Before readers get too excited, I need to acknowledge that the Today Show in the below video is broadcast from Sydney, Australia, not New York City. However, it is still kind of exciting to have a TV newscaster chanting “Go Nuke!”
The broadcaster’s excitement is based on an announcement by Liberal Party Senator Sean Edwards of his vision for using the funds that have been set aside around the world for used fuel disposal as the financing base to establish a fuel recycling and nuclear energy industry in South Australia.
Here are some additional resources that provide more details about the proposal that is mentioned in the plan.
Liberal Senator Sean Edwards unveils radical plan for a booming nuclear industry in South Australia
The above linked article includes a completely non-scientific, self-selected Internet poll. However, I like the way the results looked when I voted.
Royal commission is set the debate a proposed plan from SA senator to expand nuclear industry
I watched the video. In it the man asked the woman something to this effect, “You wouldn’t want to live near a nuclear power plant, would you?” The woman responds by stating something to this effect, “I wouldn’t be living next to it because it would be located in the northern part of the State where no one lives.” That exchange represents a key attitude which must be changed. It is an attitude of fear – that somehow living next to a nuclear power plant represents an undue risk not apparently present when driving an automobile or riding in a jet plane or breathing in air polluted by emissions from a fossil fueled power plant. While the woman’s chat “Go Nukes” would bring a smile to any pro-nuclear person’s face, it is obvious that neither TV journalist understands one iota of either science or engineering. If they did, then there would be no issue with living next to one of safest facilities ever designed and built by modern man. However, the truth is that I have come to expect complete ignorance on all matters of science, engineering, history and religion from today’s journalists, regardless of their political persuasion, and this video represents the best that one can expect from them.
Once again Rod Adams proves what a truely fine communicator he is. I have always admired Rod’s writing and his insights, even though Rod and I have occasionally had our disagreements. Some time ago, I designated Rod as the Dean of Pronuclear bloggers, and preposed Rod as a candidat for Energy Czar.
That poll was amazing, but it caught the anti-nukes off guard. In the following days there were a few others and this one that is in an opinion piece on the Nuclear Royal Commission is much more accurate to the pro/anti divide:
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/david-penberthy-sa-ticks-boxes-for-nuclear-energy-and-waste-storage/story-fni6unxq-1227260578080
Still, even with the social media mentioning by Greens Party members of parliament and other anti-nuclear voices, they can’t pull a clear majority. A petition on the State Green parliamentarian’s personal website only managed to pull 1,000 signatures, from a membership/voting base much larger than that.
Well, I think the follow-up poll is more accurate to the antis not being off guard, rather than the actual divide.
I was aware of the impending headline, I probably have a better network of nuclear supporters than most in this State and I assure all readers, there was no effort to pre-load the poll. From about 6 am to 4 pm it ran at about 85 % support even as votes rose through the day. There was then a late burst of votes for “shut down the industry” which made support for Edward’s proposal … 75 %. That late burst was, in my opinion, some organised self-selection in action.
Naturally this is nowhere near as robust as the random polling undertaken by SACOME last year, which also gave strong results for nuclear. However, the result is too strong to be written off altogether. The result was representative of the Adelaide Now readers on the day and such polls on this topic have never delivered a result like that.
I think this says a lot about 1) the key messages Senator Edwards has adopted and that he chose his messages well and 2) that speaking of new developing new nuclear technology from our clean slate may be a potent foundation on which to move forward.
To be even clearer, I was aware of the impending headline, I was NOT aware of the impending poll.