THE NUCLEAR FILES #7: The Australian government’s key nuclear technology advisory agency ANSTO – which runs the nation’s only reactor, for research and medical isotopes rather than power generation – has been caught up in a political conflict. It’s the ongoing principal sponsor for the pro-nuclear energy lobby’s big annual conference, which last year hosted inflammatory Opposition attacks on the government.
The federal government’s Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation is the regular top sponsor of a major annual conference that strenuously advocates for lifting the ban on nuclear power in Australia and developing it for electricity generation.
This is the exact opposite of government policy, on a highly contentious political battlefront, with the renewables versus nukes contest for the energy transition looming as a key issue for the next national elections due by May 2025.
Last year’s conference gave the coalition Opposition’s nuclear frontman, Ted O’Brien MP, a platform to attack the government, and he didn’t miss, accusing it of “hating nuclear” and of thereby positioning Australia to be “poorer, weaker and more dependent”.
Yet the government’s ANSTO, the nuclear equivalent to the CSIRO, is listed as the Australian Nuclear Association (ANA) annual conference’s principal sponsor for 2024, as it was in 2023, and since 2007.
An ANSTO spokesperson told The Fifth Estate: “We strongly refute any suggestion that ANSTO’s participation and sponsorship of this event represents advocacy for nuclear energy. As a government science organisation, we take an impartial position on nuclear energy.” (A full list of questions sent to ANSTO, and its response appear at the end of this article.)
Other high-level sponsors included top Canadian-based design, engineering and project management firm, AtkinsRéalis, which has close ties to the nuclear industry and is building a presence in Australia; and an Australian lobbying group for small modular reactors (SMRs), SMR Nuclear Technology (SMR-NT) which is closely tied to Trevor St Baker a Queensland energy magnate with a long history of investing in coal and gas power stations, and who is a stalwart of Australia’s unofficial nuclear club
The CSIRO’s most recent GenCost report, produced with the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), identifies SMRs as one of the most expensive possible energy options for Australia, which it says would cost four to six times as much as renewable wind and solar backed by storage technologies such as batteries and pumped hydro.
So ANSTO, which has no mandate to advocate for nuclear power, is bracketed with strong proponents of SMR nuclear power technologies that remain illegal in Australia, are unproven in the Western world, appear to be prohibitively expensive, and are totally in conflict with current government policy for a renewables-led energy transition.
AtkinsRéalis also a partner of the international lobby group Net Zero Nuclear, and Trevor St Baker is a patron of the Coalition for Conservation (C4C), which is allied with Net Zero Nuclear and is a key lobby group shaping the coalition’s pro-nuclear political campaign, which on Wednesday saw Opposition announce an election policy for developing seven government-owned power reactors, including two SMRs.
C4C has been funding pro-nuclear events and overseas trips by Liberal-National coalition politicians, including Ted O’Brien MP, as detailed by The Fifth Estate.
Twitter link https://twitter.com/Matt_KeanMP/status/1775817087606575276/photo/1
Earlier this year, former New South Wales Energy Minister in the previous Liberal-National government Matt Kean resigned from C4C because of its advocacy of nuclear energy.
He said the C4C’s rhetoric on nuclear energy had shifted since the former president of the Nationals, Larry Anthony, whose lobbying firm SAS has represented fossil fuel companies, joined the organisation as chair, and the energy millionaire Trevor St Baker came on as a member of its advisory board.
His resignation letter said, in part: “It has become clear in recent times that the Coalition for conservation has increasingly focussed on nuclear power in the electricity system.
“In particular I was concerned to read an article in The Canberra Times advocating nuclear power stations as an alternative to building new large scale transmission lines.
“While I recognise that one cannot rule out nuclear playing a constructive role in the Australian electricity system in the distant future, the reality is that there is no feasible pathway to play any material role in helping Australia replace our coal fired power stations in line with the climate science.”
He said the organisation had gone from a focus on a diverse range of clean energy solutions to an organisation singularly focused on nuclear energy.
ANSTO’s implicit support for nuclear lobby and its ANA sponsorship means that the renewables friendly Albanese government, and ultimately the taxpayer funds it is responsible for, are helping the pro-nuclear coalition Opposition to have a free PR kick.
