"Aussie Ministers push case for nuclear solution"

Or a mix of both extreme conservation and
alternative sources.

"It's a war out there" for energy, water
and land.
There was a sense of sacrifice in war for
many. Can the population return to those
days or can't they see that far ahead?

Can Oz give up the comfortable lifestyle
for a clean energy one, even one that is
tied to nuclear?

X-URL: http://www.smh.com.au/text/articles/2006/10/16/1160850872643.html

Ministers push case for nuclear solution

Date: October 17 2006A Sydney Morning Herald
Phillip Coorey, Chief Political Correspondent

THE Federal Government has ramped up its push for nuclear energy with
one minister suggesting work on the first power station could begin
within 10 years.

With crippling drought placing the focus on climate change, the Prime
Minister, John Howard, the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer,
and the Industry Minister, Ian Macfarlane, all spruiked nuclear energy
yesterday as part of the solution.

A Government-appointed taskforce inquiring into the nuclear industry
is due to report by the end of this year, but it was clear yesterday
the Government had embraced the concept of nuclear power in the
context of climate change and would be pushing it in the lead-up to
next year's federal election.

.... The Finance Minister, Nick Minchin, warned recently the only way to
make nuclear energy financially competitive would be to tax the rival
coal and gas industries so heavily as to make them non-viable.

The Labor leader, Kim Beazley, restated his party's opposition to
nuclear energy yesterday because it was old and dirty technology that
created problems with waste. He has been using the drought to promote
his climate change policies which focus on clean, renewable energy
sources such as wind and solar.

"Our future is about renewables, not reactors," he said during a visit
to a wind- and solar-powered school in Canberra.