Extract from ABC News
By Eric Campbell
The Vogtle nuclear plant in Georgia. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
As day dawns in the southern US state of Georgia, the first sunlight breaks through steam clouds billowing from the giant Alvin W. Vogtle nuclear plant.
Residents have been sleeping, but the nuclear power plant never rests.
Its AP1000 reactors run 24/7, using nuclear fission to boil water to create steam to turn turbines to power more than a million homes and businesses with zero-emissions electricity.
Construction of the latest nuclear reactor at the Vogtle power plant in Georgia. (Supplied)
It's been touted as the start of a new era for the US's flagging nuclear power industry. Vogtle's newest reactors are among the first built in the US in decades.
"Thank you for your service to our nation in providing this arsenal of clean power," Energy Department Secretary Jennifer Granholm said at the May opening ceremony for Vogtle's latest reactor.
Jennifer Granholm "reports for duty" at the opening of the latest reactor. (Supplied)
"Now let's draw up some battle plans for new reactors. I don't know about you but I for one am reporting for duty!" she said, saluting.
Peter Dutton is ready to enlist Australia. If he wins next year's election, he plans to build seven nuclear power stations at retiring coal-fired plants.
Mr Dutton has flagged the AP1000 reactor used at Vogtle could be one of the models used to power homes and businesses in Australia.
"We don't want to be the purchaser of the first in class or have an Australian-made technology, we want to rely on the Westinghouse AP1000," he said in June. Beyond this, he's given little detail about how exactly the plan would work.
Nuclear energy provides nearly a fifth of US power and almost half its clean energy. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
Four Corners travelled around the US to examine the Coalition claims that developing nuclear power plants was the best way to replace coal power.
It has cited the US, which remains the world's largest producer of nuclear energy, as one of the places to see the benefits it could bring Australia. Before launching the policy, Coalition MPs accompanied two groups of engineers and environmentalists around the US and to Ontario in Canada to see the potential first-hand.
In our experience, the reality was more complex.
Cost blowout
The Coalition's pitch for nuclear is that it's reliable, clean and cheap. And Vogtle certainly ticks two of those boxes. The plant almost never stops running and it produces no emissions. But here's the problem. It was expensive to build.
The giant AP1000 reactors designed by Westinghouse opened seven years late at more than twice the budgeted cost. The final bill of around $US35 billion ($50 billion) makes them among the most expensive nuclear generators ever built.
Now, Georgia residents are paying the price for Vogtle's overruns in their electricity bills.
Kimberly Scott and other community organisers have seen thousands of social media posts of Georgians shocked by their power bills. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
Community organiser Kimberley Scott said people have been struggling to keep up.
"Power bills have gone up hundreds of dollars for consumers including myself," she said.
Georgia ratepayer Anna Hamer said she now has had to ration air conditioning in the Atlanta summer as her bills rise. In July she was hit with her highest power bill ever: $US618 for one month.
"They were telling us everything was going to be OK with this plant, that it would be on time and it would be on budget. It's over budget and we are paying for that. That seems wrong to me."
Anna Hamer was recently hit with her highest power bill ever: $US618 for one month. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
It's very different to what the Coalition has been suggesting in media interviews and energy speeches since it launched its nuclear policy over three months ago.
At the nuclear policy launch in June, Mr Dutton said: "Electricity is cheaper where there is a presence of nuclear energy. That is a fact. So we can rely on that international experience."
The Coalition often cites the Canadian province of Ontario as a model, saying its three nuclear plants contribute to much lower power bills than Australia. The plants are owned and subsidised by the provincial government.
While some have questioned whether this is a fair comparison to Australia, Shadow Energy Minister Ted O'Brien maintains it is.
"One of the reasons they see power prices coming down is because of the role of nuclear in the mix," he told Four Corners.
Peter Bradford, a former member of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which licences commercial reactors, told Four Corners building nuclear plants was always the most expensive option.
"It's an unbroken string of economic disappointment," he said.
Peter Bradford says there's a long history of claims about cheaper nuclear costs that don't come true. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
"If nuclear power were a person, it would be weeping with its head in its hands over the Vogtle story. Vogtle is clear proof that large nuclear construction is not an economic way to go."
That's not to say Vogtle doesn't still have keen supporters.
Stephen Biegalski, who teaches nuclear engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, believes the AP1000 is potentially a great choice for Australia, and said with each new reactor built, the price should come down.
"When you build the first of a kind unit you have to establish the process. It will not be perfect the first time you do it. But on the positive side, once it's done, the road's been paved, you can reproduce that with less effort, with less uncertainty and less risk."
Australia wouldn't be alone: countries like China and Poland are lining up to install the AP1000 model.
Ted O'Brien said the Coalition's policy has been shaped by the lessons learned by other countries.
"If you look at the Vogtle example, one of the lessons we need to learn in Australia is we should not be adopting first of a kind technology. We should only be adopting what's referred to as next-of a kind proven technology."
He said a Coalition government would spend two-and-a-half years studying the sites and consulting communities before an independent authority chooses the most appropriate reactor design.
The SMR conundrum
The other type of reactor the Coalition wants in its nuclear power arsenal has been promoted as a game changer for the industry.
The theory is that small modular reactors (SMRs) can have their components built in factories then trucked to a site, making them quicker and cheaper to build.
The Coalition wants SMRs operating in Australia from 2035. There's just one problem.
They don't exist yet, at least not commercially.
Billions of dollars are being spent to make them a reality. But so far, all attempts are years from completion or have already failed.
