Selling uranium to India will literally blow up in our face

mick says:

08:06am | 18/11/11

Good post John.  Uranium is a double edged sword. 

Given that India is buying military aircraft and putting troops on the border one has to see the writing on the wall.  And given that both India and Pakistan have nuclear weapons one has to worry about the possibilities.  We all need to remember that Pakistan harboured Bin Laden whilst at the same time claiming to be a friend of the US all the time accepting US aid money.  If you think that Pakistan would not flick the nuclear switch then you’d also believe in the tooth fairy.

It is wrong to sell India uranium and it is highly likely that the worst case scenario will occur in time.  What then?

Erick says:

09:04am | 18/11/11

It’s funny how the greenies who think themselves so progressive, actually tend to live in the past. The Fukushima reactor was based on 1960s technology, and even then some of its designers resigned because they thought it was unsafe. They turned out to be right.

Modern reactor designs, having benefited from fifty years of intensive development, are nothing like those clunky, dangerous old reactors. The best way to improve both nuclear safety and decrease carbon dioxide emissions is to build newer, cleaner reactors and gradually shut down the old ones.

AdamC says:

10:32am | 18/11/11

@Erick, they also quite like windmills, too, which have to be about the oldest form of mechanical power there is. (And don’t seem to be much more effective than they were when Don Quixote was charging at them.)

Willie Mac says:

10:33am | 18/11/11

“those who organised a genocide of Sikhs in 1984 are still in power”

Genocide? You use the term far too liberally. Genocide is organised total ethnic cleansing, where the vast majority of an ethnic group is killed (Jews in Germany, Tutsis in Rwanda). In 1984, 10 000 Sikhs died out of a total Sikh population of 15 million. That was not genocide, it was a religious riot. Yes, religious violence happens in India but don’t label them genocidal maniacs.

Oh, and let’s not forget the man running the country is a Sikh. If India hates Sikhs so much, why would they have elected a Sikh man as their Prime Minister?

Andrew says:

10:36am | 18/11/11

Statistically, you might be quite safe living next to a modern reactor, Erick. Be that as it may, the list of famous last words is very long.

neo says:

10:59am | 18/11/11

Nuclear energy is the way to go, it is the most advanced thing we have to date, we should use it more. As for disasters in Chernobyl and Fukushima, it’s as Erick said, both were built with ridiculous safety oversights to meet deadlines, something that should never happen. Take your time, ensure every safety standard is met, and you will have a reactor running with no problems, like the majority of reactors that operate today.

Erick says:

11:05am | 18/11/11

Andrew, statistically I would be perfectly happy to live alongside a modern reactor.

As it happens, I’ve been living within ten miles of Australia’s only nuclear reactor, at Lucas Heights, for well over thirty years. Living next to an even newer, safer reactor wouldn’t bother me.

Andrew says:

11:29am | 18/11/11

My point, Erick, is that in my opinion you are too sure of yourself. You may be right, but that is far from certain.

Phil says:

01:30pm | 18/11/11

@Andrew

If people were as sure of themselves as Erick is then nothing would ever get done, everyone would be to concerned about the what if’s.
Look at the amount of nuclear power plants around the world, the years they have been running and the deaths DIRECTLY related to them and you will find its very very safe.

Coop says:

02:56pm | 18/11/11

Im a complete ignoramus when it comes to nuclear power generation but I’ve little doubt that current technology is capable of delivering safety etc when properly and responsibly built and operated.

The issue to me is that I just dont see India as a being responsible and capable in this respect. I’d suggest that they are governmentally and culturally incapable, and unwilling, of ensuring responsible and proper operation and waste disposal at a variety of levels and that corruption, cost and corner cutting would be the norm

Kevin says:

07:15am | 18/11/11

Well said!!  People like Dave Sweeney would drag us back to the seventh century.
He obviously knows nothing about the latest generation of nuclear reactors either. Including Generation IV Integral Fast Reactors and the thorium LFTR.. Google is your friend.

TheRealDave says:

10:08am | 18/11/11

Its not often I agree with Tim but I do wholeheartedly here. Referencign Fukashima is - at best, disingenuous. I’d call it deliberate fraud in my own opinion. Japan is geologically nothing liek the Australian continent. We do not suffer anywhere rmeotely near the amount of earthquakes and other geological activity the Japanese islands do. Infact, we NEVER will.

