PM using nukes to spike the Green/Left

Only very foolish people doubt John Howard's political instincts

John Howard has recast the political debate on nuclear power, with Ziggy Switkowski's report saying that if you take global warming seriously then nuclear must be assessed as part of the solution. Either Howard or Kim Beazley has made a blunder as they seize opposing positions in the energy debate. Beazley says Howard "is developing some of the characteristics of a fanatic" on nuclear power. He says there is a clear-cut distinction between Labor and Liberal, and that Howard must answer a simple question: Where will his 25 nuclear reactors be located?

The more Beazley fumes, the more moderate Howard sounds. "I think public opinion is shifting," Howard says. "I want to take the public with me. I'm not trying to force it down the throat of the public. We're talking about a debate that is going to go on for some time. We can't expect instant policy gratification." You bet. Howard has no intention of committing Australia to nuclear power before the next election. His real purpose is to redefine the politics of energy in Australia and to destroy the moral and practical superiority Labor has enjoyed for so long courtesy of the global warming debate.

While the issue was about belief or disbelief in global warming, Howard was the loser. Climate, science and popular sentiment united against him. Howard's answer is to declare himself a believer and begin a new debate about solutions. This is a debate about markets, costs and economics, where the key ideological factor is no longer Howard's scepticism about global warming but Labor's rejection of nuclear power.

As a politician, Howard specialises in eroding Labor's symbolic ideas. This term he has assaulted Labor's industrial orthodoxy with his Work Choices package and now assaults its anti-nuclear orthodoxy. Such positions are assumed to be highly unpopular. So why does Howard embrace them? Because he thinks the election winner will be the leader propounding positive ideas for the nation's future. "I think the public will listen to the debate," he says of the nuclear issue. "I don't think they have the prejudice about nuclear power that Mr Beazley and Senator Brown have. I mean, Senator Brown and Mr Beazley have a prejudice about nuclear power. I'm open-minded about nuclear power." This is Howard tying Labor into green ideology as opposed to his rationalism.

Switkowski's report is designed to make nuclear power respectable. But it cannot make the nuclear option financially viable. The report's key is the nexus between global warming and nuclear power. Switkowski spelt it out at the National Press Club: you only think nuclear if you believe in climate change. In Australia, nuclear power is hopelessly uncompetitive, about 20 per cent to 50 per cent costlier than coal and gas-based electricity on which Australia relies. So there is no investment appetite for nuclear power, as Australia enjoys the fourth cheapest electricity among the countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

While Switkowski finds that nuclear is a "practical option" for Australia, the assumptions underpinning this conclusion reveal the remoteness of the nuclear pathway. Consider the list. The report asserts at the start that Australia's best option is clean coal. Frankly, it is a no-brainer. This technology is a joint Howard-Beazley aspiration of deep import for Australia and the world economy. Beyond this, nuclear would only be viable if fossil fuels begin to pay for their emissions. A price of $15-$40 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent would be necessary to make nuclear electricity competitive.

But complications abound. The period for planning, building and commissioning Australia's first nuclear power plant would be 10 to 20 years. Australia lacks the expertise and skills in nuclear research. Nuclear engineering and nuclear physics are degraded and a national mobilisation would be required to generate such expertise. Australia has no regulatory framework for the industry and it would need to establish a single national regulator to cover all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle, drawing heavily on overseas expertise. The report says that if Australia is serious about nuclear power, it is essential that this regulatory framework be "established at an early stage".

Australia's existing laws ban the establishment of nuclear fuel cycle facilities, from power plants to enrichment plants. This inhibition, significantly, is on Howard's mind. "If we are to have a nuclear power industry in this country, we need to change the law, because the law doesn't permit it at the present time," he says. Such laws would need passage through the federal parliament. Might Howard contemplate this before the election as part of a showdown with Labor and the Greens over putting the nuclear option on a commercial evaluation basis? Australia is locked into an anti-nuclear power administrative and legislative system. Freeing up this system may become part of any genuine debate. Howard's message is that he wants the nuclear option decided on commercial factors. Yet Switkowski's report contains even more warnings on this score.

Overseas experience suggests "the first plants may need additional measures to kick-start the industry". Sure. The report says the US Government is providing a subsidy for the first six nuclear plants based on next-generation technology. Given this history, can you imagine commercial operators launching a nuclear industry in Australia without subsidies? And imagine further just how popular such subsidies would prove!