At the ANA’s most recent event, on 6 October 2023, the Opposition’s shadow minister for climate change and energy, Ted O’Brien, was on the attack as a key speaker:
The Australian government today has already chosen a pathway. That pathway will lead to an Australia that is poorer, weaker, and more dependent…And it’s a pathway that excludes nuclear. This government hates coal, hates gas, hates nuclear. Is there an alternative? I believe there is an alternative for Australia to successfully decarbonise
The ANA’s president, Dr Mark Ho, is a senior ANSTO engineer, nuclear entrepreneur and well-established member of the nuclear club. Ho helped to promote the recent Navigating Nuclear international workshop at UNSW in Sydney on 13 May 2024, an orchestrated pro-nuclear arguably propaganda event where he was one of the speakers and was credited as being part of the organising committee.
Prior to that event, Ho had claimed on his LinkedIn that the workshop and its international guests that included top US nuclear scientists from Massachusetts Institute of Technology would provide “the facts without the politics”. But as it turned out, Ted O’Brien attended and spoke at the start of the poorly attended event, which mainly attracted only nuclear club insiders.
In his speech to Navigating Nuclear, Ho said: “One side of politics is backing this really heavily. I’m just waiting for the other side to come along to the party.”
Ho’s LinkedIn account has since been taken down or otherwise removed.
At best, Ho faces a juggling act between his ANA presidency and ANSTO job, although the ties that bind between the nuclear club, the ANA and ANSTO are deep, as The Fifth Estate’s series The Nuclear Files continues to reveal.
Former senior ANSTO figures are among the key faces of the nuclear club, including long time ANSTO chief executive Adrian (Adi) Paterson and reactor manager Tony Irwin, now SMR-NT’s technology director, both of whom were cited as nuclear authorities by Opposition Leader Peter Dutton MP in his July 2023 nuclear policy headland speech.
Ho, however, still has his day job with ANSTO. In a 2019 speech, Ho said that ANSTO does not advocate for nuclear power, and he explained that it is ANSTO’s role to advise the Australian government on all matters related to nuclear, including maintaining relationships with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and undertaking research into the nuclear fuel cycle.
Five years on, Ho and ANSTO seem to be at least teetering on the rhetorical edge of going full pro-nuclear power.
By attaching its prestigious brand name to the ANA ANSTO is an issue for its political master, the Minister for Industry and Science Ed Husic MP, its board of directors, and its senior executive team.
As a guide, on its website, ANSTO acknowledges that its government appointed board “… must consider the current policies of the Commonwealth Government in relation to ANSTO’s functions, and to government directives such as the minister’s statement of expectations, that is issued from time to time.”
It’s not at all clear in what way being the top sponsor for an ANA event that overtly campaigns to lift the 26year old ban and bring nuclear power to Australia considers the current policies of the government, which supports retaining the ban and rejects nuclear power.
Curiously, when I first looked at the ANA 2023 conference website early in May 2024 there was a link to O’Brien’s speech, but no video link, which other prominent speakers had.
Then when I went back at the end of May the link to O’Brien’s speech was gone too, although no problem because he hosts a transcript on his own website for this memorable moment. Is there some new sensitivity here?
The next annual conference of the Australian Nuclear Association (ANA) is coming up this spring, on 11 October 2024, with the preliminary program having a strong emphasis on nuclear power, including SMRs, and AUKUS nuclear submarines (sometimes referred to as “SMRs on a boat”).
The military AUKUS pact, unlike civilian nuclear power, is an official policy of the Albanese government, even though it began its life in 2021 as a dramatic new defence policy of the then Morrison coalition government.
ANA’s own policy statement, of which its principal event sponsor ANSTO must be aware, especially given that ANSTO’s Ho is the ANA’s president, is explicit about its support for nuclear power, including:
- ANA strongly supports the use of nuclear power plants as reliable, affordable and low carbon generators of electricity and as a low carbon source of heat for industry. Adding nuclear energy to Australia’s energy future would help meet our international obligations on carbon emissions, improve energy security and contribute to our economic future.
- Australia can benefit from current and emerging advanced reactor designs as well as from the considerable international experience accumulated in regulating and operating nuclear power plants, taking into account safety, environmental, technical, economic and social factors.
- The ANA supports the removal of federal and state legislative nuclear prohibitions so that nuclear energy can be considered on its merits.
ANSTO clearly does have a role to advise the government on “all matters related to nuclear”.
However, in this regard, at least officially, ANSTO itself is bearish about any near-term potential for SMRs, the emerging nuclear technology most championed by the nuclear club and the coalition Opposition over the past two years, saying in an April 2024 update:
As global interest in SMRs grows, in part because of their potential advantages, it is fair to say they are still in their infancy and a relatively untested concept …
Any estimate about cost or time to construct, whether optimistic or pessimistic, should be considered with a high degree of uncertainty.
