nuclear-news

Strangely, India’s govt is ignoring the worldwide rethink about nuclear power

Unpredictable financial implications associated with constructing, running, decommissioning plants and handling nuclear risks are causing a rethink on nuclear energy worldwide. But these developments seem to slip by India without so much as causing a ripple…..

This renaissance is just a fairy tale, THE HINDU, 15 June 12, NITYANAND JAYARAMAN  The unpredictable financial implications of constructing, running, decommissioning plants and handling risks are causing a global rethink on nuclear energy

For a professed proponent of liberalisation and free trade, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s penchant for a technology that cannot float without subsidies is telling. Nuclear power’s unfavourable economics are not lost on Dr. Singh.
Recently, Westinghouse Electric and Nuclear Power Corporation of India
Limited (NPCIL) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to
negotiate the setting up of AP1000 reactors in Gujarat, ending a slump
in interest from the Toshiba subsidiary in India’s nuclear market. For
Toshiba’s Westinghouse and other nuclear equipment suppliers, the
Civil Nuclear Liability Act’s clause on supplier liability was the key
hurdle to investing in India. The companies wanted the Indian
government to insulate them from the financial fallouts of any
potential disaster caused by their technology by spreading that
liability among taxpayers. The recent MoU suggests some progress in
moving towards this goal.

More obstacles remain, though. Nuclear projects are un-bankable. The
government may deploy mental health specialists to deal with the fears
of Kudankulam protestors. But those shrinks are unlikely to be able to
allay the fears of financiers or nuclear equipment suppliers.
According to nuclear energy expert Peter Bradford, “The most
implacable enemy of nuclear power in the past 30 years has been the
risk not to public health but to investors’ wallets. No nuclear power
project has ever bid successfully in a competitive energy market
anywhere in the world.” Mr. Bradford was member of the U.S. Nuclear
Regulatory Commission and chair of the New York and Maine electricity
regulatory commissions. He teaches a course on nuclear power at the
Vermont Law School.

Second thoughts

Unpredictable financial implications associated with constructing, running, decommissioning plants and handling nuclear risks are causing a rethink on nuclear energy worldwide. But these developments seem to slip by India without so much as causing a ripple…..
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article3528968.ece

June 16, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general