Beattie will cave under the pressure all will be a go ahead in...

Beattie will cave under the pressure all will be a go ahead in April.


But now, a number of political and economic trends have converged, and we are presented with a renewed and serious attempt to establish nuclear power as a legitimate power source in the 21st century. Australia now stands at the threshold on the question of its energy future. We have two options:

Using renewable energy and taking responsibility for our role in creating global warming; or
Massive exports of uranium, risks of nuclear weapons proliferation, huge quantities of high-level radioactive waste, and entrenched use of coal for domestic energy production (further exacerbating greenhouse problems).
The federal Coalition government is doing everything it can to expand Australia's involvement in the nuclear fuel cycle. Rising uranium prices have driven a wave of uranium exploration in the past two years. The industry has successfully convinced much of the media, many opinion formers and a handful of environmentalists that its is now 'greenhouse friendly'. Labor maintains its policy of no new uranium mines, but this is being challenged from within the party and could be overturned at the ALP national conference in April 2007.