The only project that won approval from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission was abandoned last November because of rising costs, even after the US Department of Energy pledged more than $US500 million in grants.
Four Corners went to the latest place where there's a concerted attempt to break this conundrum. It's a sleepy coal town in south-west Wyoming called Kemmerer, with a population of nearly 3,000.
It's full of ranchers and coal workers.
The town of Kemmerer, Wyoming. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
The local coal-fired power plant is due to close next decade. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan )
Enter Bill Gates. In June the billionaire climate change activist came to town and turned a sod on his project to construct a working SMR, declaring: "This is a big step towards safe, abundant, zero carbon energy."
He's putting $US1 billion of his own money into trying to make it a success, with the federal government pledging another $US2 billion.
At Kemmerer's main bar, Grumpies, Trump flags with messages like "F*** Your Feelings!" adorn the walls. Owner Teri Picerno said there hadn't been a lot of chatter about nuclear at the bar.
"Gates has a hard sell," she said.
"I don't know if it's his politics, but they just don't trust him saying it's going to make anything better."
Grumpies bar owner Teri Picerno doesn't hear much chatter about nuclear. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
With coal production falling across Wyoming, Kemmerer's coal-fired power plant is slated to close next decade.
Ms Picerno said most folks still think coal has a future and don't believe in climate change.
"I think people would be OK if the nuclear were to gain us jobs. But it's not, we're not getting a gain, we're maintaining."
Bill Gates is putting $US1 billion of his own money into the Kemmerer SMR project. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
Fortunately for the project, the town administration welcomes the prospect of anything that might bring work.
"Essentially, the town was going to lose a couple of hundred jobs or more," Mayor Bill Thek said.
"We're hoping that the people that work for the power plant, the current coal burning power plant will be able to transition, or at least some of them, into the nuclear plant."
Bill Thek says the looming closure of the coal plant puts hundreds of jobs at risk. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
For now, all that's being constructed are the bits around the reactor, while the project waits for approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). Project spokesman Jeff Navin said they still hoped to finish construction by 2030.
"We expect to get our license from the NRC in another year-and-a-half to two years and I suspect when that happens we'll start to see a significant number of orders coming up so people can get in line and get into the queue."
Kemmerer's SMR project is only in its very early stages of construction. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
SMRs face a challenge. They're small, producing far less power. Any power they produce would therefore be more expensive, unless the modules can be mass produced to make them cheaper to construct to offset the generation cost.
But nobody is going to mass produce anything until there is a working model that promises to produce power economically that attracts lots of eager customers. Which takes you back to square one.
Peter Bradford has seen promised breakthroughs like SMRs come and go.
"In this industry, vendor claims about cheaper nuclear costs have a long, well-documented and very sad history — they just don't come true.
"There is no basis for believing that this utterly unproven technology is going to sweep in and make a success of a field that up to now has been an unmitigated economic failure."
Bill Gates speaking at an event for the SMR project he is backing. (Supplied)
Even in the Gates-backed project's most optimistic scenario, it's unlikely SMRs would be mass produced to bring down costs before Australia plans to install them.
When asked about this, Ted O'Brien did not appear fazed.
"By the time Australia would be making procurement decisions, there will be multiple SMR designs.
"The Wyoming story is a fascinating one … a wonderful example of how you can practically go from coal to nuclear and leverage the existing workforce."
Getting it done
The uncertainty around SMRs, and the cost blowout in Georgia, point to the practical difficulties Australia would face in trying to build reactors cheaper than countries with decades of experience, when we've never built a nuclear energy plant before.
The US is not the only nuclear country struggling to build new plants.
- France's latest reactor opened 12 years behind schedule and around 10 billion euros over budget.
- Britain's Hinkley Point plant is running six years late and facing a 20 billion British pound overrun.
- A South Korean consortium was able to build four reactors in the United Arab Emirates over 12 years. Even under an authoritarian regime, each reactor was connected to the grid around three years later than expected.
US journalist and nuclear historian Stephanie Cooke has been covering the industry since 1980.
"I have never seen a project come in on time or budget. They've come in way, way over budget and way over time. It amazes me that there's so much hype about something that's been such an abject failure in my opinion.
"I mean, yeah, it's produced electricity, but at what cost? I don't think that we should be wasting our money on it plain and simple."
Clean energy analyst Simon Holmes a Court — who backed climate-focused teal independents to win Coalition seats at the last election — is a big fan of nuclear, just not in Australia.
"The resources that we have in wind and solar are the best in the world. To turn our back on that and pursue a technology where we do not have any advantage is crazy," he said.
"One day the nuclear sector might have a product that fits the Australian market. What's really clear is that the nuclear sector does not have a product at the moment that fits into what Australia needs right now."
Before the Coalition launched its policy, MPs toured the US and Canada to see the potential of nuclear first-hand. (Four Corners: Ryan Sheridan)
The finer points of how the Coalition plans to overcome the challenges it will confront are still unclear.
It's yet to reveal how much its plan will cost or how it will overturn federal state bans on nuclear energy.
It says SMR plants could be operating by 2035, or 2037 if it starts with larger reactors. But the timing beyond that is unclear.
It says it will release more details before the next election but for now it's asking Australians to take it on trust.
Mr O'Brien insists in the end Australia's can-do mentality will triumph.
"There is no shortage of political opponents who will always point to an example of a project not going well. Or they want to basically say, Australia does not have the capability. I'll let them run that argument. When Australians have put their mind to things, they've gotten it done."
Watch Four Corners's full investigation, Nuclear Gamble, tonight from 8:30pm on ABC TV and ABC iview.
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