To my mind, Fukashima is a great example of how safe the modern nuclear power industry is. Despite a totally ‘off the scale’ earthquake AND devastating tsunami the damage to people and land around the nuclear was and is minimal. 40 years ago it would likely have been a different story. If it was 70’s Soviet gear it would have been a different story.

Anti-Nuclear dills like the author of this article only want to remind you of a far more primitive nuclear industry and falsely misrepresent those ‘old days’ as the current safety standards of the modern industry. Its blatant fraud and should be called out as such.

Start building the bloody reactors here so WE can start taking advatange of longer lasting, cheaper AND cleaner power for ALL of us….instead of just selling it off to other countries to benefit from. Its akin to the Arabs selling off oil and refusing to use motor vehicles…..ridiculous would be a kind way to describe it, I’d call it moronic.

neo says:

11:03am | 18/11/11

It’s not the Soviet gear that was to blame for Chernobyl to be honest, the reactor was built to a strict deadline, and the people in charge knew they would be thrown in prisons if they did not meet it, it was built with horrible safety faults, which were pointed out by the engineers and scientists at the time, however the government had their own idiotic way of doing things. In the end, it was the people that suffered. I can imagine Australia, being a safety obsessed nation that it is, can easily avoid these pitfalls.

marley says:

01:47pm | 18/11/11

@neo - minor point, but I think there was a fatal flaw in the design, not just the construction, of the Chernobyl reactor.  If I remember rightly, there was no containment structure around the reactor.  That’s a pretty basic design flaw.

Tim says:

01:54pm | 18/11/11

Chernobyl had no containment structure and used graphite containment rods.
And even then, it took the operators turning all the safety alarms and safeguards off to run an experiment for it to blow up.

neo says:

02:55pm | 18/11/11

Yep, unfortunately due to the strict deadlines, the plant went operational with safety faults.

Adam says:

03:18pm | 18/11/11

The thing with the nuclear industry is that incidents & accidents don’t happen - they merely begin.

Furthermore… “Whatever reactors we put under safeguards will be decided at India’s discretion. We are not fire-walling between the civil and military programs in terms of manpower or personnel. That’s not on.”

India had no intention to quarantine its military program from its civilian
program because nuclear scientists would work across both programs. -
India’s chief scientific adviser, Rajagopala Chidambaram, in an interview
with The Hindu newspaper . - The Age, 16/8/07

Phil says:

10:55am | 18/11/11

Well America isnt going to be able to take on China all by its self now is it?
Its very obvious whats happening and the reasons behind it.

Mark G says:

07:12am | 18/11/11

Marley,

Couldn’t have said it better myself. I was going to comment on this article but I dont think I need to now.

AdamC says:

08:13am | 18/11/11

Top marks, Marley. Comment of the day!

BD says:

08:29am | 18/11/11

Cop that young Harry….. a knockout blow if I have ever seen one

Seth Brundle says:

11:55am | 18/11/11

The ref needs to stop this fight.  The author of the article is on the ropes, bloodied and woozy and no longer able to intelligently defend himself.

Sean says:

12:13pm | 18/11/11

I disagree with the continual assertion by pro nuclear types that it will produce cheap power. Every indication is that it will be several times more expensive than coal even with the massive government subsidies that are expected to be required before private industry will make the investment to set up a reactor.
I also disagree that renewables are not a solution for baseload power generation. It is early stage technology, which shows significant potential for improvement in efficiency. We didn’t get from the Model T to the Bugatti Veyron in one step.
Furthermore, most discussions about the cost effectiveness of renewables do not properly account for the amount of taxpayer funding that has gone into the coal industry (& nuclear in other nations) over the years. Level the subsidy playing field and renewables are getting there. Put a cost on pollution and factor in finite resources and renewable start looking even better. It need time and support.

marley says:

12:58pm | 18/11/11

@Sean - there are plenty of studies out to show that nuclear power works out at a similar or lesser cost to coal over the lifetime of the plant.  Construction of the plant is more expensive, but fuel is much cheaper - and you don’t have to worry about carbon taxes either.  As for renewables, maybe they’ll be competitive in the future but they’re not now.

See this:

http://world-nuclear.org/info/inf02.html

Jordan says:

05:34pm | 18/11/11

“I also disagree that renewables are not a solution for baseload power generation. It is early stage technology, which shows significant potential for improvement in efficiency.”