A recent report by the expert Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) found that:
Small modular reactors still look to be too expensive, too slow to build, and too risky to play a significant role in transitioning from fossil fuels in the coming 10-15 years.
Which all makes the ongoing ANA conference sponsorship even harder to explain, as via this commercial arrangement ANSTO is explicitly exposed to promoting SMRs, and nuclear power more generally, in total conflict with official government policy.
Last year’s event included international guest speakers from some of America’s top nuclear companies and advocacy groups, at least one of whom took the opportunity to attack the government while in Australia: meet Dr Rita Baranwal, a senior figure with the iconic nuclear services company, Westinghouse Electric, who previously was a top US government nuclear official appointed by then President Donald Trump.
All of this has to make you wonder what questions ANSTO bosses will have to field the next time they face a Senate Estimates Committee? Or a meeting with Minister Husic for that matter, who appears far too polite to ask: WTF?
Questions to ANSTO. the Department of Industry and Science and Minister Ed Husic MP
The Minister’s media team did not respond to our questions below, and the department referred The Fifth Estate to the Minister’s office. The response from an ANTSO (Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation) spokesperson is included below, following the questions submitted and copied to the department and the Minister’s office.
Questions:
- As a principal sponsor of the ANA annual conference, is the ANSTO executive leadership team and board aware that the ANA is a strong proponent for nuclear power in Australia and that this conference is a platform for other pro-nuclear proponents, including the federal Opposition? (Opposition nuclear frontman Ted O’Brien MP was a keynote speaker in 2023 and used the ANA conference platform, sponsored by ANSTO, to attack the current federal government.)
- Who has approved this sponsorship, which is currently being advertised as continuing in 2024?
- And is ANSTO aware that one of its nameplate co-sponsors, SMS Nuclear Technology, is actively lobbying for nuclear power in Australia and has close connections to the coalition Opposition? (The other, Atkins Realis, is closely involved with the nuclear industry too.)
- How is this sponsorship in compliance with the requirement for ANSTO to reflect the policies of the government of the day? (Which are opposed to nuclear power and in support of maintaining the ban on nuclear power in Australia.)
- Does the current federal government including Science and Industry Minister Ed Husic MP approve of this sponsorship arrangement?
- How does ANSTO manage any conflicts that may exist between the dual roles of its senior employee, Dr Mark Ho, as both a senior scientist with ANSTO and the President of the ANA?
- Is ANSTO aware that Dr Ho was an organizer of, and speaker at, the Navigating Nuclear propaganda event held at UNSW on 13 May 2024, at which O’Brien also was a speaker, in spite of Dr Ho himself having earlier promoted the event as being free of politics?
- Is ANSTO supportive of Dr Ho in participating in such events, at which he talked about ANSTO, but also made a political comment in regard to nuclear power for Australia to the effect that: ‘One side of politics is backing this really heavily. I’m just waiting for the other side to come along to the party”?
- Is ANSTO aware that Dr Ho’s LinkedIn account appears to have been taken down in recent days or weeks, and has it had any involvement in this happening?
- How does ANSTO reconcile all of this with obligations to impartially and expertly advise and align with the government of the day?
- Has the ANSTO board considered its position on nuclear power and the ban in recent times, say the last 12 months, and what, if any, position has it adopted?
ANSTO responded:
- ANSTO is Australia’s largest nuclear organisation, using nuclear science and techniques to deliver research, produce nuclear medicines, and work with industry and academia partners.
- As custodian of some of the country’s most significant scientific research infrastructure, ANSTO supports access to nuclear technologies, including the OPAL research reactor, the Australian Synchrotron, and accelerators and neutron beam instruments.
- ANSTO is a principal sponsor of the Australian Nuclear Association’s (ANA) 2024 Conference on Nuclear Science, Technology, and Engineering in Australia.
- This sponsorship is not new. ANSTO has previously supported the ANA with their conferences since 2007.
- This support has ranged from the provision of financial funding to delivering presentations about ANSTO’s operations and its contribution in the areas of health, industry, environment and research generally.
- We strongly refute any suggestion that ANSTO’s participation and sponsorship of this event represent advocacy for nuclear energy. As a government science organisation, we take an impartial position on nuclear energy.
- We continue to provide our expertise in science across climate, materials, and the environment to support Australia’s commitment to net zero.
- The primary driver of ANSTO’s support and sponsorship is to hear and learn from other experts in the nuclear field and share information on advances in nuclear science and technology.
- We view these conferences as an invaluable platform to engage with Australian and international nuclear specialists to further support our mandated role as an expert technical adviser to the Australian Government on matters of nuclear science and technology.