Thursday, 20 June 2024
Motions
Nuclear energy
Motions
Nuclear energy
Debate resumed.
Paul EDBROOKE (Frankston) (14:58): It seems a few weeks ago members of the opposition were a bit confused. We heard members of the federal opposition talking about a plan to introduce small modular reactors into areas of Victoria. We heard even over the table in question time people saying that this was just a fantasy, that this was not fact at all. But it comes to my attention that at the same time as they were saying this someone was actually leaking shadow cabinet documents to the media. I will read you Steve Price’s article from 31 May 2024, which was around that time, I think you will agree, ‘John Pesutto’s nuclear comments show he’s either crazy, brave or unhinged’:
Pressure on Victorian Opposition Leader John Pesutto to keep his job is again certain to intensify after leaked shadow cabinet documents released to this column show him at odds with some members of his party room.
Obviously you cannot trust them.
A number of shadow ministers were gobsmacked listening to their leader on radio late last week dismissing the Federal Coalition’s nuclear plans, knowing a similar plan on our nuclear future had been presented to the Liberal leadership by shadow energy spokesman David Davis.
Price went on to say:
That led to me being leaked a copy of those confidential shadow cabinet documents and after reading them I can understand why even Pesutto supporters inside the Liberal Party would be confused and angry.
When it comes down to it, I think what Steve Price is trying to get at is: they do not trust their leader. And I do not think the community does either. We have heard about all this, and then the feds came out and they showed us their plan based on no targets, no data –
Mathew Hilakari interjected.
Paul EDBROOKE: no dollars – that is right, member for Point Cook – but at the same time basically white-anting scientists. The CSIRO did a GenCost report in 2023. The national science agency said the cost of generating 1 megawatt hour using wind and solar would be an average of $82 in 2030. It projected nuclear power from small modular reactors would cost around $282 per megawatt hour by 2030. Most of us would believe what emeritus professor – an actual emeritus professor, I might add – Ken Baldwin from the Australian National University, an energy expert, says. Most people would talk to the chief executive of the CSIRO Dr Douglas Hilton and think that he is a man that knows what he is talking about. Not Mr Dutton – Dutton dismissed the report as ‘discredited’, and that prompted the CSIRO to defend its research in an open letter, with chief executive Dr Douglas Hilton saying political leaders should ‘resist the temptation to disparage science’. I might put it another way: close your mouth and appear stupid, then open it and remove all doubt. Questioning scientists like that is one of the dumbest things I have heard, especially when we are talking about something so important.
We have seen the results of industrial accidents in Australia and Victoria. I would not have been in my former job if mechanical infrastructure did not break down, if technology did not go wrong and if humans did not do dumb things and have accidents. We had a situation not that long ago under the opposition government where a whole town was considered to be evacuated. Kids under five were bussed out of the area. People with lung issues, people with potential heart issues and elderly people were moved out of homes. Eleven people died. There was an inquiry about it. That was the Morwell coalmine fire in February 2014. I remember it well. I was there for about 45 days in that coalmine as we monitored the poisonous carbon monoxide going into Morwell. That is a coalmine industry fire, which is not unheard of – accidents happen all the time. That one came about as a result of a bushfire. But, you know what, we did not have the resources to put it out in the time we needed to. We just kept pouring water on that thing, and we put it out eventually.
The people of Morwell have to watch the news and hear Dutton, who does not believe the scientists – the emeritus professors – say that they are going to put a nuclear reactor at Loy Yang. I know from speaking to my parents and other people in the Traralgon and Morwell area that they are horrified. They are still scarred from what went on at a coalmine fire, but now they are imagining what happens when a nuclear reactor goes wrong. Let me tell you from training – that was my speciality; I was a hazmat technician – there is no way of dealing with a nuclear accident, and 50, 60, 70 years of these accidents shows that to be true. We trained for chemical incidents, biological incidents and radiological incidents. There is nothing too scary about chemical; we deal with it every day. Biological: it was after 2001, so it became an issue – anthrax scares, all this kind of stuff. When we came to training for radioactive accidents, whether that be in transport or onsite, I think the general consensus for most of us was to screw the training and run away – it really was – because we learned about alpha rays, beta rays, gamma rays and how to protect yourself from them. Although the Chernobyl incident was in the 1980s, we would still be treating that incident and solving that incident in the same way this decade, because there is no safe way to deal with this; there is no safe way to look at this.
Richard Riordan interjected.
Paul EDBROOKE: You cannot even read the government business program, my friend. I really get scared when people who are intellectually frail, let me say, start talking a big game. Only 10 per cent of the world’s energy is nuclear power, and there is a reason for that. There is not one single small modular reactor that is working now, because they cost so much money. And when these things go wrong, it is not just a car accident; it is not just a fire you put out. These things go wrong very badly. Towns do not just have to be evacuated, towns have to be moved. There are whole places, 30-kilometre zones, where people cannot go any more. I really think that those people opposite can talk about Three Mile Island or talk about Chernobyl, Fukushima, Idaho Falls, the Windscale fire, Kyshtym and Mexico City. These are all incidents where the emergency services at the time could not deal with the issue, and we still cannot because we have no conclusive evidence, no research and no gear that lets us deal with this issue. When a roof blows off a reactor or when there is a leak, it is deadly, and there is no good way to deal with it without endangering people’s lives in the emergency services or in the community.
