As Australia debates electricity prices and the future of its energy system, the country is missing a deeper issue. Nuclear power is no longer merely an energy technology. In a more dangerous world, it is also a form of sovereign capability.
For decades, Australia has thought about nuclear power as though it were an argument about spreadsheets. Is nuclear cheaper than renewables? Is it too slow? Too risky? Too politically toxic? Those questions remain important. But they are not the only ones that matter. The world has changed. And energy policy can no longer be separated from geopolitics.
In this predatory environment, great powers are testing limits, trade is weaponised, and supply chains are leveraged for coercion. Energy itself has become a tool of statecraft, as Europe discovered brutally after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
For a middle power like Australia – geographically isolated, economically open and strategically exposed – the convergence of energy security and national security should concentrate minds. As Canadian prime minister Mark Carney remarked during his recent visit to Australia, middle powers will need “sovereignty” as the global order begins to rupture.
Australia’s legislative prohibition on civilian nuclear power was crafted in a different era. It reflected a time when the global order felt stable, when American primacy seemed unchallengeable, and when Australia could assume that ultimate security guarantees would endure without qualification.
That assumption is now harder to sustain.
None of this implies that the US alliance is collapsing or that extended deterrence is disappearing. But prudent states do not build their futures on single assumptions. They diversify risk. They cultivate capability. They preserve options.
This is where nuclear energy enters the conversation, not merely as a climate solution, but as a sovereign capability.
Countries that operate civilian nuclear industries possess deep reservoirs of technical expertise. They maintain sophisticated regulatory institutions. They train engineers and scientists in some of the most complex technologies known to humanity. They embed themselves in high-trust international supply chains that are strategically significant.
Energy policy is no longer simply about emissions targets or quarterly power prices. It is about resilience in a turbulent era.
Australia, by contrast, has legislated itself out of that ecosystem. This is increasingly striking given that Australia is already entering the nuclear domain through the AUKUS submarine program.
Consider Japan. After Fukushima, Tokyo did not abandon nuclear power altogether. It recalibrated. Japan remains firmly committed to non-proliferation and operates under the US alliance. Yet it retains a sophisticated civilian nuclear sector and a world-class engineering base. In a region marked by North Korean missile tests and rising Chinese power, Japan values technological depth. Strategists sometimes refer to this as “latent capability”: maintaining the technological and industrial foundations that could allow a country to move further if its security environment deteriorated dramatically.
South Korea offers a similar lesson. Seoul has built a competitive nuclear export industry while navigating one of the most volatile security environments in the world. Domestic debates periodically surface about deterrence and autonomy. But the foundation of those debates rests on an advanced civilian nuclear infrastructure.
In Europe, the mood has shifted decisively. France has recommitted to expanding its nuclear fleet. Finland has completed a new reactor. Even countries once sceptical are reassessing nuclear power in light of energy vulnerability and geopolitical risk. The experience of the Ukraine war has underscored a simple truth: energy independence is strategic independence.
Australia’s refusal even to permit civilian nuclear development stands out among advanced economies. Removing the prohibition on nuclear power would not commit Australia to building reactors tomorrow. Nor would it diminish the central role of renewables in decarbonising the grid. Australia has extraordinary solar and wind resources and should continue to exploit them.
But a diversified system is more resilient than a monolithic one.
Nuclear energy offers reliable baseload power, low operational emissions and long-term price stability once capital costs are absorbed. More importantly, it anchors a country within an elite ecosystem of advanced technological capability.
Strategic maturity means recognising that optionality has value. The ability to develop, regulate and manage nuclear technology confers institutional strength. It reduces the risk of starting from zero should circumstances change. It signals seriousness in an increasingly competitive Indo-Pacific.
Australia prides itself on realism. Realism, in this context, does not mean alarmism. It does not mean abandoning non-proliferation commitments or embracing militarisation. It means acknowledging that the world is less forgiving and more predatory than it once appeared.
Energy policy is no longer simply about emissions targets or quarterly power prices. It is about resilience in a turbulent era.
In geopolitics, states that deliberately narrow their own capabilities rarely fare well. Those that preserve choice tend to be more confident and more secure.
Australia does not need to rush headlong into a nuclear build-out. But maintaining a blanket legislative ban in the face of shifting realities looks increasingly anachronistic.
The debate should move beyond caricature. Nuclear energy is not a panacea. It is not without cost or controversy. But nor is it an irrational relic of the past.
In a harsher world, sovereign capability matters. Removing the prohibition on civilian nuclear power would not be radical. It would simply allow Australia to participate in the technological ecosystem that many advanced economies already consider essential to their long-term resilience. It would be a recognition that optionality – in energy, as in strategy – is itself a form of power.
Vincent So is a former federal and NSW Coalition adviser to national security and Treasury ministers. Views are his own and not of his employer.