This is true, but we simply can’t afford to wait that long. The fossil fuel power plants and factories we have right now are enough to lead to dangerous levels of C02 in the atmosphere. That’s before the paranoid countries like Germany phase out their nuclear - to be replaced with a mix of renewables and new coal and gas - and before any growth at all in the developing world’s energy consumption.

neo says:

11:10am | 18/11/11

As of 2008, the total deaths from radiation at Chernobyl was at 64 persons. Premature deaths from cancer is estimated at anywhere between 30,000 to 1 million. Of course, it is hard to say, as many of those people could have developed cancer regardless of the disaster.

Jordan says:

05:30pm | 18/11/11

Only Greenpeace et al.  have ever produced estimates anywhere near 1 million; its even less scientifically supportable than Tea Party brigades’ the “the planet is not getting hotter.” And 30,000 is not the lower bound for the estimate.

Its also worth noting that most of the deaths were preventable, if the Soviet Government’s response had been even marginally competent. Most of the excess deaths are attributable to thyroid cancer. They could have been avoided by destroying agricultural produce (especially milk) from the most polluted areas, and/or giving everyone iodine tablets, steps Japan, despite its failings in preventative regulation, has taken all of these steps, and it is very likely any impact on life expectancies from the disaster will be too low to ever measure.

Even assuming a casualty figure at the upper end of what’s plausible for Chernobyl, Nuclear’s deaths caused per kilowatt hour of energy produced would still be lower than Hydroelectricity, for instance, and order of magnitudes better than any fossil fuel.

larry says:

09:58am | 18/11/11

pretty unrealistic to label the many thousands of nuclear weapons threatening our planet as a mere distraction. FAIL.

Peter says:

10:51am | 18/11/11

Disagree larry - Dave’s article is about energy. The biggest threat of climate change comes from coal. This is why nuclear is a distraction.

Jordan says:

10:57am | 18/11/11

Its simply false to say renewables are cheaper than nuclear.

Most of the expense in nuclear comes from high capital costs due to two factors:  extreme safety over-engineering to mitigate against disasters, and regulatory volatility - i.e. ongoing changes to the safety rules while the plant is under construction. This subjects construction to large and unpredictable delays, and hence makes loans to build a plant risky and expensive.

And yet, even in the most highly regulated jurisdictions with zero-casualty safety records for nuclear power - the U.S., the U.K., France, Germany - Hydro is the only renewable has a track record of anything like scalable cost-competitiveness with Nuclear. And Hydro, while it has a lot going for it, has its own serious issues: environmental, as I’m sure most people are aware, but also safety:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dam_failure
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morvi_dam_failure

Peter says:

12:58pm | 18/11/11

Jordan, you ignore the lifetime cost of nuclear - especially waste. We can discuss IFR’s burning waste later, but how much did the cancelled Yucca Mountain project cost? Seems Schacht Konrad in Germany will cost 2 billion Euros alone. What the are running costs for these facilities?

Troy Flynn says:

03:49pm | 18/11/11

Does anybody have any support for Geo-Thermal? I saw an article a couple of months ago saying Iceland, which is dotted with geo-thermal plants, is soon to begin exporting the power gererated by their geo-thermal plants. Don’t we have geo-thermal zones in our country which we can exploit? (Alice Springs etc.) It’s not like the earth’s core is going to cool off anytime soon.

Jordan says:

05:17pm | 18/11/11

Peter, its true waste management costs associated with Nuclear Power are not always fully incorporated into its price, which is wrong - they should be. But they aren’t anywhere near large enough to make nuclear more expensive than current generation wind or solar.

Tim says:

08:55am | 18/11/11

When I look at the gridlock of cars in peak hour in our major cities I wonder what goes through these people heads.

I think there should be more use of flying cars and teleportation machines.

Fiddler says:

09:48am | 18/11/11

you mean where over ten thousand people drowned and a few died from damage caused to a fifty year old reactor design, yet all the media coverage was over the hyper-inflated fears of radiation? Is this the incident you are referring to?

Andrew says:

10:43am | 18/11/11

Flying cars and teleportation machines do not exist, Tim. Geothermal and solar power do, are in significant use, and by all accounts will greatly increase. Your argument fails. Also, you are using an irrelevent argument deliberately, I think, to annoy your opponent. It works, to be sure, but it is not a valid way to argue. It is not honest.