I bore witness to how badly we responded to the mine fire, and that was just a coalmine on fire. I say ‘just’ because when I think of Chernobyl and when I think of Fukushima, these were the peak of the future. This was the stuff that was meant to get us clean energy, and in the end we were basically outdone by nature. Look at Fukushima – piles of dirt with tarps on them, water that has been contaminated. We cannot clean this stuff up, and we should not have to clean it up.
The other thing that I do not think has been raised that much in this house is not just the cost of building these reactors but the cost of storing their waste, and that far outweighs over the time we would be living the cost of actually building those reactors. I ask everyone on the other side of the house to have a think about why they were elected. Were they elected just to be an ambassador for their community? Do they put the badge on – ‘I’m an MP’ – or are they going to live by their values and actually stand up for their community and say, ‘I’ll listen to you. I might not just say no, but I will listen to you. I will give you a say’? I reckon those communities overwhelmingly will say, ‘Not in my backyard – not ever. We should go with renewables. We have seen what happens when nuclear goes wrong.’
Chris CREWTHER (Mornington) (15:07): I rise to speak on this nuclear motion. I note that this nuclear motion has been brought on, though, because the state Labor government refused to and wanted to divert from their responsibilities to talk about crime and their failures on crime, particularly given the stats today, with an increase of over 20 per cent on youth crime and over 10 per cent on crime altogether. But I digress. I fully support Dutton and the federal Liberals on nuclear.
Belinda Wilson: On a point of order, Acting Speaker – which was on relevance, but the member seemed to be just drifting back into relevance as I stood.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): The member for Mornington to continue. It is a wideranging debate.
Chris CREWTHER: As I was saying, yes, I am speaking on nuclear, but I was making the point that the state Labor government had brought this on to avoid speaking on crime.
On nuclear, as I said, I fully support Dutton and the federal Liberals on this issue, and I have personally always supported nuclear. Unlike the state and federal Labor teams, I am not afraid – and we are not afraid – to talk about nuclear, to have this debate, and we are not engaged in nuclear fearmongering. I congratulate the federal coalition team on their bold position on nuclear. It is something that I raised in the federal party room years ago. I know the member for Narracan is probably sick of me talking about federal politics, but I raised it when I was a federal MP. I said in the federal party room we should get rid of the federal legislative restriction along with Tim Wilson at the time. I also suggested to then Prime Minister Turnbull that we and he adopt this as our federal policy at the time.
The fact is, yes, we need to move to lower emissions, but we need to do so while increasing baseload power supply, reducing intermittency and keeping costs down. We are the only one of the top 20 nations not to have nuclear, and many other nations are looking to invest in this, such as the UAE, which already has two nuclear plants and is building another two nuclear plants in just a few years time. We have one of the world’s largest and biggest domestic supplies of uranium and thorium.
Nuclear produces baseload power with zero end emissions. We have enough stable land mass and spaces to store the minimal amount of nuclear waste of modern nuclear plants, which we would already need to do anyway with the AUKUS nuclear submarines as well as the Lucas Heights test reactor. We also have key locations at sites of current and former coal plants to put such nuclear reactors with transmission lines, water supply and so forth. It will create jobs as well in regions, such as regions nearby here that have been impacted by the closure of coalmines and the timber industry. It is also important for defence and for energy self-sustainability here in Australia. It reduces the need for more and more above-ground transmission lines to cope with increased renewables, which in turn also risks fires, takes away farmland and results in the cutting down of trees.
I do note that renewables in the overall supply chain actually do damage the environment. We should not just look at the end emissions. For example, with wind power we see uncontrolled deforestation, often using forced labour, in places like Ecuador for balsa wood used in wind turbines. About 30,000 child slaves are used for the mining of cobalt for lithium-ion batteries used in electric cars and so forth in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We see the modern slavery involved in solar panels with Uighur forced labour in China and more. So renewable energy itself is not free from environmental damage as well as labour concerns.
I also fully support getting rid of the federal legislative restriction, along with Dutton and the federal Liberal team, as well as any state restrictions, and I support the need to invest in nuclear in Victoria and in Australia, obviously in suitable locations.
I also note – this is thanks to the member for Benambra; this is a bit of a tip – in Wangaratta, where my grandpa lived for so long, in race 7 at 3:30 pm today we have a racehorse called Going Nuclear, and that is probably something that might be a very good tip for people to invest in.
Jade Benham interjected.
Chris CREWTHER: I think the member for Mildura wants to put a bit of a bet on that.
Jade Benham interjected.
Chris CREWTHER: She has already done it. We do have 32 countries around the world, including Canada, France, the United States and the UK, which use zero-emission nuclear power today to bolster renewables. Across the world nuclear power accounts for more than 16 per cent and growing of energy generation, with lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions from nuclear power being between 10 and 100 times less than emissions from fossil fuels. An additional 50 countries are exploring or investing in next-generation nuclear technology, yet the Victorian state Labor government fails on every single metric to have a sensible debate about the future of nuclear energy in Victoria. As noted, we are not afraid to have this debate today, tomorrow, next week or anytime into the future.
