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The ABC has apologized to Dick Smith after the outraged businessman wrote to him demanding corrections to a fact-checking report on renewable energy and nuclear power which he said was “full of lies”.
Mr Smith said the report, written by RMIT’s ABC Fact Check, stated: “Businessman Dick Smith has supported calls to introduce nuclear-generated power to Australia, rejecting nuclear generation. electricity based on renewable energy in the process.’
He wrote to ABC CEO David Anderson to say this was not true, prompting a backflip and apology from the national broadcaster within hours.
“It’s good that they apologized,” Mr Smith said. 2GB Ben Fordham on Wednesday morning.
“(But) we are not going to get any leadership from… the ABC on the need to move to nuclear energy as soon as possible for our future generations.”
The ABC has apologized to Dick Smith (pictured with wife Pip) after the outraged businessman wrote to him demanding corrections to a fact-checking report.
The ABC posted its apology online at 8.03pm on Tuesday, posting: ‘The first version of this article was based on the inference that Mr Smith’s interview only concerned electricity grids.
‘After publication, Mr Smith clarified that he was referring to the full energy mix. The article has been updated to reflect this and add information on the full energy mixes of four countries whose grids are 100 per cent renewable.’
He added that “the article also previously incorrectly stated that Mr Smith had rejected renewable energy-based electricity generation; this has been amended and the ABC apologizes to Mr Smith for the error.’
A still angry Mr Smith said on Wednesday morning that “one of their main arguments was that I was opposed to renewable energy, which is simply not the truth”.
He claimed one of the fact-checkers called him and told him they had verified something said by Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen.
‘Chris Bowen, who is against nuclear power… had said it would take 19 years to achieve nuclear power. Then ABC fact-checked and said, ‘That’s not true.’ It only takes about 8.8 years.’
‘In other words, they were showing something positive about nuclear energy. And this young ABC fact-checker said they were just completely attacked,” Mr Smith said.
And I imagine the left would have gone crazy because he was brave enough to say something positive about nuclear energy. So it just shows you the problems there (at the ABC).’
A spokeswoman for Chris Bowen told Daily Mail Australia that “Minister Bowen is not aware of a conversation Dick Smith is alleged to have had with the ABC.”
Mr Smith said he was “in favor of renewable energy” but added: “Don’t let anyone tell you that solar and wind are cheaper.” They are not.
“If you actually do it for real, they cost about twice as much.”
He called for a nuclear power plant to be installed in an existing coal-fired power plant.
“Instead of using coal, you could use uranium to boil water (to generate power) like they do in France and have done for 50 years,” he said.
The businessman stated that betting on 100 percent renewable energy would mean “the total destruction of the environment.”
‘(We would need) 20 pumped hydroelectric dams along the east coast, so that the beautiful valleys are flooded with water.
“And then on the lower level where people live, they’re going to have to tear down the houses and flood the lower level area to pump in hydropower,” he said.
“You can have that alternative, or you can hum at the site of the coal-fired power plant, a nuclear power plant.”
Businessman Dick Smith supports Australia’s move to nuclear energy. Pictured is an aerial view of the Temelin nuclear power plant in the Czech Republic.
Smith said the fact that ABC had to apologize to him shows “that all my friends on the left – and the beautiful left at ABC – believe they have to be against nuclear power.”
‘There is no rational thinking in this, and that is going to make things really difficult for our young people, who, we are told, are going to suffer from climate change.
“It’s a real shame.”
Daily Mail Australia has contacted ABC for comment.