Jordan says:

11:01am | 18/11/11

What’s your average electricity bill, Brizben? How many kWh did you consume in the last year?

And how much of that power came from fossil fuels that kill vastly more people and pollute much more land per unit of energy produced than Nuclear has or ever will? Heck, the radioactivity from sulphur emitted by Coal plants causes more cancer than the radioactivity from Nuclear plants.

Of course hopefully your fossil fuel use is close to zero, since most energy providers in Australia now give you the option of paying double or triple etc to have all your power from renewables. You do elect to pay the extra amount, right?

Jane2 says:

11:26am | 18/11/11

Brizben, do you know all those images of people getting swiped by giga counters? The western media took those images and misinterpreted them. The free swips were to assure the population they WERENT effected, not to identify who was.

There are not thousands of Japanese with radiation poisoning, in fact people are back living and working in the “exclusion” zone and regularly getting free health checks to ensure they stay healthy.

I agree though that we should use more geothermal and solar.

Brizben says:

03:03pm | 18/11/11

“a few died from damage caused to a fifty year old reactor design”
What did the designers say 50 years ago and in 50 years time what will the world say about the reactors built today.

“to annoy your opponent”
Yep exactly. I think News should tighten up on the comments policy and stop allowing multiple comments under different pseudonyms.

“Heck, the radioactivity from sulphur emitted by Coal plants causes more cancer than the radioactivity from Nuclear plants.”
Heck yeah, but that is an argument for more renewables.

Brizben says:

03:14pm | 18/11/11

Plutonium-239 has a half-life of 24,200 years. Is it worth the risk?

Jordan says:

05:40pm | 18/11/11

I take it then Brizben, from your non-answer, that you don’t pay extra to source your energy from 100% renewable options, despite living in one of the wealthiest nations on the planet.

But you presumably want India to install nothing but solar panels for any new energy supply. Which is to say you want people in one of the poorest nations to pay double or triple for energy what you pay. Generally they want it for things like lighting and cooking in the first instance, not Plasma screen TVs.

We should definitely use more renewables. But, at the moment, they are simply too expensive for poor countries to use.

Brizben says:

09:52pm | 18/11/11

Jordon ???? you asked many questions. Here’s a direct question for you - Have you posted on this blog under another username?

larry says:

10:07am | 18/11/11

Hi Fiddler, don’t know where ‘here’ is for you, but I live in australia, and renewables are powering all around us. My (small) city powers the equivalent of 1000 homes from biomass at the main tip. Down the road, communities of up to 2000 people are purely solar powered, and a few more hours away they’re building wind, after hearing of the success of community controlled wind energy companies in other cities. Sure, no one has invested in the scale it’d take to power some of our heaviest industrial consumers (like the bauxite ops) but some smaller remote mining jobs are employing renewable energy options.
Renewables are powering us here and now.
Sorry, after so many years, the logic of MAD still fails me. I insist that total disarmament is the best way to reduce the risk for weapons to be used.

Fiddler says:

10:33am | 18/11/11

I also live in Australia and unlike the ad you have just put up (I’m trying to picture it without Cate Blanchett talking in a condescending tone) it’s pretty much all coal power here. All those figure you have provided I can almost be certain are “under ideal conditions” and you will be receiving over 90% of your power (and rely upon for baseload) from coal.
The renewable energy options the mines are using I have no doubt are for show only.
As for not understanding MAD, it’s quite easy, even children understand it. No it isn’t perfect but unless you can convince every country in the world to get rid of their nuclear weapons (here’s a hint, you won’t) it is actually safer than countries having a small amount. Larry insisting on total disarmament won’t make it happen, unless you happen to be Clark Kent and this is Superman IV (the worst one made)

Markus says:

10:34am | 18/11/11

So you’ve got enough to power the ‘equivalent’ of 3000 homes. Great, but how much will it cost to develop the capability to power the remaining 10 million? And to power industrial requirements?
In theory it can be done, but it is completely unaffordable.

“I insist that total disarmament is the best way to reduce the risk for weapons to be used.”
Except that for the day after total disarmament, at least one country will be armed again. Then another.

Perhaps the argument is that MAD is the most, and only, realistic way to reduce the risk of the weapons being used.
It is a far sight better than hoping for the day every country lays down their arms and sings kumbaya.

