7 comments on The Bullroarer - Tuesday 11 December 2007
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While I realise that NZ doesn't exactly have the answer to all the issues, there certainly does seem to be the perception that cutting carbon is actually possible- the moratorium on new fossil plants was a pretty strong step in that direction.
Without nukes, I don't think Aussie has a hope in hell, there are just too many entrenched interests in coal and business as usual. A solar breakthrough would be great, but unlikely. 30 years of intensive research and they are still expensive and toxic to manufacture.
Speaking of nukes, is there any support in urban australia for them? Was that the downfall of Howard (or was it the screw-the-workers bill?)
Support for nuclear power plants in Australia is non-existant.
Even mining uranium is dodgy territory with the voters.
Have you checked out what the solar industry has been up to over the past 30 years ?
CSP plants up to gigawatt size are being planned - see what Vinod Khosla is doing with Ausra for example...
Ditto for thin film - once the presses at Nanosolar and the like start rolling you'll see the beginning of a revolution in the building industry.
Unfortunately none of these have any political muscle locally - we'll be a laggard ditching coal...
I agree the public doesn't want nukes but they also want plasma TVs and aircon. Within a decade they will probably also want electric charging for cars. If the various forms of solar don't step up within that decade then maybe the public will decide nukes aren't so bad after all. Squeaky clean energy has got just a few years to prove itself.