The test for Howard is whether he moves towards a carbon-pricing policy. If he does, he risks prejudicing Australia's comparative advantage in cheap electricity based on fossil fuels. Yet if he doesn't, he undermines the necessary condition Switkowski outlines that would make nuclear competitive, thereby compromising his nuclear initiative. Howard's view is that no single technology can meet Australia's future energy demands. He wants nuclear assessed as part of the mix and the report's philosophy is that all options should be examined on a market basis and all technologies should "compete on an equal footing". This may eventually rule out nuclear power for Australia. But Beazley is not interested in such evaluations.

Labor has an ideological objection to nuclear power and a political conviction that a scare campaign will be effective against Howard. It would be an advertising agency's delight: depicting Australia's cities as the next Chernobyl. The immediate response of Labor's premiers betrayed their faith in such a scare at state and local level. These premiers, most of whom have singularly failed to manage infrastructure and water policy properly, now purport to veto a comprehensive debate on Australia's energy future. They don't deserve to be taken seriously and few people will take them seriously. Having being routed before the High Court in their totally counterproductive challenge to Howard's industrial laws, the premiers have neither the power nor the authority to take this decision about the Australian nation.

The real difference is that Howard wants to open the door to a nuclear debate and Beazley wants to keep it shut. It is a division not between nuclear policies but between political positions. It repeats the patterm since 1996 of Howard as the agent of initiative and Labor as the agent of resistance.

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RECORD COLD, FEWER HURRICANES: MUST BE GLOBAL WARMING

Mocking comment from Harvard by Lubos Motl

Eastern Australia hasn't seen this November cold for 100+ years: it was the coldest November day in a century. Recall that "November" in Australian can be translated as "May" in the U.S. Nevertheless, they have had mushy snow in Canberra, a blast of Antarctic magic. A goosepimply, teeth-chattering Sydney has another reason to shake its collective head at the weather gods today.

Nevertheless, intelligent journalists immediately explain us that cooler weather and fewer hurricanes do not lessen global warming trends because weather is not climate, just like religion is not faith. The climate and the climate change are not only independent of the weather but they are independent of all other things that can be measured, too.

More precisely, weather is only climate when it's getting warmer and when the hurricane frequency increases. When the weather is getting cooler and the hurricane rate is decreasing, weather is no longer climate. It follows that the climate is always getting warmer - QED Amen. That's why Kofi Annan can tell us that we, the skeptics, are out of step, out of time, and out of arguments. He is out of tune, out of touch, and out of mind, trying to build the 1984-style global government.






CURE FOR CHEATING

When two students walked into their lecturer's study to mount a challenge about the mark one of them had received in a multiple choice exam, the academic smiled. The first student had scored 90 per cent; the second 10 per cent. All three people knew the real reason for the gripe was that the second student had copied the first. So why the discrepancies in the marks? Unruffled, the academic compared the disgruntled student's answers to the master copy, demonstrating that the fail mark was justified.

They had just been foiled by a well-worn sting within the biochemistry department at the University of Sydney. Frustrated by suspicions that students were cheating, the department creates four variations to each multiple choice exam it prepares. If students copy the letters circled by their neighbours, they will arrive at different results. The more they copy, the worse they will do.

"What our solution enables us to do is say natural justice has occurred," said Associate Professor Gareth Denyer, a senior lecturer. "This student has ended up with an incredibly low mark as a result of their cheating . There's a wonderfully sweet feeling . It's evil of me, I know. But they're trying to get one over you and you end up getting one over them."

The department has been improving the system over seven years, but despite its success being published within the university and externally, other academics have resisted adopting it. Some regard it as a form of entrapment. Others have their own systems. But Professor Denyer believes that many do not want to know if their students are cheating. "There's a very strong head-in-the-sand culture," he said.

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Bundaberg nurse recognised with whistleblower award

The woman who alerted authorities to the Bundaberg Hospital crisis will be recognised at the annual Whistleblowers Australia conference this weekend. Bundaberg Base Hospital nurse Toni Hoffman will receive the Whistleblower of the Year award for uncovering the alleged criminal malpractice of overseas-trained surgeon Jayant Patel. Patel is allegedly linked with 17 patient deaths, and earlier this week a Brisbane Magistrate approved an arrest warrant for the 56-year-old doctor who fled to the US.

Ms Hoffman says she is thrilled to receive the award. "It's a great honour and I hope to be able to improve whistleblower protection through raising awareness," she said.

The national director for Whistleblowers Australia, Greg McMahon, says it was Ms Hoffman's concern for the community that earned her the award. "Toni Hoffman took the view that more was required of her because of her responsibility so that everybody needed to be protected," he said. Ms Hoffman will share the title with heart specialist Dr Con Aroney, who is being honoured for his role in revealing cutbacks at Brisbane's Prince Charles Hospital in 2004.

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