Phil says:

10:52am | 18/11/11

@ Larry

One and two thousand here and there is a great start but its hardly a drop in the ocean when you are talking about hundreds of millions of people who require power in India.
Quite simply there are few options that are viable at the moment and it will be some time before there are, until then there is no valid reason why we shouldnt be using nuclear power.
Its safe, its reliable, its cleaner than burning fossil fuels.

Jordan says:

11:12am | 18/11/11

Energy from waste is a great technology, but it almost won’t ever provide a significant fraction of supply - there simply aren’t enough rubbish tips.

Other biofuels are no good, they’re diverting agricultural produce desperately needed for food supply, and are highly inefficient as well. Third, fourth and fifth generation stuff that uses discarded biomass and GM algae etc has more potential, but largely its R&D for stuff that’s maybe coming 10 or 20 years down the track, not something we can build now. 

Wind is great, and we need more, but until we get grid-scale storage, it needs to be complemented by peaking plants (gas) and baseload (coal or nuclear). It also needs to get cheaper.

I shouldn’t have to explain the problems with Water, i.e, Hydroelectricity, to people claiming to be environmentalists. Unless the Greens are going to start campaigning for more dams in Tasmania?

Solar is currently still too expensive, even in places like Australia that are ideally suited to it, and it has pretty much all of Wind’s drawbacks to boot.

neo says:

11:15am | 18/11/11

Yeah, the nuclear deterrent has, so far, prevented another world war. The truth is, both Russia and USA have enough nukes to destroy this whole world a few times over, and no one has a missile defense system good enough to stop it. Which keeps countries friendly, more or less.

Adam says:

02:56pm | 18/11/11

Jane 2 - geiger counters do nothing to measure internal radiation exposure - the very thing that puts health at risk.

In any case, any radiation exposure due to the nuclear industry is in ADDITION to natural background levels and its effects are CUMULATIVE over time. As such, there can be no “safe” dose.

Willie Mac says:

10:40am | 18/11/11

Germany is rich. India is not. Renewable energy costs a lot of money. It’s really that simple.

MarkS says:

10:41am | 18/11/11

Don’t see where he recomended buying power from French reactors.

Germany went the NIMBY option, no nuclear reactors in Germany, will buy their power from the French. Open your eyes.

Jordan says:

11:04am | 18/11/11

Not only will Germany be importing energy from France, which has an 80% nuclear supply, it will also be building far more new fossil fuel plants now than it had been planning to pre-Fukushima. Not exactly wave of the future stuff.

Jane2 says:

11:36am | 18/11/11

Germany’s population is 81 mill, India’s is 1.2 bill. India is 14 times bigger population wise than Germany. Even assuming that each Indian only needs 1/10th the power of Germany you would still need to double Germanies energy usage to cater for India’s need.

However, the Inidan government providing free solar cells would help the country a lot….unfotunately that is too expensive and the rest of the world is not willing to donate them.

If you are serious about your stance, buy solar panels and donate them to India.

Fiddler says:

10:39am | 18/11/11

I can assure you it will be “up to 15%” when it is hot and windy, and will take 39 years to build, at a cost of 400 billion Euros.

You have just demonstrated why it is crap. This money should be invested straight into thorium research and we will have stuff online by 2020 or 2025.

Clarkie says:

10:56am | 18/11/11

So you green types are now advocating this new form of European imperialism exploiting the poor, benighted nations of North Africa and the Middle East so the complacent, self-indulgent elite of Germany can keep enjoying their Mercedes and Blaupunkts and just so Angela Merkel can pander to the Greens in a deal to save her political hide.  What’s the betting replacing nuclear with local coal-fired power stations will prove much cheaper and easier than this peculiar throw-back to nineteenth-century colonial thinking.

jimmylad1 says:

11:04am | 18/11/11

Your entitled to your own opinion Fiddler, but obviously the leaders of Europe think otherwise! It’s as though you don’t want sustainable solutions to work. We know that Thorium remains a technology that is yet to be proven - its just theoretical at this point. So I assume you think Germany, the most successful economy in Europe, is ‘crap’??

marley says:

11:51am | 18/11/11

@jimmylad1 - the Germans are smart people and have a strong economy.  They have decided to replace their nuclear power plants with plants powered by fossil fuels.  What does that tell you about the readiness of green technology for mass implementation?  The German plans are 40 years in the future; Indian farmers can’t wait that long.

