Coalition must do the nuclear energy debate better

The federal Coalition's announcement to move Australia to nuclear energy has immediately defaulted to a political rather than policy debate with an inevitable pile on by the government, various interests and experts including even Peter Dutton's own party in Queensland.

The result is claims and counterclaims on costs, timeframes, and environmental safety, leaving the public confused, decision makers divided and the policy process suspended.

Making precipitous announcements on such politically sensitive issues and where evidence is marginalised and so contested as to be meaningless seems how we do policy in Australia these days.

No wonder reform has stagnated and our productivity has stalled.

Once, when faced with an emerging controversial issue where there were competing views, governments appointed an independent, expert and public inquiry to clarify the facts, weigh the evidence, hear all arguments and make recommendations. Such inquiries educated citizens and decision makers alike.

Of course, the Productivity Commission has performed similar tasks, but its underlying principles are under attack by trade unions and recently its remit has been narrowed, diminishing its capabilities and perceived independence.

While an arm's length public inquiry is needed, it is worth noting we have been here before with the 2006 Taskforce Review on Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy. Appointed by the Howard government to "undertake an objective, scientific and comprehensive review of uranium mining, processing and the contribution of nuclear energy in Australia in the long term", it ticked all the boxes for an independent review.

Its members were experts, its processes public, its methodologies rigorous, and all was overseen by the Chief Scientist's Expert Panel of eminent scientists.

The Taskforce assessed hundreds of submissions and employed reputable consultants and university research bodies to supplement its research. It made site visits to USA, Canada, UK, France, South Korea, Sweden, Belgium and Hungary, including to where nuclear power plant accidents had occurred like Three Mile Island (USA) and Chernobyl (Ukraine).

Further, the Taskforce framed its recommendations in the context of the "scientific consensus" on climate change and the need to "contain and reduce greenhouse gas emissions". No head in the sand here.

Photo by Nicolas HIPPERT on Unsplash

Although the Taskforce concluded nuclear energy was a viable option and could be operational within 10 years under an "accelerated program", it did not adopt a take it or leave it stance like many expert bodies.

It understood the practical difficulties of moving to nuclear power given "current legal and regulatory impediments", the need for "some form of government support", waste management issues, and the importance of upgrading workforce skills. It acknowledged nuclear power was a "difficult issue for many Australians" and thus any step in that direction was necessarily a "social decision".

Because the Taskforce reported in the last year of the ebbing Howard government it was caught in the crossfire of partisan electoral politics. The Howard government had left the issue too late.

Understandably, the Labor opposition in reaction to the Taskforce promised to "campaign locally by warning that nuclear plants could be built in neighbourhoods to towns if the government was re-elected", thus scuttling all hope of debate or bipartisan support.

While the Rudd-Gillard government quickly buried the Taskforce report, the subsequent Coalition federal government made no effort during its nine years in office to exhume it.

Nor did it capitalise on the South Australian Labor government's 2016 Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission which urged the state government to "pursue removal at the federal level of existing prohibitions on nuclear power generation to allow it to contribute to a low-carbon system if required" while acknowledging issues of commercial viability.

It was only in 2019 that the Coalition initiated a House of Representatives parliamentary inquiry into nuclear energy, but despite its good work, its report was divided on partisan grounds.

All in all, the Coalition missed an opportunity for the strategic policy and political development of this controversial issue. These issues, as the move to the GST showed, take time, persistent effort, and clear processes of public engagement.

Certainly, Dutton's sudden pro-nuclear announcement has put the issue back on the agenda and given the Coalition a point of difference to the government, but is this the best way to win the politics so necessary to progress such a complex issue?

Indeed, in the current pre-election environment this issue faces the same fate as the 2006 Taskforce when all discussion was reduced to narrow, simplistic election sloganeering and scaremongering and so risks putting any progress on this issue off for another decade.

The Coalition needs to do it better.

This article was originally published in the Canberra Times on 17 July 2024. You can view the original article here.

Dr Scott Prasser edited Tragedy without Triumph: The Coalition in Office 2013-2022 and authored Royal Commissions and Public Inquiries in Australia and worked in federal government.