Muswellbrook's likely future federal MP, Barnaby Joyce, says he supports building a nuclear reactor outside the Upper Hunter town.
Mr Joyce said on Thursday that he made no distinction between burning coal or using enriched uranium to make power at the former Liddell Power Station site, 14 kilometres from Muswellbrook's town centre.
The former deputy prime minister's comments come a day after Opposition leader Peter Dutton announced Liddell would host one of seven nuclear reactors a Coalition government would build on former coal-fired power station sites across Australia.
The Nationals MP holds a clear 16.4 percentage-point margin in the New England electorate, which will include Muswellbrook and Denman at the next election under a draft boundary redraw announced by the Australian Electoral Commission last week.
The Coalition says it will abandon the 2030 emissions-reductions target that forms part of Australia's commitment to the Paris climate agreement.
Mr Joyce told the Newcastle Herald on Thursday that he did not support the rollout of wind and solar farms to meet Australia's 2050 net zero target.
"Our nation has two choices," Mr Joyce said.
"We can continue on the intermittent power path. We can continue with the offshore and onshore swindle factories and photovoltaic blacks fields that are driving industry offshore and power prices through the roof or we can go with a globally proven baseload nuclear power source.
"Whether it is coal boiling water to make power at Liddell or uranium only enriched to about 5 per cent boiling water at Liddell to make power, the jobs and the money and the commerce remains and our nation gets stronger, not weaker."
The US Office of Nuclear Energy says America's large-scale nuclear plants employ up to 800 workers with salaries 50 per cent higher than in other electricity industries.
Labor state and federal leaders have rubbished the Coalition's nuclear plan, saying it will take decades to materialise, cost billions and drive up power prices.
Mr Dutton has not said how much his nuclear power stations will cost to build and run or whether they will be large-scale reactors or small modular reactors.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported on Thursday that a yet-to-be-announced Coalition energy policy would include heavily discounted electricity for businesses in new industrial zones around the nuclear plants.
A CSIRO analysis says nuclear power stations could cost at least $8.5 billion to build and produce electricity at least 50 per cent more expensive than solar and wind.
"Despite nuclear power being a component of electricity generation for 16 per cent of the world's countries, it does not currently provide an appropriate solution for Australia's net zero target," the CSIRO said in the analysis updated last month.
"Nuclear is not economically competitive with renewables and the total development time in Australia for large or small-scale nuclear is at least 15 years.
"Small modular reactors (SMRs) are faster to build, but are commercially immature at present.
"The total development time needed for nuclear means it will not play a major role in electricity sector emission abatement, which is more urgent than abatement in other sectors."
The Nationals' state Upper Hunter MP, Dave Layzell, said he did not support a plant in the Hunter "unless we better understand the local benefits".
The Nationals' state MP for Bathurst, Paul Toole, said he did not support the proposal for a nuclear plant at the Mount Piper coal plant in Lithgow.
"The announcement lacks detail and raises more questions than answers," he said.
"I'll be backing the views of my community 100 per cent."
Mr Dutton edged ahead of Anthony Albanese as preferred prime minister in a Resolve poll published by Nine newspapers this week.
Labor maintained a 51-49 advantage in voting intentions after the distribution of preferences, but Mr Dutton took a 36-35 lead over Mr Albanese as preferred leader.
NSW Premier Chris Minns told Parliament on Thursday that the NSW Department for Climate Change, Energy and Environment had estimated replacing the state's coal power stations with large-scale nuclear reactors would cost $70 billion.
"If you were to do the small-scale modular nuclear reactors, the number would increase to $211 billion," he said.
"CSIRO says small-scale nuclear is $230 to $380 a megawatt hour. Large-scale nuclear is up to $230 a megawatt hour, and wind and solar is between $90 and $120 a megawatt hour."
He said the only large-scale nuclear program "currently undertaken" in the world was the United Kingdom's 3260-megawatt Hinckley Point C reactor, whose estimated cost has risen from $17 billion in 2008 to $92 billion this year.
Construction began in 2017 and is forecast to finish between 2029 and 2031.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen was in Newcastle on Thursday announcing that an Equinor-Oceanex joint venture had won a licence to explore the feasibility of a Hunter offshore wind farm, a project which has shrunk from eight to two megawatts since the government announced it last year.
The licence area does not include Port Stephens, where fishing enthusiasts had led a Dutton-backed campaign against floating wind turbines off the Nelson Bay coast.
