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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2024-06-18 Daily Xml
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Nuclear Energy

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (14:48): My question is to the Minister for Energy and Mining. Does the minister stand by the comments made by the Premier in December 2022 on energy costs? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mr PATTERSON: In December 2022, the Premier is quoted as saying, about nuclear energy, that:

It would be madness to contemplate sources of energy that are more expensive than the ones that we already have.

In May this year the 2023-24 CSIRO GenCost report found that at every stage for the next 25 years both large-scale and small modular nuclear reactors are cheaper per megawatt hour than hydrogen electricity generation.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (14:48): First things first, I absolutely support what the Premier said. He is absolutely right. I would say to my friend opposite that the nuclear debate is—

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Yes, dull, that's one part. It's also a distraction, and it is an excuse for lazy policymaking. It's lazy policymaking.

If the member had been listening to my answer to the house previously when I talked about hydrogen, hydrogen is not just a form of storage. Hydrogen offers a lot more. The government has detailed its policies on hydrogen as a form of storage through its generator and Hydrogen Jobs Plan. It has also talked about, through the state prosperity plan, its plan to decarbonise critical minerals in this state and export them.

What the member fails to do with his devotion and love for nuclear energy is articulate a policy platform for it to stand on. Members opposite would have us believe: do nothing for the next 20 years while we develop a nuclear industry in this state, and from scratch, we will build a regulatory framework to govern the whole thing—from scratch, despite only a few years ago all the members who were in this parliament accepting a royal commission finding saying that nuclear energy did not suit South Australia's position. Not only did they not accept the generation of nuclear energy but they also opposed the storage of its waste.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Members opposite—the ones chortling now like children, those ones—now want us to stop the reinvestment of renewable energy, which is cheaper than any form of nuclear industry. They want us to stop that and they want us to build a brand-new nuclear industry.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Interjecting won't change facts. Screaming won't change facts. It just won't. Members opposite have yet to announce an energy policy, yet they ask questions about nuclear energy. It is more expensive and would take too long to build. I can say that today at the Hydrogen Conference and at the Copper to the World conference there were plenty of investors wanting to invest in decarbonisation, plenty wanting to invest in copper and plenty wanting to invest in hydrogen, but do you know who weren't there? Nuclear investors—not one. But, apparently, members opposite have a whole line of people who want to build these things. What rubbish. It's a distraction. It's a hoax.

After their nuclear policy, it will be a monorail through the city of Adelaide. Then after the monorail—

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA: Point of order, sir.

The SPEAKER: The member for Hartley.

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA: This is debate, a breach of standing order 98. The minister is clearly off the rails in his answer.

The SPEAKER: I think it's just the one rail; it's not 'off the rails'. Monorail by its very definition would be just the one rail. Has the minister finished? No, he has more.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Hence the term 'mono'. No-one serious about the energy transformation in this country is talking about nuclear energy—no-one. There are two people talking about it in this state: Peter Dutton and David Speirs. That's it. No-one else is taking it seriously.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Sorry, and the member for Hammond. Other than the member for Hammond, the federal Leader of the Opposition and the state Leader of the Opposition, no-one else is taking the idea of nuclear energy in this state, as a form of generation, seriously. Why? We don't have the conditions for it. We don't have the large-scale industrial demand. We don't have the large population centres. We don't—

Mr Patterson: We can have submarines.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Again, propulsion systems are not the same as generators, but we will talk about that later.

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