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| Down Under |
| Nuclear India is good for globe |
| 2008-07-27 |
| By Andrew Robb LAST Tuesday's vote of confidence in the Indian parliament supporting an international agreement on the use of uranium for clean energy production means that Kevin Rudd must correct the snub to India by reversing his earlier decision to abandon uranium sales for clean electricity generation. The Government must reverse its position on this issue, which has been described as the most crucial to face India since it gained independence nearly 61 years ago. One of the first foreign policy acts of the Rudd Government was to overturn a decision by the Howard government to help India supply greenhouse gas-free electricity to its growing population, provided certain conditions were met, under a agreement being negotiated between the US and India. The Rudd Government's decision was wrong, an offence compounded by Foreign Minister Stephen Smith telling India it was because of party politics. India's energy security and needs are the major issue in the relationship between our two countries. This issue can make Australia a very important partner to India strategically. It is what India really wants from us. From a climate perspective there is overwhelming merit in addressing the reality of India's energy needs by supplying the resources for clean energy, otherwise these resources will simply come from less environmentally friendly sources. Two thirds of India's emissions come from burning coal, mainly in power stations. Without a change in the method of base-load power generation, this share of emissions from coal-fired power stations will increase through to 2030 and beyond. As India grows, it will rank third behind the US and China in terms of global energy usage and greenhouse gas emissions. If the existing restrictions on the import of nuclear technology and uranium for peaceful power sources are removed, as much as 35 per cent of India's total energy needs could be met by clean nuclear power plants by 2050. This would have a much bigger impact on global greenhouse gas reductions than any domestic policy Rudd could propose. Countries using Australian uranium avoid carbon dioxide emissions roughly equivalent to our entire annual CO2 emissions from all sources. Around the world nuclear power today reduces global emissions by more than 2 billion tonnes a year. As well, the conditions that Australia placed on any sales of uranium to India would have seen global non-proliferation strengthened by including India, a country the Government acknowledges has an exemplary record on non-proliferation. The majority of India's nuclear reactors are coming under the strict coverage of the International Atomic Energy Agency for the first time. Smith has stated that India "has a strong record on non-proliferation" but that Labor will not change its position on opposing the sale of uranium to India because the policy is "long-standing and well known". This is putting grubby party politics ahead of the national interest. India is understood to be deeply offended by the Government's decision, and the manner in which it was conveyed. Influential foreign affairs commentators from India have denounced the decision in the strongest terms, labelling the scrapping of the pledge to sell uranium as "retrograde ideology, pathetic hypocrisy, misplaced non-proliferation zealotry", and accusing our Prime Minister of parroting "the same lame excuse as if he has not read the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty text". However, while the Government is saying to our Indian friends that we do not trust them with our uranium, at the same time Rudd and Smith say they have not yet made up their minds on whether to veto sales of uranium to India by the 44 other members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group. How can Australia refuse to sell our uranium to India, yet plausibly support the rest of the world supplying uranium? Either way, Australia will be adding insult to injury. The bottom line on all this is that by reversing Australia's commitment to sell uranium to India, Labor did substantial damage to the Australia-India relationship. The national interest was not considered. Climate change was ignored. Nuclear non-proliferation was sidelined. A China bias was implied. Constructive US policy towards Asia was opposed. India's feelings were trampled . It makes no sense to sell uranium to China and Russia, and not to India. Or to claim climate change to be the great moral challenge of our time and then block the adoption of nuclear technology, which is greenhouse gas-free and already provides 16 per cent of the world's electricity needs. The US-India nuclear agreement is good for India, good for Australia, good for the region, good for climate change and good for nuclear non-proliferation. To block uranium sales to India is disastrous politics. It is a position that is unsustainable. It can and must be reversed. Andrew Robb is Opposition spokesman on foreign affairs. |
| Posted by:john frum |