Why we should say NO to
nuclear power

7. Because there are safety concerns

When the former Howard government was criticised for doing too little about climate change, it floated the idea of nuclear power. The then Labor opposition predictably asked the government to identify sites where power stations might be built.

The criteria are pretty clear. Power stations need to be:

• near the coast because of their heavy demand for water

• in places to which nuclear fuel can safely be brought

• near the infrastructure for major construction works

• near major cities.

The Australia Institute, a Canberra-based think tank, did the sums and released a list of possible sites for nuclear power stations, setting off a tsunami of panic among backbench Members of Parliament representing those areas.

Even in the 1960s and 1970s, when there was widespread acceptance of the possible use of nuclear power, there was never much enthusiasm for the idea of living near a reactor. At the time, the word “nuclear” inevitably evoked memories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Clearly, the word still evokes concern: the physics technique of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) has become widely used for medical imaging. However, the industry has re-badged the approach as MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), quietly dropping the n-word.

In the 1970s, public caution about the risks of living near a nuclear reactor was based largely on fear of the unknown. However, after the well-publicised accidents at the Three Mile Island nuclear power station in the United States in 1979 and at Chernobyl in 1986, the public caution was based on fear of things that were very well known.

The public does not appear to have been impressed by the nuclear lobby’s arguments that Chernobyl was the result of a Russian design that would not have been approved in Western nations and that at least Three Mile Island didn’t result in any deaths.

It is hardly persuasive to argue that nuclear power stations have quite a good safety record and the risk of an accident is low when the result of just one accident may be catastrophic. Even if the probability of release of radioactive material is very low, people don’t want to take the risk of a nuclear power station in their neighbourhood.

Newspoll surveys since 2006 have consistently shown about 50 per cent of people opposed to nuclear power, with about 35 per cent in favour. A Newspoll commissioned by the Australia Institute found the percentage opposed increases to around 70 per cent when the nuclear power station would be in the local area.19

Only very brave politicians would stand up and support a nuclear power station in their electorates, especially as our relatively short electoral cycle means they would inevitably face the voters while the proposal was still being considered.

The level of community hostility is often cited as one of the factors forcing long delays in building nuclear power stations. Many people are so violently opposed to the idea that there are inevitably court actions, political campaigns and civil disobedience when a government tries to push ahead against public opposition.

As discussed earlier, the citizens of South Australia have violently opposed storing radioactive waste in their state, even though their government zealously promotes the mining and export of uranium.

A proposal in 1983 by the Australian Government to undertake a feasibility study for a uranium enrichment plant near Caboolture, north of Brisbane, drew 600 angry protesters to a public meeting.

Such examples show how difficult it would be to obtain public support for the various stages needed to have a nuclear power industry:

• uranium enrichment (an expensive process that almost always requires large public subsidies)

• fuel fabrication

• reactor construction and operation

• waste handling and final storage.

They are all activities that most people don’t want in their neighbourhood.

Since releasing his task-force’s report, Dr Switkowski has argued that it will be possible to change the political climate through “public education”, but I am not convinced. Firstly, human beings don’t have a rational quantitative approach to risk, but worry most about risks they can’t control in any way. Flying is statistically very much safer than driving, but people worry much more about flying because they have no control over the risk.

The same argument applies to nuclear power. Even if it is true that living near a nuclear power station involves less risk than driving a car or lighting a cigarette or climbing a mountain or eating a fatty hamburger, those are risks we take voluntarily, rather than risks imposed on us by others.

The second problem is the credibility of those giving the assurances. The nuclear lobby assured us for decades that its approach was cheap, clean and safe when it turned out to be expensive, dirty and dangerous. It will be difficult for those very same people to mount a convincing case that will change public opinion.

Essentially they have to admit that they have been wrong for the last 50 years, but have finally got it right and should now be trusted with our future. Call me a cynic, but I can’t see it succeeding.