The evidence is crystal clear that nuclear is the cheapest and most reliable zero-emission source of baseload energy, yet maybe the members of the other side have seen Dr. Strangelove one too many times, are self-consumed and perturbed by a Cold War mentality and allow their instinct to take hold and just reject, reject, reject. Here are some facts that I raise, and I challenge the other side to just consider debating these in a mature manner and looking actively into the benefits of nuclear: (1) nuclear has the lowest carbon footprint, needing fewer materials and less land than other energy sources; (2) uranium is more abundant than gold, platinum and many other rare metals; (3) nuclear power does not rely on the weather, of which the latter can be very volatile; (4) nuclear power is a flexible baseload source for wind and solar that provides more energy when it is needed and less when it is not, displacing coal and enabling renewables; (5) nuclear energy is about as safe as solar, far safer than coal, gas and oil and safer than almost any other energy source; and (6) spent fuel from nuclear power generation is compact, efficient and extremely carefully managed, particularly with modern-day nuclear plants. I know those opposite are looking to the past, to Chernobyl and the historical Soviet-era nuclear plants, but we have to look at the modern technology here today and the minimal nuclear waste that is produced.
I believe the federal Labor government also supports AUKUS. Do you not support AUKUS and the nuclear submarines? There is a lot of waste that goes with that. That waste will also have to be buried. Already for generations we have had the Lucas Heights reactor. The Labor Party in Victoria and Australia need to have a sensible debate on this issue, as we are willing to do. We cannot ignore all the prospects that nuclear energy offers us in Victoria and across Australia. Let us have a mature debate about its future in Victoria.
Nina TAYLOR (Albert Park) (15:15): I am very pleased to rise on this topic of nuclear energy. I just want to make a quick reference back to the article in the Herald Sun from 31 May 2024. Steve Price said:
A number of shadow ministers were gobsmacked listening to their leader on radio late last week dismissing the Federal Coalition’s nuclear plans, knowing a similar plan on our nuclear future had been presented to the Liberal leadership by shadow energy spokesman David Davis.
We can see that there is a bit of contrariness within their party. They are not sure whether they are coming or going. They are at sixes and sevens. It is just as we see here with the Justice Legislation Amendment (Integrity, Defamation and Other Matters) Bill 2024, which offered ample opportunity to transact matters of crime. I do not see why the Leader of the Opposition could not use this wonderful opportunity to set the record straight. Is he for nuclear energy or is he not? What will the opposition lead with? Will they go with Peter Dutton or will they not? This is a terrific opportunity to do so, just as – and I was saying this before – they would have had the opportunity to talk about crime on the justice legislation bill that we were discussing earlier today. I am just putting it out there – just an idea. We would all love to know. I am sure Victorians would like to be clear on this, because I can assure you they do not want nuclear in this state and most certainly there is no social licence for the waste.
Talking about having a mature debate and transacting it, no-one is resiling from this, because actually we brought it up to talk about it today. So this idea that we are running from the debate could not be further from the truth. I am a little bit astonished at the inference there, particularly as I was actually on the nuclear prohibition inquiry. At the time it was a little bit embarrassing for NuScale because they thought that would be the moment they were going to launch small modular reactors. They thought, ‘Terrific. We’re in this inquiry. Here we go – oh.’ And they had a setback. Guess what, at best by 2030, if at all, it may become commercially available. Oh, dear. That was an embarrassment, can I say, and very embarrassing. Never mind. But if you are talking about resiling from a debate, we will debate this any day of the week because, let me tell you, we are very clear on this. We do not want this toxic, extremely expensive energy resource for this state. Let us be real and clear about that.
I do not know if there is also an inference that the CSIRO are not mature because of their research into this topic. They have been very up-front as well – they are not running – so I do not know about this ‘mature’ concept. Is it immature to talk about cost, to talk about risk, to talk about the future of Victorian children and what we would be condemning them to if we were chucking nuclear reactors all over this country? I do not know. The CSIRO’s most recent GenCost 2023–24 report again confirms that nuclear – get this – is the most expensive form of power generation available. So should we believe the member for Mornington or should we believe the CSIRO? I do not know. I think I am going with the CSIRO, but it is up to the chamber – whichever way you want to go. I am going with the CSIRO. I think the scientists might have it right. But, you know, I am just putting it out there; maybe the member for Mornington knows something that we do not know. Maybe he does. We would love him to put it forward. But in any case, I am sorry, call me old fashioned – I am going with the scientists.
Another really important point: the cheapest forms of power are wind and solar. And, guess what, Australia has abundant wind and solar. So when we are comparing Victoria to other parts of the world, we should look at the weather and look at the geography of our state. This is why when we are talking about where we put offshore wind it is not about penalties, it is about looking at where there are these really strong wind corridors. Yes, because, again, scientists can work these things out. They know where you can get really strong gusts of wind that you can really rely on.
A member interjected.
Nina TAYLOR: Yes, maybe from the opposition. But anyway, coming back to the original point, when we are comparing costs, are we comparing apples and oranges? What are we comparing? The cheapest forms of power are wind and solar – get this – even when coupled with the costs of energy storage and transmission. This includes the costs for building new transmission and firming capacity. Oh, my goodness, the scientists have factored that all in. Who knew? Fancy that, that they would be thorough when transacting this issue. This includes the cost for building –
Richard Riordan interjected.
Nina TAYLOR: Pardon me, but I cannot hear myself thinking above your voice over there.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): Member for Polwarth! Order, please! I cannot actually hear the member for Albert Park very clearly.
