Quote Originally Posted by studsg View Post
While I agree nuclear power stations should definitely be one of the our sources of power replacing coal and gas power plants. However, that's not the main source for why our energy costs are high.

Many countries that do not have nuclear power plants also have cost competitive manufacturing. Singapore has a thriving semi-conductor sector, they even process all the fuel we produce but deem too expensive to process onshore. Thailand makes all our Japan car imports, Malaysia produces computers, sound systems, Etc. I would say the key factor is high labour costs that has crippled our ability for any form of manufacturing.
I wouldn't agree with comparing us to a country like SG. All the parameters are different. For example, population density in SG is much greater than in Australia. One street lamp in SG illuminates an area for a far greater number of people than a street lamp in Australia. That pushes up the overall price of energy in Australia even if both these countries do not use nuclear power.

There's also the geographical location factor. SG is in a strategic location having many neighbouring poorer countries. They can leverage on that by signing extremely competitive supply agreements with their neighbours for just about everything... Water (check how stupid the Malaysian gov was to sign a FIXED PRICE contract to supply water to SG; they're actually paying money to supply SG with water now, due to inflation!) , energy, etc. Can't do any of that in a huge isolated country like Australia.