move away from nuclear will benefit gas lng

As in Japan and in Australia the move to renewables will have to be accompanied by a greater use of gas in power generation by way of peaking power to smooth wind and solar generation.


Germany halts nuclear energy plans
By correspondent Rachael Brown and staff

Posted 10 minutes ago on ABC News Online:

Germany says it will speed up efforts to abandon nuclear energy in the wake of the Japanese crisis.

Japanese military helicopters and fire trucks are pouring water on the overheating nuclear facility, trying to cool the stricken Fukushima plant as eastern Japan reels from more aftershocks.

As the crisis unfolded German chancellor Angela Merkel decided to rethink extending the life of the country's 17 nuclear power plants.

She has suspended that decision for three months and has temporarily shut down Germany's seven oldest reactors.

Ms Merkel says the Japanese disaster means it can no longer be business as usual, telling parliament the goal is to reach the age of renewable energy as soon as possible.

But she has been heckled by the opposition and the nuclear industry for her abrupt change of stance on atomic energy.

Ms Merkel says "when, in Japan, the apparently impossible becomes possible, then the situation changes".

Several other European nations, from Finland to Switzerland, have turned more sceptical about nuclear energy after last week's earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima plant in the world's worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

In Italy the government called for time to reflect, apparently softening plans ahead of a planned June referendum on reintroducing nuclear power.

A week after the magnitude-9 earthquake and 10-metre tsunami, the official death toll stands at more than 5,600, with more than 9,500 people missing.