Nina TAYLOR: This includes the cost for building new transmission and firming capacity like batteries to complement the new renewable energy projects. So we can see that the scientists have taken a holistic perspective on this, examining all aspects of not only energy generation but also storage and transmission. That is particularly important when we are wanting to have a ‘mature debate’ on this subject. Let me tell you – just reinforcing – we will debate this any day of the week.
Members interjecting.
Iwan Walters: On a point of order, Acting Speaker, there has been a lot of noise, and I believe your direction has been that those at the table should desist from that. I am trying to listen to this outstanding speech, and I would like to do that and be able to hear it.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): It is actually incredibly hard for me to hear. Member for Polwarth, I have asked you, please, to allow the member for Albert Park to be heard.
Nina TAYLOR: Clearly I have hit a nerve, but we are having a ‘mature debate’. Anyway, let us talk about other countries, because they are saying, ‘Oh, in other countries they’re all nailing it.’ Let us look at the costs. Experience in other countries demonstrates that initial cost estimates are almost always far too low. I am talking about nuclear when I say this. The UK is currently building a new 3260-megawatt nuclear plant in Somerset known as Hinkley Point C. It provides a valuable lesson in creating a nuclear rod for your back, pardon the pun. The plant was initially estimated to cost $30 billion in 2016 – that would be £18 billion. The most recent estimate is that the project will now cost – oh, dear – $61.2 billion or £32.7 billion. In anyone’s language that is a lot of money and that is an enormous blowout.
I will go further. We are looking at other countries; let us go further on this. The most recently completed nuclear plants in the US are Vogtle 3 and 4. Vogtle was built as a pair of reactors, not a single plant, in the hope that this would increase scale efficiencies and reduce costs. Instead the project ran over time by seven years and cost more than $25 billion more than originally budgeted. The cost overruns were so epic that the builders, Japan’s Toshiba Corp, which was at the time the owner of Westinghouse, paid an A$5.6 billion penalty to be released from their contractual obligation to deliver the project at a fixed price. All told, the two reactors cost close to $50 billion.
This is what I really do not understand about the opposition, because they claim to be the party of economics, economic rationalism and neoliberalism and yet they go hurtling towards nuclear when we can see, when we look at other countries that are not nailing it, the blowouts here; they want to go hurtling to that irrespective of these phenomenal blowouts in cost. Part of the reason as well is because obviously they have to have huge safety elements, because nuclear has form. Unfortunately, it has had absolutely devastating impacts on populations around the world, and I do not know why they want to ignore these kinds of consequences. Why, when you are thinking about your children and future generations, would you want to put your head in the sand and pretend that nuclear is safe? I heard the word ‘safe’. Where do they get these concepts from? I do not know.
In any case, one further element when we are looking at comparisons to other countries is a new plant in Flamanville in France, which was originally expected to be completed in 2012. Ten years later it still is not producing electricity; actually that should be more than 10 years. In any case, another plant in Somerset in the UK started construction in 2016 and still is not anywhere near being finished. Climate change is now. Cost of living challenges are now. This is why we are decarbonising at the fastest rate in the country. This is why we are going full steam ahead with renewables, and we have really strong targets for emissions reduction by 2035.
Jade BENHAM (Mildura) (15:25): I am thrilled to be able to rise today to speak on this motion about nuclear energy. I did see a tweet today actually from the Minister for Creative Industries. The member for Mornington referenced perhaps an omen bet running at Wangaratta today at 3:30. I am going to miss that race, but Going Nuclear is also trained – here is another omen – by D O’Brien. It is not D O’Brien from Gippsland South, but if that is not an omen I do not know what is. I will let you know how we finish up; it is paying $20 at 3:30.
Let us talk about some facts, because I do not get my facts from The Simpsons and Blinky the fish, who was a cartoon. I had the pleasure of hearing Dr David Gillespie speak about the progression of the technology in nuclear a few weeks ago, and he was brilliant at articulating all of the major concerns that are being thrown around about nuclear. When we talk about small modular nuclear, there are a lot of concerns around nuclear waste. First of all, we already have a nuclear industry in this country. We have Lucas Heights, which obviously has to dispose of its waste already, and we also have the submarines coming as well. For a small nuclear reactor, the waste that ends up being produced is actually recyclable. We cannot do it here – we have sovereignty of all of our resources here, yes, which makes sense – but what happens is they can be reprocessed. They have to go to France. Do you know what France’s biggest export is? It is not champagne, not cheese; France’s biggest export is isotopes. So their nuclear industry is well advanced, and their biggest export is not champagne, it is not cheese, it is isotopes, so they are really moving forward in their nuclear development. We can see it.
The Olympics are going to be held there in, what, 30 days? They did not cancel their 15-day sporting event; they are moving ahead, and they are actually very concerned. They have wind, obviously, lots of wind turbines throughout particularly the north of France, and they are very concerned now – and this is another conversation that no-one seems to be having – about these turbines which are at end of life. What do they do with them? They just end up in landfill. They are very concerned about that. I had a conversation with the mayor of Villers-Bretonneux about this, and he is very, very concerned about it. He was also concerned that they have had that infrastructure there for 20 years producing power but are unable to get it to where it needs to go. So we can learn a lot from countries that are already doing this. We can learn what not to do. We can learn what the future holds from countries that are already doing this.
