LCOE calculations not use the lowest historical capacity factors for the low range assumptions?

12. Why were all potential cost factors not included in the LCOE calculations?

13. What is the boundary of development costs? Is it only costs from the point of contracting a developer before commencing construction?

14. How is interest lost during construction included in GenCost?

15. Why do other studies find higher costs than GenCost for integrating variable renewables in the electricity system?

16. Why are integration costs not increasing with VRE share in 2023 but increase in the 2030 results?

17. Why do other studies show the cost of storage increasing more rapidly with higher VRE share?

18. Why are the cost of government renewable subsidies not included in the LCOE calculations for variable renewables with integration costs?

19. Why is a value of 100% applied to the fuel efficiency of renewables in the LCOE formula?

20. Why do you apply only one discount rate or weighted average cost of capital to all technologies?

21. Why did you take the maximum and average of existing generator prices to create the high and low range greenfield coal prices?

22. Why do you not include high and low ranges for economic life?

23. Why are your low range capacity factors for coal and renewables closer to the historical average capacity factor?

24. Why use historical 2023 coal and gas prices that are impacted by the Ukraine War for 2023 LCOE estimates instead of a longer time series?

25. Why does GenCost only conduct LCOE analysis instead of system cost to society analysis?

26. If GenCost shows renewables are cheaper, why are electricity prices higher in Australia and in countries transitioning to renewables?

The completed final report would not have been to Messrs. Dutton and Littlerpoud's liking as, although there are no known technical constraints to deploying large-scale nuclear generation units, it would require that Australia commits to a continuous building program and only after an initial higher cost unit is constructed would capital cost of a large‐scale nuclear plant come in at $8,655/kW, based on 2023 pricing.

While an estimated electricity cost range for large‐scale nuclear generation under current capital costs and a continuous building program is $155/MWh to $252/MWh

None of which could begin to be put in place in the estimated timeline before 2040.

The Financial Review's political editor observed on 22 May 2024:

Peter Dutton’s nuclear energy plans have suffered a setback with the CSIRO estimating the nation’s first large-scale nuclear power plant could cost as much as $17 billion in today’s dollars, and would not be operational until at least 2040.

This is the current reality of Australia's electricity generation mix. Click on the images below to enlarge the graphs.

Comparative Capital Costs of Current Generation Technology

Key Changes In Capital Costs In The Past Year

The GenCost 2023-24 final report can be downloaded at

https://www.csiro.au/-/media/Energy/GenCost/GenCost2023-24Final_20240522.pdf

The Making Of A Client State: did Israel capture Australia between September 2016 and May 2022?

Australia is well-known as a committed supporter of the United Nations since its inception and, as a very early supporter of the partitioning of Palestine in order to create the State of Israel.

However, was the general public aware of just how vested the former MP for Wentworth and the former MP from Cook were in the Commonwealth of Australia's relationship with the State of Israel?

To the point that by May 2022 the inequity built into the Israel- Australia bilateral economic relationship in trade and investment was running at a crude ratio of billions:millions in Israel's favour and the number of Israeli companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) made it the tied third largest source of foreign company listings. 

The Turnbull - Morrison Federal Government Years Sept 2015 to May 2022

In 2016 Austrade established an innovation Landing Pad in Tel Aviv, as part of the National Innovation and Science Agenda.

Since 2017, Australia and Israel have expanded cooperation on national security, defence and cyber security

Defence officials began annual strategic talks in 2018 and in early 2019, Australia appointed a resident Defence Attaché to the Embassy in Tel Aviv. Leveraging Australia and Israel's respective areas of expertise, cooperation on national security continued to develop, including on aviation security with Home Affairs as the lead Australian agency.

Australian Trade and Defence Office established in Jerusalem in 2019 facilitating trade, investment and defence industry partnerships.

In 2020, Australian investment in Israel totalled nearly $1.6 billion and Israeli investment in Australia was $585 million, mostly centred in the innovation sector.

In 2021, two-way goods and services trade amounted to approximately $1.34 billion, of which Australian exports were worth $325 million and imports from Israel $1.02 billion.

