French exceptionalism: a guide through the energy wars

A comprehensive evaluation and critique of the French Nuclear program has been published by the London-based economist Francois Nectoux for Greenpeace in 1991. Back then he opined the French nuclear program was in the midst of an “economic and industrial crisis”. That has not materialised 16 years on. However on the positive side Green peace conceded that the French program reduced heavy oil and coal import for electricity generation.

This sort of fair judgment seems to have been lost since with other parts of the Green movement. Just look at the terrible experience of Germany with a prospect of a nuclear-free future. There you see the deplorable effects of the Green party, which held the balance of power for a decade and used their influence to stop all nuclear development. A dedicated nuclear scientist has described it as “a soul-destroying experience for thousands of scientists and engineers who have spent most of their lives bringing their project to fruition”.

The Green movement has already created a lost generation of science-illiterate youths in many Western countries with long-lasting cultural effects. Again the French have experienced exceptionally less damages of this kind thanks to venerable institutions like the Grande Ecoles and the Engineering Universities. As someone presently working everyday in the august Victorian State Library - packed with thousands of Chinese and Indian students - I get a feeling as to who will finally win the energy wars.

Responsible energy mix for Australia

Britain’s government has just decided on a new nuclear energy program and will build four new nuclear power stations in the coming decade. A 2006 study from the Australian House of Representatives detected 441 commercial nuclear power reactors worldwide operating in 31 countries. They generate 16 per cent of our energy supply. About 27 nuclear reactors are currently under construction and at least 38, some estimate well over 100, are planned or on order worldwide.

Therefore nuclear capacity is expected to increase by 22 per cent until 2025 - generating a surging demand in uranium, of which Australia has plenty. There is a strong case to be made for the use of nuclear power in Australia in order to provide the more than doubling demand in electricity from 48GW now to 100GW by 2050.

Under a scenario in which the first reactor comes online in 2020, and with a fleet of 25 reactors in place by 2050, nuclear power could be delivering about one third of Australia’s electricity needs.

Another good argument is the due replacement of her submarines giving a welcome opportunity to catch up with international standards of nuclear propelled ships. Unfortunately the two parliamentary reports do not discuss the potential benefits of smart fast breeders. These fast-neutron reactors could extract much more recycled nuclear fuel and minimise the risks of weapon proliferation. They produce much less nuclear waste with a radioactivity dropping to safe levels in a few hundred years instead of tens of thousands of years. Fast breeders not only would increase the efficiency to 90 per cent they also render the uranium supply inexhaustible and enabling true sustainability.

And - just to set the minds of some climate-alarmists at rest - this would save GHG emissions of roughly 50 per cent of the projected emissions from electricity generation. Already by the year 2000, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, nuclear and hydroelectric power together annually avoided GHG emissions of about 8 per cent of the total global emissions from fossil fuels, equal to 1.2 billion tons of carbon.

One last reassuring thought in the tradition of good old French scientific enlightenment: man did not invent the nuclear processes that occur in nuclear fission reactors. These processes have been occurring on the earth since its formation. Such natural uranium fission was discovered by French scientist in 1972 in the Oklo uranium deposit in Gabon (equatorial Africa). Thus are we not just emulating nature? It has been theorised in this sense that a “natural reactor” in the earth’s core produces enough heat to keep its outer layer liquid, which produces the enormous electricity required for the earth’s magnetic field. Are we going to allow the Greens to persuade us we can do without?