• Zagorath@aussie.zone
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    1 year ago

    because it has long lead times and that forestalls action

    I won’t profess to know for sure what their reasoning is. I suspect it’s a bit of that, and also a bit of hope/expectation that the fossil fuel industry will be well-situated to pivot into nuclear in a way that they can’t as easily do with renewables. The more centralised nature and heavy reliance on large-scale resource extraction is very similar. But they actual explanation isn’t what’s important.

    What’s important is the simple fact that the biggest climate change deniers are now trying to promote nuclear. If you want to refute the claim, you need to explain that better than I can.

    • scarabic@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I’m not very familiar with Australian politics or leaders so I can only go with what I see in those articles. First, I don’t see any climate change denial. I see a debate about renewables and nuclear

      Why are conservatives against renewables:

      They can’t meet our total energy needs.

      Wind and solar products are predominantly made in China and conservatives don’t want to feed the Chinese economy or increase dependence (one thing I do know about AU is that Chinese influence is quite heavy and a cause of great concern there).

      Why are conservatives pro-nuclear:

      It provides baseload capacity that supports wind/solar where they are weak.

      It has military applications.

      It creates large infrastructure spending within AU and supports mining industry.

      They believe it will rankle liberals.

      Maybe you have a point that conservatives who are dead-set against renewables will throw nuclear into the conversation as a distraction which they know will not go anywhere. But as an outside observer who doesn’t have built up associations with these characters, I honestly just see rational inclusion of nuclear in the energy mix. This all seems healthy to me.