Peter Dutton's nuclear power policy is a 'suicide note'

Dr. Rebecca Huntley, director of research at 89 Degrees East, told the Nine newspapers that participants in focus groups were bringing up nuclear power more often than before the last federal election, but support usually dissolved once the discussion turned to timelines, logistics and the issue of how to store nuclear waste.

RedBridge pollster Kos Samaras told the Nine newspapers that the question of social licence would be impossible to overcome because soft support for nuclear power would evaporate and bump up against hard opposition which he puts as high as 32 percent.

Murray Goot says that "majority support" was being conflated with "strong support" in the Murdoch newspapers, adding: "A metre wide doesn't necessarily mean a metre thick." Moreover, he notes that the February Newspoll survey only achieved majority support by manipulating both the question and the response options.

The Murdoch-Coalition echo-chamber was especially excited about younger poll respondents in the February Newspoll survey (65 percent support, 32 percent opposition). But the poll was biased and as Goot notes, other polls reach different conclusions: "But eighteen- to thirty-four-year-olds as the age group most favourably disposed to nuclear power is not what Essential shows, not what Savanta shows, and not what RedBridge shows."

Unbiased polls also find that Australians support renewables to a far greater extent than nuclear power; that a majority do not want nuclear reactors built near where they live; and that most Australians are concerned about nuclear accidents and nuclear waste.

Sticker shock

It can safely be assumed that support will weaken as more Australians become aware of the high cost of nuclear power and the likely impact on both taxes and power bills.

Some polls indicate that Australians need educating on this issue. For example a 2023 Essential poll found that 38 percent of respondents ranked renewables as the "most expensive" option, 34 percent ranked nuclear the most expensive option, and 28 percent ranked fossil fuels the most expensive option. But Essential also found that 60 percent of respondents agreed with the proposition that 'Australia needs to rapidly develop renewables because it will provide a cheaper and stable energy source, and create jobs', while only 17 percent disagreed.

Simon Benson wrote in the Australian that "any Coalition energy policy must be framed in a cost-of-living context that can demonstrate how nuclear power will deliver cheaper and more reliable power into the future."

But nuclear power would increase both power bills and taxes and the only way that the Coalition can get around that problem is with creative accounting and continuing to attack CSIRO's detailed costings . The latest CSIRO GenCost report gives these 2030 cost estimates: small modular reactors A$212-353 per megawatt-hour, 90% wind and solar with integration costs (energy storage and transmission) A$69-101 per megawatt-hour.

Nuclear power could also involve the curtailment of rooftop solar to allow reactors to run smoothly and profitably. Put that in the electoral pipe and smoke it.

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