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| Fig. 1: Map of Australia. (Source: Wikimedia Commons) |
Australia is a country spanning an entire continent of its namesake (see Fig. 1). A large part of Australia's current energy is generated from coal and natural gas - much of it being driven by the local coal mining industry. In 2020, coal was a large part of electricity generation - accounting for 54% of it. As for energy in general, fossil fuels accounted for 93%, of which oil accounted for 37%. [1]
The role of nuclear power in supplying domestic energy consumption is pretty much nonexistent in Australia. No nuclear reactors exist in Australia at the present moment. [2] On top of this, the Australian Government has ruled out nuclear power multiple times in the past. [3] There currently is an outright ban on nuclear power stations in Australia. [4]
This is not for the lack of trying, though. In 2006, the Australian Government spun up a Nuclear Task Force which emphatically stated that by the year 2050 (considering the expected growth in Australia's electricity needs), 1/3 of the country's electricity needs could be fulfilled by approximately 25 nuclear reactors, even claiming that a reactor could be set up as soon as 10-15 years out from the publication of the report (~2016-2021). [5]
What's also interesting is the vast Uranium resources that the Australian continent is endowed with. Australia has the largest cumulative sources of affordable Uranium in the world. It has about 1.18 million tonnes of Uranium recoverable at less than US$ 130 per kg. [6] These resources are not sitting idle either. They are being exported for electricity generation at nuclear power stations in other countries in North America, etc. Over the last decade, about 6400 tonnes of Uranium has been exported from Australia on average, accounting for about 12% of global exports. [6]
Yet, despite the above, there has been little tangible progress made in Australia in terms of using nuclear power for domestic needs, as mentioned earlier. Two reasons include the economic/labour considerations of such a move and the political nature the topic has taken in the country.
A good part of the inertia against moving towards nuclear power has been due to cost considerations. Australia has lots of cheap fossil fuel sources that it already relies on. At the same time, nuclear costs have increased. Switkowski, who led the above-mentioned Nuclear Task Force, has pointed to costs as a reason for why Gigawatt scale nuclear plants may not be comparatively financially viable anymore. He mentioned that adding nuclear capacity one gigawatt at a time is hard to justify, especially as costs are now very high (in the range of AU$5 billion to AU$10 billion), with development timelines of 15+ years. [7] While small-modular reactors have been presented as a possible alternative option, they too are not expected to be affordable till the year 2050. [8]
At the macro level, fossil fuels are also incredibly important to Australia's economy. Australia is a large exporter of coal, gas, etc - with US $40 billion of coal being exported in 2020 and the coal industry employing about 40000 people. The importance of this industry to the Australian government can also be seen by the fact that fossil fuel corporations received about AU$10 billion in tax subsidies in 2020. [9]
Beyond just economic matters, the topic of nuclear energy has generally been a sensitive, controversial topic in Australia. Around the time of the release of the above-mentioned task force report, the ruling conservative Party led by Prime Minister John Howard was pushing Australia to go nuclear. The opposition Labour party led by Kim Beazley on the other hand was staunchly anti-nuclear, making strong statements including that the next election there will be a referendum on nuclear power and that, "If John Howard is elected you can guarantee there will be 25 nuclear power plants, and waste dumps." [5] Part of this opposition also stems from a concern of nuclear power generation being a gateway into nuclear weaponry. [10]
Given the above reasons and the gridlock caused by them, nuclear power in Australia looks unlikely to progress much further in the near future.
© Girish Kumar. The author warrants that the work is the author's own and that Stanford University provided no input other than typesetting and referencing guidelines. The author grants permission to copy, distribute and display this work in unaltered form, with attribution to the author, for noncommercial purposes only. All other rights, including commercial rights, are reserved to the author.
[1] "Australian Energy Update 2021," Australian Government, Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources, September 2021.
[2] M. Gerli, "Nuclear Power in Australia," Physics 241, Stanford University, Winter 2018
[3] O. Milman, "Government Rules Out Nuclear Power for Australia," The Guardian, 17 Dec 13.
[4] D. Mills, "Mission Zero: What Nuclear Energy Means for Australia," Melbourne Herald Sun, 13 Oct 21.
[5] "Nuclear Power in Australia Within 10 years: Switkowski," Sydney Morning Herald, 27 Nov 06.
[6] "Uranium 2020: Resources, Production and Demand," Nuclear Energy Agency, 2020.
[7] C. Latimer, "Australia Has 'Missed the Boat' on Nuclear Power," Sydney Morning Herald, 11 Jan 18.
[8] R. Kurmelovs, "Should Australia Build Nuclear Power Plants to Combat the Climate Crisis?" The Guardian, 12 Oct 21.
[9] F. Mao, "Climate Change: Why Australia Refuses to Give Up Coal," BBC, 22 Oct 21.
[10] G. Farley, "Origins of the Anti-Nuclear Movement in Australia," Physics 241, Stanford University, Winter 2017.
