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India’s pursuit of nuclear – fraught with obstacles

India’s desperate pursuit of nuclear energy risky the New Nation, bangladesh, Savvy Soumya Misra October 19, 2009 Ever since the Indo-US nuclear deal signed in October last year lifted 34-year-old global sanctions that denied India access to the international atomic energy market, including uranium, Delhi has been on a shopping spree, buying nuclear fuel and reactors.India has signed civil nuclear agreements with France, USA, South Korea and Russia in the past 18 months…………………

setting energy targets is easier than meeting them. Even if India gets uranium immediately and overcomes the fear Chernobyl and Three Mile Island accidents evoke, several bottlenecks remain. Long timeframes and delays are one. Nuclear energy is capital-intensive and delays result in cost overruns, making it even more expensive.

For any foreign company to set up shop in India it will take a couple of years for regulation clearances and approvals. Add another minimum 10 years for a reactor to be ready. Only Russians, who have been working with India and have their designs approved, are likely to set up reactors within four-five years.

The second bottleneck is technology. Fast breeder reactors necessary for the second stage of India’s nuclear programme are fraught with financial and health risks……………

Plutonium used in them is 30,000 times more radioactive than uranium-235 used in heavy water reactors. Fast reactors generate a lot of heat in very small volume and use molten metals, like liquid sodium, to remove the heat. Since sodium burns on contact with air or water, a leak can be dangerous. These reactors are also costly to build and maintain, though they partially solve the problem of disposing of plutonium-rich spent fuel.

Worldwide, fast breeder reactors have been abandoned. The Superphénix reactor in France was shut down in 1997 after a sodium leak and a roof cave-in. Russia began constructing one in 1987 but did not finish it. Japan shut down its Monju reactor after a fire caused by a sodium leak. The US and Germany pursued large breeder programmes for several decades before abandoning them………………..

In India, health hazards from nuclear power plants have always been swept under the carpet. In 2007, physicist V Pugazhendhi of the Doctors for Safer Environment released a study on the incidence of autoimmune thyroid disease among women in and around Kalpakkam, where the prototype fast reactor is under construction. It showed the disease affected 24 per cent women within a radius of 5 km from the plant. It reduced to 6 per cent within a 40 km radius and to 0.8 per cent in 400 km.

The New Nation – Internet Edition

October 19, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 1, business and costs, India | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear spin, nuclear wastes, radiation, radioactive, uranium