Our VP, Dr Margie Beavis OAM, has testified today to the House Select Committee on Nuclear Energy inquiry into the consideration of nuclear power generation in Australia.
Our recommendations to the inquiry include:
• Nuclear Energy should be rejected as an energy option for Australia. It is expensive, slow, presents significant known health and accident risks and has intractable highly toxic waste – an unsolved problem globally.
• Australia must vigorously pursue energy policies that recognise the urgency of climate action. Many experts advise nuclear power will take at minimum two decades to provide electricity. It will prolong the use of fossil fuels, worsening climate change and increasing the risk of conflicts within and between nations. New coal and gas facilities are also highly problematic.
• Existing legal prohibitions against nuclear power for Australia should remain. Nuclear power has a long list of mostly insurmountable problems, as noted, but perhaps the most significant of them being its inextricable links to nuclear weapons.
• False and exaggerated claims made linking nuclear power and medical imaging and treatments must cease.
Download the full submission to the inquiry, and find past submissions on the nuclear chain in our Library.