The Nuclear Files – an introduction to the big questions and an election on the way

This is a series, not just a story. Join me on the journey over the weeks ahead. Together we can try to answer these headline questions: Is the nuclear push in Australia a serious energy security campaign? A stalking horse for coal? Or an ideological joke?

It could be all three. And more!

Read the main story here

Whichever you believe at the start, or even if you simply don’t know or have no hard opinion, I think you’ll be surprised by where we go with this.

My aim is to inform you. I want to guide you to many sources of information you may be unaware of. Ultimately, I hope to better enable you to make up your own mind on this highly contentious topic.

Spoiler alert: I will say, however, that having travelled this road over several weeks, investigating back at least five years, I’m taking the nuclear energy push a lot more seriously than I did before I started. Not in the sense of supporting Australia going nuclear, although I acknowledge that nuclear power is a reality globally, accounting for about 10 per cent of total electricity generation and will remain so for humanity for many decades ahead, if not forever (however long that lasts).

To be clear, upfront, nuclear is not for me and never has been, for reasons I am happy to share through this series.

But I recognise that there are powerful economic, technological, ideological, domestic political and geopolitical forces at work.

2025 election – a fork in the road

These are forces of consequence – with national elections due by May 2025 – a contest between the broadly pro-renewables Anthony Albanese-led Labor government, and the newly pro-nuclear Peter Dutton-led Liberal-National coalition opposition.

Both mainstream parties still retain their varied allegiances to coal and gas. But now they are very clearly differentiated on the energy transition and net zero by 2050.

The coalition’s nuclear frontman, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy Ted O’Brien, is right when he says we face a “fork in the road”: stick with a renewables-led energy transition or pivot to a nuclear led one.

Here’s a taste of what we’ll reveal:

• Dutton’s “mouth” – How key pro-nuclear advocates, with ultra-right influencers, captured it
• Inside a critically timed retreat in Canberra in 2023 conducted by key conservative influencer-group, the Institute for Public Affairs, which lays bare an ongoing keep-coal, go-nuclear strategy
• A deep dive into a conservative mindset that equates renewable energy to an existential threat to Western civilisation and value systems (but is not so worried about the climate crisis, if it’s acknowledged at all)
• How the AUKUS nuclear submarine deal has influenced Australia’s climate change policy and created a Trojan horse for civilian nuclear energy
• The geopolitical forces driving a global nuclear revival bid, promoted by the US, at least in part to counter China’s renewable energy technology dominance
• Just how close Australia came in the past 12 months to a potential North American corporate breakthrough for nuclear power down under

Just who are these people?

We’ll profile who’s who – the people and organisations – and show you what they’ve been doing, who they’re linked to, what they believe (based overwhelmingly on their own words), and what they want.

Get in touch with Murray@thefifthestate.com.au

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