AUSTRALIA & ISRAEL HAVE SIGNED:

• Working Holiday Agreement (2016)

• Technological Innovation Cooperation Agreement (2017) which includes a bilateral funding program to enable cooperation between Australian and Israeli companies

• Air Services Agreement (2017)

• Memorandum of Understanding on defence industry cooperation (2017)

• Memorandum of Understanding on cyber security cooperation (2019)

• Double Taxation Agreement (2019)

[DFAT Israel Country Brief, retrieved 29.05.24]

When it came to the pointy end of defence materiel required it appears that the then Coalition federal government was negotiating on assumptions concerning Australia's national defence requirements not having bothered to conduct an Australian Defence Force Posture Review - apparently relying instead on an outdated 2012 document.

Perhaps the ease with which Israel appears to have inserted itself into Australia's national security architecture may be explained not just by these two former prime ministers but also by the ministers appointed to Defence or Defence Industry portfolios during those years.

Those Australia-Israel MOUs and agreements mean that Australia purchases or leases a range of defence materiel, technology and services from the Israeli defence industry and is in some form of arrangement concerning the sale of arms and armament parts to Israel. 

As a nation Australia is reaping bitter fruit now that Israel is conducting a punitive war on the entire Palestinian population of Gaza.

ABC News, 9 April 2024: Details of an agreement struck between Australia and Israel on defence industry cooperation will not be released publicly over concerns the information could damage Australia's "international relations"....Following a three-month process, the defence department formally rejected the application, arguing that the document, which contains sensitive diplomatic information, is exempt under FOI legislation....

The document within the scope of this request contains information which, if released, could reasonably be expected to damage the international relations of the Commonwealth," the Defence Department said in a letter explaining its decision....

"The document contains information communicated to Australia by a foreign government and its officials under the expectation that it would not be disclosed," a Defence official wrote.

BRIEF BACKGROUND

MALCOM BLIGH TURNBULL

Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull said without the support of many in the Jewish community, “I may never have got into parliament, let alone become prime minister.” Recalling Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Australia in 2017 – the first by an Israeli prime minister – Turnbull said, “I’d always enjoyed Bibi’s company. He’s a tough, Machiavellian politician – he couldn’t have survived as long as he has without being so.”...“He has a very clear-eyed view of the Middle East. His only goal is for Israel to survive and to prosper. And he’ll do whatever deals, take whatever twists and turns that he needs, to achieve that.”

SCOTT JOHN MORRISON

Then Liberal MP for Cook & Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison flagged moving Australia's embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, copying Donald Trump's controversial proposal, in a shift that appears timed to coincide with the Wentworth byelection - October 2018.

Said he went to Israel because 'Jewish Australians need to know that their cause is a right one'

Then Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison labelled ceasefire call a ‘play from Hamas’ while visiting Israel alongside former UK prime minister Boris Johnson - December 2023.

Then Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison accused UN of antisemitism and applying double standards against Israel - Sydney rally, February 2024

The chance of a La Niña event this year remains a flip of the coin as behaviour of major climate drivers becomes harder to predict

 

Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM)

Sea Surface

Click on images to enlarge

Overview - Climate Influences

Global sea surface temperatures (SSTs) have been warmest on record for each month between April 2023 and April 2024, with May 2024 SSTs on track to be warmer than May 2023.....The global pattern of warmth is affecting the typical historical global patterns of sea surface temperatures associated with ENSO and IOD, meaning inferences of how ENSO or IOD may develop in 2024 based on past events may not be reliable.

Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Climate Driver Update, 28 May 2024, excerpts:

The ENSO Outlook is currently at 'La Niña Watch', meaning there are some signs that a La Niña might form in the Pacific Ocean later in 2024. A La Niña Watch does not guarantee that a La Niña will develop. Climate models suggest that SSTs in the central tropical Pacific are likely to continue to cool over the coming months. Four of seven models suggest SSTs are likely to remain at neutral ENSO levels, with the remaining three models showing SSTs cooling to La Niña levels from August.

