Nuclear interference in energy comms

In Christopher Nolan’s Academy Award winning film Oppenheimer, there’s a moment when Cillian Murphy’s character is trying to recruit a concerned scientist to the Manhattan Project. The scientist is hesitant, as he has communist affiliations.

“So you’re a fellow traveller, so what?” asks Oppenheimer. “This is a national emergency.

I’ve got some skeletons, and they’ve put me in charge. They need us,” he stresses.

“Until they don’t,” replies the scientist.

Some corners of the Australian energy industry are borrowing their nuclear communications strategy from Oppenheimer: keep quiet, or at the very least tone it right, right down.

If you’ve seen the film or know Oppenheimer’s story, you’ll know the scientist was right to be concerned. In our industry’s case, however, it would be a mistake.

Every stakeholder in the Australian energy industry needs a forceful position ready on nuclear energy if they have anything to say about the grid between now and the next election.

The Federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has made it clear he is willing to make the next election a referendum on nuclear energy in Australia and attack any credible opponents with Trumpian-style insults.

His most flamboyant attack was levelled at the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE). Last month, the organisation described the small modular reactors Dutton covets as a “chimera,” a mythical creature, adding that they would be unlikely to be built in Australia before the mid to late 2040s.

ATSE is a bunch of well respected, conservative nerds (I say that with nothing but affection, we need smart people doing smart things if we’re to solve the transition). Dutton, a small modular reactionary, dismissed ATSE as “fanatics”.

These comments went hand-in-hand with his attack on the CSIRO after the organisation's GenCost report indicated nuclear energy was the most expensive technology Australia could pick. The Opposition’s narrative about Australia’s energy industry and the tactics with which it’s willing to promote it will have consequences for our industry for at least 12 months.

All companies and organisations compete with each other for ‘earned media’ coverage to project their key messages and secure strategic communication goals. Most energy companies are very sensible on the nuclear issue and privately flabbergasted that the Opposition is taking us down this route. They would prefer for the adults to continue having the slow, grey, comparatively boring conversation about decarbonising the grid using the technologies we’re all very familiar with.

But editors across Australia’s media industry are always subject to the whims of the audience and all indications are the audience is interested in nuclear energy coverage.

That is not to say the country wants nuclear energy. Those are two very separate things. Australians definitely want coverage of nuclear energy. Polling indicates enough Australians are confused about their high energy prices at a time when everything else costs a bomb to at least hear the argument out.

This means the broader narrative about the transition to the average punter is increasingly shaped by nuclear. This will only increase as the Opposition ramps up its campaign in the lead up to the next election. Hell, I broadly understand the real reasons energy prices are high and I obsessively read anything about the Opposition’s proposal. Why? Because I can’t help myself.

From now until polling day, our industry is at risk of being unable to generate cut-through on just about anything to do with the transition, without first addressing what the Opposition has said about nuclear.

I’m not a political analyst, but the consensus seems to be that the Labor government will likely wait as long as possible before calling the election, due no later than May next year. The thinking goes that this will allow as much time as possible for inflation to come down.

By then we will have a new incumbent Best Picture winner at the Academy Awards. But nuclear will still loom large, at least in Australia.