MarkS says:

12:19pm | 18/11/11

Europe is a basket case that is busy burning while their Nero’s fiddle with themselves. So if the leaders of Europe think it is a great idea, then clearly it must be crap.

Andrew says:

11:32am | 18/11/11

Maybe you should state your qualifications, Kassandra, since you seem to be implying that your knowledge is superior.

Mirage says:

12:04pm | 18/11/11

Actually she is very right, they teach you this in high school physics these days.

The issue would not so much be getting the weapons grade material (black market anyone? there are corrupt people selling the stuff for excessively large amounts of money, that would go without saying), but the people you need to create such weapons. If it was really that easy, then terrorists would have be building the most basic of these bombs for the last 20 years.

By the way the Nuclear Physicists who have the ability to engineer such warheads are far and few between, and you can bet that the government agencies of all the superpowers have a close eye on them at all times.

Kassandra says:

12:06pm | 18/11/11

@ Andrew:
My qualifications are just fine thanks, but they are none of your business. Maybe you should state your argument, since you seem to be implying that you have one.

Andrew says:

01:52pm | 18/11/11

“My qualifications are just fine thanks, but they are none of your business.” My request was civil.

Andrew says:

11:35am | 18/11/11

Uh ... iron pigs?

Jason Todd says:

11:48am | 18/11/11

If it is anything like what you made with CAPS: Innapropriate racial slurs?

Adam says:

03:00pm | 18/11/11

Maybe Dave knows a thing or ten about where uranium comes from, and its legacies.

Would you rather believe uranium corporation spin or someone who’s out of a job when they win their campaign? I mean, really… step back and ask: wherein lies the greater integrity?

marley says:

06:58am | 19/11/11

@Adam - we’ve had nuclear power for the better part of a half century.  It’s safe.  Produce scientific evidence to the contrary.

marley says:

01:05pm | 18/11/11

@jimmylad1 - does Australia wish to put its assessment of what Indians want ahead of the Indian government’s assessment of what India wants and needs?  Sounds kind of presumptuous to me.

Brizben says:

02:57pm | 18/11/11

Well if all the humans fault lets get the monkeys to run the next reactor then!

If the contamination lasts for hundreds of years and there is an unforseeable accident every 20 years. After 200 years there will be at least 10 sites around the world leaching pollution into the surrounding areas.

John Smythe says:

03:01pm | 18/11/11

ZOMG…the power of ze googles!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

(if you don’t like wikipedia as a collection of information, feel free to independently research the footnotes used as sources)

Scroll down to the Safety History section. Wouldn’t really need to read much else to realise this tragedy is at fault of human negligence.

But, let;s just make it out to be something it’s not…better for the phear phactor that way!

John Smythe says:

03:05pm | 18/11/11

Brizben…please. You are showing just how much you don’t know.

Let’s just ban all sea travel because some Indonesian fishing boat carrying people smashed up on the rocks shall we…..

John Smythe says:

03:28pm | 18/11/11

The power of google…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

scroll down to the part on Safety History…no real need to read anything else.

Brizben, please. You are truly showing how little you know.

Thomas says:

05:25pm | 25/11/11

France is a good example: they have to buy expensive back-up energy from Germany whenever a French nuclear reactor is down, and that happens at least one month out of every year for maintenance. The nuclear sector has all in all been very expensive for France and would be closed down right now if market forced prevailed - but they don’t; the French nuclear industry is hugely subsidised. Given France’s levels of corruption and laziness, I’d be fairly worried to be one of the neighbours, and it would be even worse to be living in France: not only would you have meltdowns to worry about; you would also know that plenty of tax money was being wasted (yet again) but the French government.

Markus says:

03:11pm | 18/11/11

Like the cockroach, the cricket can survive nuclear fallout.

So we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief. Just as long as we have our masks on.

marley says:

03:22pm | 18/11/11

@Adam - and this is a problem?

palone says:

06:36pm | 18/11/11

You are a fool or you are pretending to be a fool. Both work.
Australia has massive reserves, and by the time that our resources, (coal, gas, uranium etc.), are exhausted the world will have developed alternative sources of power, sufficient to our needs.
I am working on a power supply that no-one has sussed yet. I may be wrong in my enthusiasm, but I shall continue. We must, all of us, try.
Of course, any Party actively supporting the mining industry as the only source of fuel for electricity is conning the public in the Party’s enthusiasm to placate Big Business.
You know it makes sense.