The first part of a series on the risks and high cost of India's ambitious civilian nuclear programme.
While India has set a very ambitious nuclear power generation target of sixty-three thousand megawatt (MW) by 2030, it has not adequately debated the risks to such a large programme arising from accidents and terrorism, nor has there been a great focus on costs.
In the Rajya Sabha two weeks ago, Shiv Sena MP Mohan Rawale highlighted the perceived high cost of nuclear power generation. He said that nuclear power's capital cost of Rs nine crore per megawatt (MW) would force consumers to pay a high price for nuclear electricity. In reply to Rawale, the minister of state for power, Jairam Ramesh, disputed the high cost attributed to nuclear power. While not producing data in support of his argument, Ramesh nevertheless claimed that nuclear power was as competitive as coal power. He said coal power turned expensive when generated by a power plant located more than eight hundred kilometers from a coal mine.
But Ramesh's defense of nuclear power does not convince another MP besides Rawale, Sitaram Yechury of the CPI-M. In April last, while calling the Indo-US nuclear deal "dangerous", Yechury said that nuclear power cost Rs eleven crore per megawatt (MW), Rs two crore per megawatt more than Rawale's estimate. To meet the country's nuclear power generation target of sixty three thousand megawatt by 2030, extraordinarily large capital investments have, therefore, to be made. If Rawale's figure of Rs nine crore megawatt is taken, it would cost Rs 5,67,000 crore. On the other hand, if Yechury's data is used, then the capital cost to meet the same target is still higher: Rs 6,93,000 crore.
Besides this, there is another variable, which is uranium. In the absence of safe, commercially viable and proliferation-resistant breeder (which generates and consumes plutonium to make power) and thorium reactors, the accent around the world is to make variants of natural uranium or low-enriched uranium-fuelled reactors. This means there is great stress on the available uranium resources, which are limited in addition to being a severely restricted export commodity. There is one estimate that "if enough nuclear fission reactors were built to meet most of the world's demand for electricity, exploitable resources of uranium would be exhausted in about fifteen to twenty years".
What happens then to the several hundred lakh crore of capital investments in uranium- fuelled nuclear reactors? But even before the total exhaustion of uranium worldwide (which will never happen because the US, China and Russia will certainly hoard uranium for their own weapons' use), supply constraints will shoot up the cost of imported uranium, putting nuclear power beyond the reach of common consumers, most of whom in India are poor.
To be fair, the two one thousand megawatt reactors each being built by Russia in Kundankulam in Tamil Nadu cost capital-wise Rs 6.59 crore per megawatt but these two were planned in the Nineties and have been under construction since 2001. The costs have gone up on these reactors too and India would conceivably have to pay more to the Russians, even though they are part financed by Russian soft loan. New reactors coming from Russia would conform closer to the per megawatt cost calculated by the Shiv Sena MP Mohan Rawale. Since France, the US and possibly Japan are also keen to set up and operate nuclear reactors here, nuclear power generation costs could go still higher, closer to Sitaram Yechury's estimate.
The second issue relates to the physical security of nuclear reactors, fuel complexes, and associated facilities. Following the Bombay terror attacks, the Kalpakkam nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu and a ten-kilometre radius around it was declared a "no fly zone". The Atomic Energy Commission chairman, Anil Kakodkar, said that security of nuclear plants across the country was being reviewed. In the past, there was a specific threat to Kalpakkam from the tiny LTTE air wing.
Reactor containment structures are usually built to withstand earthquakes measuring up to seven Richter and such structures are also claimed to be able to survive a direct attack from a fighter jet. But these claims still remain theoretical, because no functioning reactor anywhere in the world has been targeted. The Israelis destroyed Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981 but it was under construction.
The point is, while reactors have to be built strong, they cannot be completely protected especially in war-time or warlike situations. In war, reactor protection will be part of keeping the skies clear off enemy fighter aircraft and bombers (not to speak of incoming missiles). But these are barely fail-proof. If heavy bombers go after reactors, God save the country.
It is assumed that opposing air forces are not insane to attack functioning reactors. India and Pakistan have an agreement not to target each other's reactors. They exchange reactors' lists and locations. They did so yesterday again. So far, the agreement not to attack nuclear facilities has held. Any attack on a reactor would escalate into a full-blown nuclear confrontation.
But even if state air forces don't target reactors, LTTE terrorists and jihadis can. Though the government denied it, the media reported of a US warning that the Lashkar-e-Toiba was planning to attack India's aircraft carrier, INS Viraat, undergoing life-extension at the Cochin shipyard. From attacking a warship to targeting an operational nuclear reactor with all its terrifying consequences may display a quantum jump in jihadi fanaticism, but it is not inconceivable for that reason.
On that score of terrorist threats to Indian nuclear reactors, we have only the government's word that things are under control. If Bombay can be held to ransom for sixty-two hours by ten terrorists, you fear for the security of Indian nuclear establishments.
The thing about nuclear reactors is that above a size, say, exceeding one thousand megawatt (MW) generating capacity, they have all to be set up on the seacoast for availability of vast water sources for cooling. The Bombay terror attacks have advertised India's nonexistent coastal security.
According to a Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) study, "nuclear plants of capacity between one thousand and sixteen-hundred megawatt will generally be constructed at coastal sites so that along with cooling requirements it will be easier to transport heavy equipment to the plant. Further it will also facilitate transportation of new and spent fuel on a regular basis. India has a long coastline and it will be easier to identify eight to ten coastal sites suitable for large nuclear power complexes. At each of these sites, a nuclear island of around six thousand megawatt capacity can be created."
Taken at its full scope, the Indo-US nuclear deal will facilitate setting up of more than thirty large reactors. If these are clustered in islands as the CII study indicates, then it represents mega targets for terrorists. Hitting one functional nuclear reactor is apocalyptic enough. Imagine smashing up three or four of them together. Does India have the capability to protect such outsized targets for terrorists, given what has happened in Bombay?
In Parliament during a discussion on the Bombay terror attacks, Sitaram Yechury made an interesting observation about the Indo-US nuclear deal. He said that it signaled India's strategic proximity to the United States, and, therefore, India would commensurately be more vulnerable to attacks from anti-US terrorists. He alleged that India has not factored this and thus left the country more vulnerable as the Bombay attacks revealed.
India's foreign minister, Pranab Mukherjee, swiftly denied any link between the Indo-US nuclear deal and the terror attacks. While such a link may not be obvious, Yechury pointed to it as a factor making India extra vulnerable to terrorism. There may be a point to what Yechury says. In other words, while the giant nuclear reactor complexes which will be commissioned in the coming years are horribly attractive terrorist targets, the fact of India's growing strategic closeness to the US increases their vulnerability by several degrees. Charles D.Ferguson of the US Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) made the same points two years ago.
No comments:
Post a Comment