Let us just talk about Victorians, and we will talk about them right now. The conversation at this point has been that we have leapt over so many things in Victoria. Let the feds do what they are doing, but at the moment we cannot have plans to have nuclear in Victoria because there is a moratorium on it. If the Commonwealth government of whichever persuasion it might be initiates a conversation – I mean, they are having the conversation – but if they decide in the future to lift the moratorium, then we can have these conversations. Is that Going Nuclear running now? It is probably not far away.
And also remember that the Gippsland community that are having the heart and soul ripped out of that region need to be part of this conversation. I sat down with the member for Morwell. I often talk to the member for Morwell and the members for Gippsland South, Gippsland East and Narracan about what the community sentiment is in Gippsland. The sentiment there is of course they want a nuclear industry. Of course they do; they need the jobs. They are bleeding at the moment with the wipe-out of the timber industry much, much sooner than it was supposed to be. They are bleeding from the potential shutdown of their coal-fired power plants. They need the jobs down there, and they are more than happy to have a sensible conversation. It is common sense, and that is what needs to prevail in our energy arguments right now. We just need common sense to prevail. I know that sometimes common sense is not that common, but the Victorian Nationals are doing our best to bring that back and make it sexy again, let us just say that.
After 10 years of energy policy failure Victorians are paying a higher price for power now than they ever have, and when everything else is increasing in cost as well, Victorians simply cannot afford to be paying this price for policy failure. So our focus will remain on keeping the lights on, keeping energy prices affordable and preventing the looming gas shortage, which Labor have failed to tackle because they are too busy talking about offshore wind. Do you know what I call these onshore wind plans? An obstacle course for whales, because that is what it will be.
Labor’s 95 per cent renewable target relies on 2 gigawatts of new offshore wind generation by 2032. Construction has not started, and the federal Labor government’s veto of the Port of Hastings facility on environmental grounds – because it would end up being an obstacle course for whales – is perhaps a little embarrassing for the Premier, and again it puts Victorian jobs at risk. So we do need to talk about that right now. We need to actually talk about keeping the lights on in the immediate future. Hopefully, in time we will evolve to a point where we can have a commonsense conversation about nuclear, or about any technology that presents itself, because the beauty of having a bit of common sense is that you might remain agnostic and open to any ideas that do present themselves. Even though some are saying that we could build nuclear power plants within seven to 10 years – okay, that is fine – again, while there is a moratorium on it, it simply cannot happen.
My point is we have sovereignty over all our resources. We have a nuclear industry here already. We know how to handle the waste. It can be recycled when we are talking small modular reactors, and we can learn from countries that are already doing it. We need to learn to not be so insular and black and white about these things. We need to be technology-agnostic, we really do, because the future is moving very, very fast. When we look at countries, particularly in Europe, that have had renewables for 20-odd years, they are now at end of life. And solar panels are exactly the same. We have an abundance of solar farms in my neck of the woods. What happens to those solar panels after, much less the emissions that go into creating all of these things, into building them?
So let us have a look at the broader discussion here. Instead of just shaking your head and saying, ‘That’s wrong,’ have a look at some facts. Honestly, the way that Dr Gillespie explained it to me – I mean, if you fail to see common sense in that argument, then you fail to possess common sense as far as I am concerned. It is a conversation, yes, we need to have, but right now we actually need to keep the lights on, and the energy policy, and the policy failure, of the state Labor government over the last 10 years means that Victorians are paying the price for mismanagement of our energy. Did it win?
Wayne Farnham: No.
Jade BENHAM: Oh, damn it. I had it on the nose too. I did not even have it each way, not that that would matter if it was fourth. It did not come close last week anyway.
The inability to have sensible conversations and the fact that Victorians are paying a higher price than they ever have on their power bills and that people are worrying about gas into the future are another illustration that Labor cannot manage projects and they cannot manage money, and it is regional Victorians that are paying the price.
Paul HAMER (Box Hill) (15:35): I too rise to speak on this nuclear power motion. I just want to touch on a couple of points raised by the member for Mornington at the outset. I think the first thing to remember is to never take a tip from the member for Mornington, because clearly you are going to do your dough if you do – no more racing tips from the member for Mornington.
The member for Mornington was also disappointed that the government was bringing this motion on, but I should actually remind the member for Mornington that it was the opposition that sought to adjourn off the justice bill, on which all of the issues that they were trying to talk about were actually being debated at the time. They chose to adjourn that off to bring on the nuclear motion. And we can see why: because we have had the member for Mornington and then the member for Mildura clearly state their position on nuclear.
The Leader of the Opposition wanted to have a bet each way, so he is clearly not a betting man. We will not be taking racing tips from the Leader of the Opposition either. He came out yesterday and said that the opposition had no plans. He did not rule out nuclear, and he did not say, ‘We’re going the full nuclear option’ – so just no plans. This probably summarises the opposition. They do not have any plans on housing or on how to deal with the population growth; they do not have any plans for transport. I saw that a member of the other place in our area is promoting not supporting any of the further development in Box Hill and not supporting any of the rail projects either. What is the proposal to deal with the increase in population? I think this sort of summarises where the opposition are at – they do have no plans.
One of the areas that I want to talk about in particular in relation to nuclear which has not really been discussed in a lot of detail is the transportation of material – both the transportation of material to get to site and then the transportation of the nuclear waste, the spent fuel rods.
Richard Riordan interjected.
