PETITION: Nuclear Industry is dangerous, dirty, costly & no solution to climate change
To the Honourable the President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The Petition of the undersigned draws to the attention of the Senate that Australians do not need or want an expanded nuclear industry, including nuclear power, in Australia.
The petitioners say there is ample evidence that:
a)engagement in the nuclear cycle leads to growth in nuclear weapons and potentially dirty bombs;
b)uranium mining and enrichment and nuclear waste reprocessing are energy intensive processes that contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions;
c)uranium is a finite, non-renewable, energy source;
d)the nuclear cycle creates enormous amounts of long lived radioactive and toxic chemical waste for which there is still no long-term storage solution;
e)nuclear power is unviable without huge public subsidies;
f)nuclear power reactors take 10-20 yrs to build and cannot address climate change in the short-term; and
g)nuclear power generation is not accident free.
The petitioners therefore request that the Federal Government abandon its plans to expand uranium mining, enrich uranium, and build nuclear power plants in Australia, and instead introduce a carbon levy, encouraging investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency.
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