Nuclear Power Cannot Solve the Climate Crisis

Welcome, the nuclear power industry will argue that nuclear energy is a solution to the current climate crisis but the evidence is clear: nuclear power is not the answer to climate change!

Over 300 organisations from 40 countries have signed a Civil Society Statement calling for urgent action on climate change not nuclear distractions. Read the statement here.

One of the biggest threats facing our planet is climate change, it warrants urgent action and nuclear power is not the solution.

Rather than fuel carbon emissions and radioactive risk through domestic coal power plants and the export of coal and uranium, Australia should embrace the fastest growing global energy sector ‒ renewables ‒ and become a driver of clean energy thinking and technology. Renewable energy is affordable, low risk, clean, and popular. Nuclear is simply not.

Read the myth busting section.

Our shared energy future is renewable, not radioactive.

We are a group of civil society environment groups who have come together to respond to the latest push for nuclear power in Australia.

We are not aligned to any political groups or ideology but unite over our position against nuclear power which is proving to be an expensive distraction to the very real need to respond to the climate emergency we face.

In January 2019, the Climate Council, comprising Australia’s leading climate scientists and other policy experts, issued a policy statement concluding that nuclear power plants “are not appropriate for Australia – and probably never will be”.

The statement continued:

Nuclear power stations are highly controversial, can’t be built under existing law in any Australian state or territory, are a more expensive source of power than renewable energy, and present significant challenges in terms of the storage and transport of nuclear waste, and use of water”.

Nuclear power is not the answer to climate change

Many Australian civil society groups agree with the Climate Council. Proposals to introduce nuclear power to Australia are misguided. Rather than fuel carbon emissions and radioactive risk through domestic coal power plants and the export of coal and uranium, Australia should embrace the fastest growing global energy sector ‒ renewables ‒ and become a driver of clean energy thinking and technology.

Renewable energy is affordable, low risk, clean, and popular. Nuclear is simply not. Our shared energy future is renewable, not radioactive.

Resources

Nuclear Power cannot solve Climate Crisis
A report by the Climate council

Nuclear power plants are not appropriate for Australia

Our shared energy future is renewable, not radioactive
Environment NGO submission

A detailed Submission to Parliamentary Inquiry into Nuclear energy

Nuclear Power No Solution to Climate Change
Nuclear Weapons and our Climate

International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons – Report

Nuclear Power No Solution to Climate Change
Nuclear Power No Solution to Climate Change

A report by Friends of the Earth

Our shared energy future is renewable, not radioactive
Let the Facts Speak

A report by Scott Ludlum, documenting nuclear accidents from 1991-2012