Coal co. laughs off nukes: chooses renewables instead
The head of Australia’s biggest coal power company, AGL Energy, laughed off suggestions that AGL should convert its closing coal plants to nuclear power plants. Instead, AGL will be building solar and wind power.
Specifically, the company was asked to delay closure of its last coal plants, (including Liddell, pictured by Webaware/Wikimedia Commons), to accommodate future small modular reactors. Would AGL do this, its CEO, Damien Nicks, was asked. “No” was his one-word answer, but the company, like other savvy analysts in the field, recognize that nuclear power is simply too slow and too expensive to be viable (never mind its other obvious detriments including safety risks and an unsolved lethal waste problem).
“We have no plans to invest in nuclear energy,” Nicks told RenewEconomy in an email. “Legislation in Australia does not support development of nuclear energy and build time, cost and public opinion are all prohibitive to its development.”
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