La Niña Watch

La Niña spectrum is the grades of blue

The chance of a La Niña developing in the coming season has increased.

NOTE:

Australia's climate has warmed by 1.50 ± 0.23°C between 1910 and 2023, leading to an increase in the frequency of extreme heat events. In recent decades, there has been a shift to drier conditions across the south-west and south-east in the cool season (April to October) due to natural variability on decadal timescales and changes in large-scale atmospheric circulation caused by an increase in greenhouse gas emissions.

Yamba CAN announces NSW Upper House Portfolio Committee No.7 visiting West Yamba floodplain urban development site 8:30am Friday 31 May 2024

 

Now is the time to help make a difference!

Portfolio Committee 7 are coming to Yamba

24 May 2024

Members of NSW Parliament’s Portfolio Committee 7 (Planning and Environment) are visiting Yamba to undertake site visits in relation to the Parliamentary Inquiry into the “Planning system and the impacts of climate change on the environment and communities.”

When is the Committee coming to Yamba: Friday 31 May 2024

Time: 8.30am

The Committee will be travelling down Carrs Drive. There are strict protocols in relation to observers remaining at a distance from the Committee visiting sites.

Yamba CAN Inc would like as many people as possible to stand on either side of Carrs Drive, near the access to Harold Tory Drive and O’Grady’s Lane.

We will have our banners and signs that observers can hold up when the Committee will be driving past in a bus.

Please ensure personal safety in relation to traffic movement.

Please be on site at about 8.20am ready to hold a sign.

The Portfolio Committee 7 Inquiry details and submissions can be seen at:

https://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/committees/inquiries/Pages/inquiry-details.aspx?pk=2987

Please see attached the NR Times and CV Independent articles this week.

Please spread the word to others to attend and please outline that there are strict protocols.

Secretary

Yamba Community Action Network Inc (Yamba CAN Inc)

Follow us on Facebook

*********

Note:

Portfolio Committee No. 7 – Planning and Environment was established on 10 May 2023 in the 58th Parliament to inquire into and report on any matters relevant to the public administration of:

Climate Change, Energy, the Environment, Heritage, Planning and Public Spaces 

[https://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/committees/listofcommittees/Pages/committees.aspx]

Click on articles below to enlarge

Clarence Valley Independent 22 May 2024
 

Northern Rivers Times 23 May 2024

A look deep into the night sky at Lake Mungo, New South Wales

By Day

A section of Lake Mungo
IMAGE: Wagga Air Centre
Click on image to enlarge

A section of Lake Mungo in south-west New South Wales, a large, ancient dry lake bed around 65-88 metres above sea level. The lake hasn't contained water for the last 18,000 years but was once an important water and food source for Aboriginal people. 

The oldest ritual burials on the shores of Lake Mungo have been dated to circa 42,000 years.

Their descendants, the Barkandji/Paakantyi, Mutthi Mutthi and Ngiyampaa people remain traditional owners of the land.

By Night

Click on image to enlarge

Photographer John Rutter: ‘This Mars-like landscape is the shores of the ancient Lake Mungo, where some of the oldest human remains outside Africa have been discovered, making it a significant site for all humankind. Its remote location grants it a Bortle 1 sky (the darkest and clearest), allowing you to stand where the first Australians once did and gaze at the same sky they beheld. The beauty of the arid, wind-carved landscape and the untouched sky is only eclipsed by the rich history of this area’

Photograph: John Rutter/2024 Milky Way photographer of the year

The Guardian, 21 May 2024

Suicide is a distressing subject and one that is linked in many kitchen table conversations with Centrelink income support programs. It appears that such a link may exist

The Guardian, 22 May 2024:

More than 30% of people who took their lives in 2019 were on welfare, AIHW says

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has just released some data that shows more than 30% of suicides in 2019 were people on the disability support pension (DSP) and newstart – despite being just 5.7% of the population.