Paul HAMER: The member for Polwarth might say it is the size of a can of Coke, but it is highly radioactive material that stays around for many, many years. There is no known uranium deposit in Victoria, and there are no uranium mines in Victoria, so if we are trying to bring uranium into the Latrobe Valley to –
Members interjecting.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): Order! Member for Polwarth – it has been a few times now – please do not interject from the table. It is incredibly difficult for me to hear.
Paul HAMER: If we are bringing uranium into the Latrobe Valley, it has to come from somewhere, right? We do not have any ports that can import or export uranium at the moment. In South Australia and the Northern Territory there are designated ports. The two designated ports in Australia to export uranium are Port Adelaide and Darwin Port. So we could bring the uranium through outback South Australia, right through the National Party electorates through western Victoria and right through the suburbs of Melbourne – probably through my electorate of Box Hill – and then out to the Latrobe Valley. I am sure all of our communities would be very pleased. Acting Speaker De Martino, it would go right through your community. I am sure your community would be very pleased to have the trucks running through with the uranium oxide –
Members interjecting.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): Order! I am struggling to hear. Apologies, everyone. Can I please hear the member for Box Hill.
Paul HAMER: That is obviously to get it to the new power stations that they are proposing down in the Latrobe Valley. I heard Senator Paterson on the radio this morning. The question was asked: where is the nuclear waste going to go? At this stage there is no plan. Just like the Leader of the Opposition said, there are no plans. Hopefully we will see something one day, but at the moment the proposal seems to be that we are going to keep those spent fuel rods –
Richard Riordan interjected.
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): Order! Member for Polwarth, I have consistently asked you to please stop interjecting from the table. I will be calling the Speaker in. This is a final warning. Please, I would like to hear the member for Box Hill without interruption.
Paul HAMER: You have got the spent fuel rods after they have been used at the nuclear facility, and where will that waste be stored? The small waste that is generated at the Lucas Heights facilities is currently stored onsite because there is no nuclear waste facility in Australia and there is no agreed way of transporting that radioactive material – and it is a highly concentrated radioactive material, the spent fuel rod. We will have the same issue in the Latrobe Valley. How are we going to get it out of the Latrobe Valley? There is no port in the Latrobe Valley. That material is most likely going to have to go through Melbourne – some parts of Melbourne at least – if not further to get out to a port that it can be exported from or to a nuclear waste facility in some location. Is it going to be in Victoria? Is it going to be South Australia? We do not know. No-one knows. There is no plan. That is what is being said on the radio at the moment.
I want to also have a look at the CSIRO’s GenCost 2023–24 report, which was released only a month ago. In their media release – it is the very first point on the media release – it says:
Renewables remain the lowest cost range of new build electricity technology.
Particularly it says:
It also determined that nuclear power was more expensive than renewables and would take at least 15 years to develop, including construction.
We have heard Peter Dutton talk about a 2035 start date, but based on the CSIRO’s report, this is just simply not achievable. It is not going to be before 2040. Again, I heard on the radio Senator Paterson trashing the CSIRO report and saying that they have got their own experts – their own unnamed experts – who claim to know a lot better, but they could not name them and they could not say what these experts were actually saying. The reason why it says it is going to take 15 years is because:
This reflects the absence of a development pipeline, the additional legal, safety and security steps required, and weighing the evidence provided by stakeholders.
It says:
… updated modelling found that renewables – including costs associated with additional storage and transmission – remain the lowest cost, new build technology.
Based on that report, why would we as a community want to be going down this path of developing a new technology? I appreciate that worldwide nuclear technology has been used, but in Australia, because it is going to be a new development and a new technology and because of the level of development and investment that would be required, the cost would be far greater than continuing on our path of renewable energy. The high up-front costs that this is going to require simply mean that this does not stack up. It does not stack up economically and it does not stack up environmentally, yet here we have got champions of nuclear energy sitting over there on the opposition benches that see this as the solution to all of their problems regardless of any other situation. They have never wanted to listen to the CSIRO, and they have never wanted to listen to any of the science on any energy- or climate-related matters, and here they are again just completely ignoring the expert reports, completely ignoring the official agency reports.
Just in the final few moments I also want to reflect on the impact of failure. We have seen far too many episodes across the world where a malfunction in a nuclear facility can lead to absolute catastrophe and be devastating for the families and people who live around there and particularly the workers at the plant and the emergency services. The member for Frankston I think spoke eloquently about his time in the fire emergency service. I commend the motion to the house.
Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (15:45): I am very pleased to rise to debate the nuclear motion –
Juliana Addison interjected.
Wayne FARNHAM: Calm down. Can I actually get started? You have interrupted already. Can I join the debate, or are we going to have a screaming match for 10 minutes? I said I am very pleased to contribute to the debate.
Juliana Addison interjected.
Wayne FARNHAM: How about you settle down?
Natalie Suleyman: On a point of order, Acting Speaker, can I ask you to bring the house to order?
The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): The member for Narracan to resume.
Wayne FARNHAM: As I said, I am very pleased to rise to talk about nuclear. Let us be realistic: an energy debate is what we are having today, and nuclear is part of that. I am glad this has come on, because why have we got to the point now that we are talking about nuclear? I think a lot of Victorians – and maybe the federal government – have realised that our transition out of coal is not as easy as maybe the government thought. Our transition out of coal into renewables is not working as well as people had hoped, and when the government also says that gas will not be part of this solution then that becomes problematic.
