The Greens NSW Energy spokesperson Jeremy Buckingham slammed the National Party and NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro for raising the prospect of a nuclear power plant in NSW saying renewable energy is safer, cheaper, and more effective at combatting climate change.
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“I challenge John Barilaro and Gladys Berejiklian to name which electorate, which suburb and which town in NSW they think a nuclear power plant should be built in,” Bellingen resident and Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham said.
“They also need to come clean with where they are planning to have a nuclear waste dump to manage the highly radioactive waste fuel that will be produced.
“Nuclear power is an enormous risk that is not worth taking. We should learn the lessons from Fukushima and Chernobyl that nuclear power can be catastrophic.
“This is just another nutty, extreme idea from the Nationals, who is stuck in the wrong century pushing coal and nuclear and ignoring the massive renewable energy potential of Australia.
“Launching their nuclear ambitions in Broken Hill shows the Nationals are completely out of touch with the community and the future of energy supply in Australia.
“One of the largest solar farms in the country, the Broken Hill Solar Plant, has just been built and the nearby Silverton Wind Farm will be the largest wind project in NSW once it is constructed.
“The declining cost of renewables means nuclear energy does not make financial sense, as we can see with Japanese giant Toshiba going broke because of its involvement in nuclear power plants.
“Even if the Nationals could force nuclear power through massive community opposition, it is not an answer to our energy needs or climate crisis with plants taking more than a decade to be built.
“The Greens believe the future of energy supply is renewables, not dirty coal and dangerous nuclear power.”
- The Bellingen Shire Courier-Sun has asked Oxley MP Nationals Melinda Pavey for comment and will update story anon. See did say briefly, however, that Mr Barilaro’s announcement was made during a visit to the Broken Hill solar farm and that a range of power sources were need to take Australia into the future: “The price of energy one of the biggest issues facing business and consumers in NSW and something had to be done to ease cost pressures. This means every type of energy source should be on the table, like solar power and nuclear energy”.