BY IAN CROUCH
Federal Nationals Mp for Lyne, David Gillespie has taken a swipe at Labor's Net Zero Emissions Policy by 2050 saying it would be taking a wrecking ball to the Hunter's economy.
He's in Tomago today (Friday March 6) for a tour of the headquarters of Westrac, which provides heavy earth moving equipment to the mining industry and employs 3,500 staff nationwide.
Mr Gillespie is also due to meet with Tomago Aluminium CEO Matthew Howell later this month - the company employs 1,200 people locally.
He says Labor's policy threatens the future of these jobs and thousands of others in the associated mining, mechanical, manufacturing, tourism and coal chain sectors because it fails to provide a future for base load power which he says is vital for heavy industry.
David Gillespie says while the Morrison government is looking at clean energy technologies like, low emission clean coal, gas, solar, wind and nuclear, major energy users like Tomago Aluminium will still need a reliable source of base load power into the future.
"We're making a change to a cleaner mix, but we've got to keep our base load producers going because otherwise we won't have things like the Tomago Smelter, we won't have all the manufacturing and all those high-value jobs in the Hunter," he said.
Mr Gillespie also responded to comments made this week by his state Nationals colleague, Upper Hunter MP, Michael Johnsen who said establishing a nuclear power generator in the Upper Hunter "would be a good fit because of its extensive energy infrastructure".
While stopping short of supporting the move, which would involve lifting a ban on nuclear technology, Mr Gillespie said the new technology has been examined in a recent report to the federal government and was found to be safe and efficient.
"One of the recommendations was to consider removing the ban on the latest 3 plus and 4 generations of smaller modular reactors and the newer more efficient ones", he said. "Things have moved on" since the old generation 1 and 2 plants and the government is relying on the "technology road map" incorporating "exceptionally efficient" coal-burning power stations which he says will reduce the carbon footprint by 43 percent, while gas-fired power stations will reduce the footprint by 50 percent and nuclear is "even better" than solar and wind.
"We're agnostic at the moment - there are no plans to remove the ban, but certainly more and more people are talking about it because it ticks all the boxes," he said.
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| Nationals Federal Member for Lyne, Dr David Gillespie |
