The following statement is attributable to Clean Energy Council Policy Director – Market, Investment and Grid, Christiaan Zuur:
“Today’s presentation by the Leader of the Opposition at CEDA has reconfirmed what every leading expert from 2006 onwards has said, time and again.
“Nuclear doesn’t make sense for meeting Australia’s future energy needs and emissions reduction commitments when renewables, backed up by storage and transmission, are already providing 40 per cent of Australia’s electricity supply and counting, with a growing number of projects in the pipeline.
“Research published by the Institute of Energy Economics and Analysis (IEEA), which examined case studies from nuclear reactors being built around the world, observed that many of these projects are routinely delivered over time and budget, even in countries with an established nuclear industry.
“We know that the levelised costs of building renewables are far lower than nuclear and the ongoing fuel and maintenance costs are also cheaper. The sun and the wind are a free resource that Australia has in abundance, while nuclear has massive ongoing costs associated with processing and storing waste safely, as well as recovering ongoing fuel and maintenance costs.
To divert from renewables to nuclear would not only prove costly for Australian households but would also increase the risk of them sitting in the dark as they wait at least 20 years for these reactors to be built and rely on increasingly unreliable coal-fired power stations for longer.Christiaan Zuur Clean Energy Council Policy Director - Market, Investment & Grid
“The Leader of the Opposition has even acknowledged that this is a proposal that will attract significant upfront costs.
"Put simply, this is a high-cost, high-risk experiment that Australia cannot afford.
“We would rather see the Leader of the Opposition announcing what steps a Dutton government would take to continue the roll-out of renewables and storage, which is the lowest-cost energy future for Australia.”
ENDS
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