In all the meetings I have had and literature I have read, gas needs to be part of our energy solution going forward. It is absolutely essential to the energy solution for Victorians, and this is part of the reason why we are having this debate today. This government was warned about gas shortages 10 years ago. It was warned about the situation we are now in. Unfortunately – or fortunately – in my time building, in all the years I built, 99 per cent of the homes that I built had gas, and at the moment we are looking at critical gas shortages. The government has failed on gas and therefore is putting the energy security of Victorians at risk.
As far as the nuclear debate goes, let us get some real facts about nuclear and not go to the three-eyed fish scenario out of The Simpsons. These are just some absolute facts about nuclear: the amount of space required for solar panels to produce the same as a nuclear plant is 40,000 hectares of solar panels, compared to 2 hectares for a nuclear power plant. So let us start weighing up environmental options and food bowl options – or food bowl problems. If we are going to start covering our state in solar panels, where is our food going to come from? Where will our cattle graze? If cattle cannot graze, they cannot produce milk. We will not produce beef. We will not produce sheep. What do we do with this?
This debate is actually so important because I do not think anyone has ever really considered the pros and the cons. There can be cons against nuclear, but there are cons against renewables. I hear that nuclear is four or five times more expensive for power, but part of this argument no-one has said is about the cost of offshore wind. Offshore wind is four times more expensive than what coal is today, which puts it up to over $200, about the same price as nuclear. What is the environmental impact of our renewables sources in 20 years time? What do we do with the old blades off turbines – onshore and offshore? Offshore is very, very expensive to maintain. So is onshore. What do we do with the solar panels when they reach end of life? Everybody says renewable is cheaper. It might be, but it has only got a certain life span. In 20 years time you start to replace things. No-one has really talked about the cost of the 28,000 kilometres of transmission lines that we will need to come along with renewables. I have never heard a cost on that. How many billions and billions of dollars will it cost this state to have 28,000 kilometres of transmission lines?
These are the mature questions we should be debating. I would love for this to keep getting debated, because we have not had a proper conversation. We have had juvenile conversation. We have had people running around saying the sky is falling, everything is going to be toxic and everything is going to fall apart. That is not the way to approach this debate. The debate should be mature. It should on facts, and I am happy to listen to facts. I am very much pragmatic about this. But you cannot sit back and just prophesise doom and gloom when you have not looked at it all.
Let us look at job creation, and I will come back to the people of the valley, the place where my electorate is and which neighbours where the proposed Loy Yang site would be. The people of Morwell, Moe and Traralgon, in particular those towns, have been decimated by the government’s transition, and there is no argument about this. Last sitting week we had the timber bill, closing down VicForests. That has ended that. They have been under the pump now for the best part of a decade on job losses. The shutdown of coal is going to create more job losses. What is going to replace those jobs in the valley? At the moment, with the new government SEC, which was going to deliver jobs for the valley, one person is employed in Morwell. So when you talk about people in the valley and their trust of government and say, ‘We will do this; it will create jobs,’ in all honesty they think you are full of rubbish. If you say you are going to create jobs under the new SEC for the people of Morwell, then deliver. One job – that is a pathetic attempt at showboating the people of Morwell. That is why the member for Morwell is sitting here. He does not sit on that side of the chamber, and there is good reason for that – because this government has consistently screwed over the people of Morwell. I can name time after time after time. There is the timber industry as well, which affected the white paper supply in Morwell, where over 200 or 300 people lost their jobs. The reason we are having this debate is because nuclear would create thousands of jobs for the people of Morwell.
I have lived down that way my whole life, and I can tell you when I was a teenager Morwell was pumping. It was such a good place to go to. They had everything. It was fun as a teenager. It was fantastic. We had bowling, we had theatres, we had all that stuff in Morwell, and I used to catch the train at Warragul down to Morwell and go out for the night and catch the train home. Unfortunately, now when you drive into Morwell and Moe – and Traralgon to a limited extent, but it is not as bad – Morwell is a ghost town. It is decimated. This government has literally killed the town of Morwell. It is row after row of empty shops. It has some of the highest unemployment in the state. So why would anyone not want to debate a power plant at Traralgon, which would create employment, which would create jobs, which would boost that local economy? It is not a negative thing.
We should have a proper, mature debate, not wave our arms around and not just abuse each other over the chamber. We should have a proper, mature debate about this and put down the pros and cons. But what we really should do is ask the people where they stand. I think that is very important. I think we should ask our communities, because I know my community of Narracan is not antinuclear. It is irrelevant what that side says. They do not know my community. Proper debate is what we need.
Michaela SETTLE (Eureka) (15:55): I am delighted to rise to speak on this motion. I was horrified at the thought that those on the other side would seek to gag us. They gag us because they do not want to talk about nuclear. The reason they do not want to talk about nuclear is because they have no position. They flip and they flop like a three-eyed fish. They cannot decide where they sit on this, and so they tried to shut down this debate. They tried to force through an adjournment on this debate, but we had the numbers and we are glad to stand here and discuss it.
The member for Mornington stood up and said that he wanted to talk about other issues, like youth crime, as was pointed out by my fine colleague from Box Hill. We were indeed on the Justice Legislation Amendment (Integrity, Defamation and Other Matters) Bill 2024 talking about those very things, but those on the other side thought that they would adjourn off that debate. They wanted to gag the debate on justice. So what was next? I know it was a bit shocking – it was a bit secret – but the next thing on the daily papers was the nuclear debate, and didn’t they go nuclear at the sight of that? Then they decided they wanted to shut that debate down as well. Well, they can try and gag us as much as they like, but we have got the numbers on this side.
