It’s been a difficult few decades for nuclear power.
Nuclear’s share as part of the global energy mix has been falling, and incidents like the Fukushima disaster in 2011 highlighted for many the risks of the technology.
Some countries started mothballing or shutting down plants, and many new projects were plagued by cost blowouts and delays.
But in the past few years there has been a remarkable turnaround.
Countries are pledging to help triple the production of nuclear power globally, and industry advocates are a growing presence at global climate summits.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, a United Nations body that advocates for peaceful use of nuclear technology, is forecasting substantial growth in the sector over coming decades.
And Australia is about to head into a federal election with the adoption of nuclear power at the centre of the political contest.
The Coalition argues Australia risks being left behind if it doesn’t get on board.
But others point out that while there is plenty of global interest in nuclear — and the as-yet unrealised promise of new technology such as small modular reactors — there is a lot more real money flowing into renewables, which are already transforming global energy grids.
Nuclear’s big global arrival
The COP29 climate summit held in Baku, Azerbaijan late last year was ostensibly dedicated to climate financing — that is, finding the money needed to fund a massive global effort to tackle climate change.
But it made headlines for a few different reasons.
One was that for the second year running, the global climate summit was being held in a country that derives most of its wealth from oil and gas. (Last year’s summit was held in the UAE).
Another was the growing presence of nuclear power.
Six more countries signed a pledge to triple nuclear’s global production by 2050, taking the total number of countries on board to 31.
They range from relatively small countries such as Moldova, through to major Australian allies like Canada, Japan, the UK and US.
All four of those larger countries have long-established nuclear industries.
Nuclear attracted plenty of attention, including headlines labelling it a “rising star” at the climate summit.
And there was an Australian presence in Baku ready to cheer it on.
Nationals MP David Gillespie, the retiring member for the NSW North Coast seat of Lyne, travelled to the summit (with some support from Coalition-aligned environment group Coalition for Conservation).
David Gillespie has been one of nuclear power’s longest and loudest supporters, chairing the “parliamentary friends of nuclear industries”.
Retiring Nationals MP David Gillespie is one of the Coalition’s most strident nuclear devotees. (AAP: Mick Tsikas)
He acknowledges that a “big slice” of the climate summit was devoted to renewable energy, and a lot of money and ambition is flowing into solar and wind.
But he said the shift in thinking on nuclear power at a global scale was clear to see.
“The world — and climate summits — for the first 25 years ignored nuclear,” he said.
“People have worked out, they realise for us to reduce our world’s requirement for fossil fuels, for industry, for running cities, for running sovereign energy systems that are not weather dependent — the way to go is nuclear.”
And he said the message he took from the climate summit was go nuclear, and go big.
“You build a fleet (of power plants), you don’t tip your toe around the edges,” he said.
“You do what France, and what Canada, and what America did in the 80s, you build a lot of them.
“And then you’ve got a grid that’s resilient and clean.”
Chatting on the sidelines
But other Australians at the November conference say it is important not to overstate nuclear’s presence, and its place in the global net-zero effort.
Tennant Reed is the Director of Climate Change and Energy at the Ai Group, and is a veteran of COP climate summits.
He said the arrival of nuclear energy on the climate scene had certainly been noticeable.
“When I was at the 2018 climate summit in Poland, there was something of a fuss and surprise when a person in a giant inflatable polar bear costume burst into the cafeteria, accompanied by pro-nuclear youth and an opera singer singing pro-nuclear songs,” he said.
“That was very unusual — you’d probably say that’s still unusual — but there’s a lot more visibility for the nuclear industry, and nuclear advocates, in the trade show element of these conferences these days.”
He made the point that growth in nuclear power wasn’t a feature of the main negotiations at Baku, but nor was scaling up any other particular energy source.
Mr Reed said nuclear advocates were hosting events on the sidelines — and they were sensitive to one criticism in particular.
Tennant Reed says the arrival of nuclear on the global stage in recent years has been noticeable, but that advocates remain conscious of scepticism about cost. (ABC News: Sean Warran)
“They’re all conscious — they have to show that they can deliver new projects ‘on time and on budget’,” he said.
“I must have heard that phrase 50 times from nuclear people.
“I think that they’re conscious that this is an ambition that the last wave of nuclear development in Western countries certainly did not meet. But they are very focused on making sure that this time is different.”
The International Atomic Energy Agency is forecasting a big few decades for nuclear power, expecting global production to more than double by 2050.
But Mr Reed said much of the growth in nuclear power was coming from countries with established industries, and while others were expressing interest in setting up an industry, few had recently broken ground.
He said there was a much more obvious momentum in the roll-out of renewables.
“Wind and solar deployment, and especially solar at the moment, is taking off like a rocket,” he said.
“It took the world a very long time to deploy its first total terawatt of solar energy production. We are now doubling every couple of years.
“And so there’s a vast amount of on-the-ground deployment of wind and solar that is happening.”
Conservationists cast doubt
Some conservation groups have sought to push back on the rising prominence of nuclear power, seeing it as a threatening distraction in efforts to combat climate change.
The Australian Conservation Foundation’s Dave Sweeney was also at the COP29 conference in Baku, and cast some doubt on nuclear’s future, at least compared to renewables.
“It’s one thing to have agreements and aspirations, it’s another to have projects and power,” he said.
Dave Sweeney of the Australian Conservation Foundation says the reality of nuclear does not match the expectations put out by its supporters. (Supplied)
“The industry is having some very good rhetoric, but it’s having a very poor reality. We’ve seen 30 countries say that they will triple nuclear (power) by 2050; we’ve seen 125 say they will triple renewables by 2045.”
And he argues part of the nuclear industry’s ambition is attracting public funding, in an effort to “de-risk” its projects.
“At meeting after meeting, they’ve spoken about the need for market reforms to de-risk nuclear projects,” he said.
“I think that is very bold code for ‘no-one wants to fund us, so we’re looking for the public purse’.”