During 2019, the most recent pre-Covid pandemic year, the age-standardised suicide rate among males who received unemployment payments was 2.8 times that of the male Australian population comparison. For females, it was 3.3.

During the same year, unemployment recipients accounted for approximately 20% of all suicide deaths among Australian males and females (across the same age range 15-66 years). Those on DSP were 14.5%.

The DSP recipient and Antipoverty Centre spokesperson, Kristin O’Connell, said:

The new figures on welfare recipient deaths by suicide are chilling, but reflect my all-too-frequent experiences supporting people who are planning to or have made an attempt as a result of dealing with “mutual” obligations or poverty.

Every government decision to leave us in poverty and subject people to abuse through “mutual” obligations is a decision that kills.

In 2020, Australia’s Mental Health Think Tank said the fastest and most effective thing the government could do to ease the mental health crisis was to keep the jobseeker payment at the poverty line.

The Morrison government plunged people back into deep poverty, and despite their claims to offer “cost of living relief” the Albanese government has continued the brutal welfare policies that led to these alarming suicide rates and widespread harm in our communities.

The wider picture also supports the assertion that welfare recipients of workforce age as a cohort are experiencing higher levels of suicide than the Australian population and, within that cohort those receiving disability or unemployment income support show the highest suicide rates. With a higher suicide rate than the general population continuing into old age for those receiving disability income support.

Australian Institute of Health and Wellbeing, Suicide & self-harm monitoring, Supporting people who experience socioeconomic disadvantage: Deaths by suicide among Centrelink income support recipients, retrieved 22 May 2024:

Age-specific rates of suicide among those who received income support payments between 2011 and 2021

Click on images to enlarge

AIHW, 15 August 2023:

Deaths by suicide, by socioeconomic areas

 From 2001 to 2022, age-standardised suicide rates were highest for those who lived in the lowest socioeconomic areas (most disadvantaged areas), and generally decreased as the level of disadvantage lessened.

In 2022, the suicide rate for people living in the lowest socioeconomic (most disadvantaged) areas (18.4 deaths per 100,000 population; Quintile 1) was more than twice that of those living in the highest socioeconomic (least disadvantaged) areas (8.2 deaths per 100,000 population; Quintile 5). Similarly, the number of deaths by suicide generally declined as socioeconomic disadvantage decreased.

Overall, age-standardised suicide rates increased for those living in the lowest socioeconomic areas (Quintile 1); from 14.0 deaths per 100,000 population in 2001 to 18.4 deaths per 100,000 population in 2022. In contrast, smaller change was observed for those living in the higher socioeconomic areas (Quintiles 4 and 5). [my yellow highlighting]

The Coronavirus Supplement was introduced in April 2020 and abolished in April 2021. Then COVID-19 Disaster Payments were announced in June 2021 and withdrawn in November 2021 placing increased financial stress on up to 2 million people. The Reserve Bank Cash Rate Target began to rise on 4 May 2022 and kept on rising - swiftly exacerbating a cost-of-living squeeze into an escalating crisis.

Although the causes of individual suicides can be complex, it is hard to resist seeing an economic policy correlation with the rising suicide rate between 2021 and 2022. It is also hard to avoid viewing entrenched poverty as being heavily influenced by federal income support policy decisions.

UK General Election 2024: Rain as a Metaphor?

 

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/observations/gcpvj0v07
Click on image to enlarge

Before facing the world's press to confirm a 2024 general election date, it seems neither the British Prime Minister, members of his Cabinet nor his staff thought to consult the UK Bureau of Meteorology which clearly shows it was expected to rain all afternoon in London and did - particularly at 17:00 BST.

The media had a field day - creating front pages & headlines just begging to become election campaign memes.

And then there were these.....

Surprise benefit of yesterday's Drowning Street announcement - it should shut up the conspiracy theorists who think the government control the weather... pic.twitter.com/SqIYIsRFAV

— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) May 23, 2024

Finally, someone gives Four Seasons Total Landscaping a run for its money https://t.co/Ft4qcT6fg0

— Possum Comitatus (@Pollytics) May 22, 2024