Sunday, 29 April, 2007

by Lincoln Wright
Sunday Herald Sun

PRIVATE enterprise would drive Australia's nuclear power industry, Prime Minister John Howard revealed yesterday.

Mr Howard also ruled out a referendum on nuclear power, saying this year's federal election would provide a mandate.

"The opinion polls seem to have shifted -- people are not so hostile," Mr Howard said after his address to the Victorian Liberal State Council in Melbourne.

The Federal Government would not get involved in building nuclear power stations and their location would be based on private sector economic decisions, he said.

"I'm not mandating it. We're just beginning the process of removing discrimination in relation to nuclear power," he said.

Mr Howard said Australia was losing out economically by not exploiting its uranium industry and that when clean-coal technology pushed up the price of coal-based energy, nuclear power could become more economical.

But Mr Howard could not say how much of Australia's electricity would be supplied by nuclear power.

"It's impossible to put a figure on it or how the market moves," he said.

Mr Howard announced yesterday he would remove current legal restrictions on uranium mining and nuclear power.

Under a 1999 environmental law nuclear power is banned here.

Mr Howard said he would take immediate steps to reduce regulations on the expansion of uranium mining and the transport of uranium ore.

Other steps include the development of a nuclear energy regulatory regime and more research and development.