This debate is of incredible importance, and I have been slightly gobsmacked by some of the presentations from the other side. The member for Narracan in his closing statement said, ‘Why wouldn’t anyone want to debate this?’ Well, Member for Narracan, ask your colleagues, because you are the ones who tried to gag the debate. You are the ones who do not want to talk about nuclear. They are the ones that do not want to talk about nuclear, and their leader, the Leader of the Opposition, is extraordinarily silent on this issue. He is not prepared to tell us where he stands. I am curious about their desire to debate when they do not really seem to have a position on it. As I say, they are flip-flopping like a three-eyed frog.
The member for Narracan talked about sticking to the facts, and I know that we on this side of the house find it extraordinary that they continue to deny that the CSIRO are in control of the facts. These are scientists; all they deal in is facts. They are not interested in politics, and they make it very, very clear that nuclear is the most expensive energy that you can get.
There was a comment from the member for Mildura, who likes to talk to us about the notion of small nuclear stations. What is interesting there is in her contribution she kept talking about how we should look to Europe and we should look to this progress. Can I point out that that there is not a single, solitary small energy plant in any OECD country. There are no facts, because it has not been done. So those on the other side ask us to look at the facts. They turn their backs on this debate. They turn their backs on the CSIRO, and then they ask us to believe in something that does not exist. There are no small plants in the OECD.
Then the member for Mildura liked to tell us all about France and how fabulous it was going for France. Can I just suggest that she look a little further into – surprise, surprise – some facts. Dutton himself likes to crow that France has the cheapest power in Europe, with 70 per cent of its electricity from nuclear power. Now, let us get some facts here. Last month France’s spot electricity price went into negative as cheap renewable energy flooded its own power market. Combined with reduced demand, French officials shut down three nuclear reactors. Why did they shut those nuclear reactors down? Why would they do that? It is because it was cheaper to use the renewables in their power structure. Those on the other side like to talk about facts, but there is quite a bit of picking and choosing amongst those. There was also the charming description from the member for Mildura about an obstacle course for whales in terms of offshore. Again, I suggest you look a little closer into some of the facts around offshore wind, I believe, being one of the cheapest to produce.
The other fact they like to have – it is a subtle thing you have got to watch for; those on the other side like to get slippery with their facts – is that there was a suggestion that Victorians now pay more for electricity than we ever did. Guess what, that can be said of everyone in the world. There is this thing called inflation, and it is gradually going up. What the member for Mildura failed to tell you is that we pay less than any other state in Australia for our power. Do you know why? Because we have a minister for energy who knows what she believes in and has driven an agenda to make sure that this state is the absolute leader in renewables. I know that that minister for energy and our Premier will fight tooth and nail before we see the most expensive form of energy brought into this country – the most toxic.
The member for Mildura also liked to talk about what we are going to do with the wind turbines when they get old. Perhaps she would like to explain to me what we are going to do when the nuclear power stations get old, because those nuclear rods age as well. I tell you what, if I was trying to find a place to store a turbine, I would be happier doing that than trying to find a place to put those nuclear rods. Right now in Australia we have small amounts of nuclear waste. They come from things like our phones, and, you know what, we cannot find anywhere to put them, because nobody wants them. They are sitting in small spaces and storage systems while we look to develop the relationships or technology to get rid of them. If we cannot deal with low levels of this toxic waste, I would like to hear from those on the other side some of their facts about where we are going to put that toxic waste.
The member for Narracan – in his seat – suggested that we are in some sort of pickle because we have got problems in our energy market and that our renewable plans were not going to plan. I am sorry to tell you I have got some more facts for you. At the moment in Victoria 38 per cent of our energy is generated by renewables. That is a fact. We are working towards 2030, and I reckon we are going to get there or darn close. We have a plan and we are working towards it. Instead the Liberal opposition suddenly turn up with some harebrained idea to build a technology that takes years and years to build, billions and billions of dollars to build, and want us to go off course. Victorians are currently paying less for their power than any other state, and that is because this government has driven a renewable program and that program is working. But those on the other side would like to have us divert.
Finally, one thing I would like to say: I personally believe that a lot of this kind of smoke and mirrors from the other side around nuclear is that they are trying to win the hearts and minds of people on the transmission line routes. I am sorry, but I have got to tell you something: nuclear energy needs transmission as well. You can take it out of those, but they are not –
Danny O’Brien interjected.
Michaela SETTLE: Have you got a policy? Loy Yang does not have the capacity to take nuclear energy out of there. What I would say is those on the other side would have us develop some new system that somewhere near 2050 might deliver some energy of the most expensive form possible.
To the member for Narracan, who I respect dearly – and I love our farming communities – I have to tell you that there is a lot of research out there and people are talking about the fact that farming underneath solar panels increases productivity. There is a farmer that was in the Age a couple of weeks ago and talked about the difference it made for the grass picked for his sheep, and there is also I think an American farmer who is consciously doing cropping under solar panels. This kind of spook that we are destroying the food bowl of Victoria is nothing more than another one of their egregious playing with information – I cannot say the L-word. I would like to make it very clear that although they tried to gag us on nuclear, those on our side will talk about it every day.
That the debate be now adjourned.
Motion agreed to and debate adjourned.
Ordered that debate be adjourned until later this day.