The Hindu Business Line : US soft-pedals nuclear power

Experts on nuclear power and firms which were in the business of investment in, and construction of, nuclear power projects in the US have begun taking a cautious line in contrast to the euphoria that prevailed following the enactment of the Energy Policy Act 2005. That Act was intended to give a fillip to the generation of nuclear power by providing tax breaks, loan guarantees and subsidies on an unprecedented scale to investors and builders.

For instance, it envisages tax credits of up to $125 million for eight years, loan guarantees with virtually no ceiling, and shared application costs, besides other concessions made available by States in the form of local tax breaks and limits on liability for catastrophic accidents. There will also be insurance coverage at government expense to compensate for the costs of delays caused by having to comply with the conditions imposed and queries raised by regulatory bodies.

(Areva, the company which is building a 1600 MW nuclear plant in Finland attributes its being two years behind schedule and incurring an expenditure of $2.1 billion in excess of the initial estimate to the slowing down of the work because of the regulatory commission’s constant queries requiring submission of 40,000 documents so far! Interestingly, one of the queries seems to have been on the endangering of safety standards by the high water content of the concrete supplied by an Indian firm.)

Notwithstanding the range of incentives incorporated in the Energy Policy Act, the outlook in the US is discouraging, with all the mighty push the Bush Administration has been giving to nuclear power right from 2001. Applications for new nuclear power plants filed before the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission is nowhere near the quantum needed to take the percentage from around 20 per cent as at present to the desired minimum of 80 per cent by 2025. The guarded response is understandable: Apart from the phenomenal outlay, made worse by cost-and-time over-runs that are routine in nuclear power projects, and the scarcity of construction materials, essential components and skilled technical manpower, the bugbears of speculation and price-fixing at unjustified levels by cartels attendant on the trading of uranium in world markets are acting as a damper.

Measly record

These worries are compounded by the need to replace the obsolescent designs for nuclear power stations with the ones that will endure for the next 60 years. Then, there is also the question of the mode and locations of disposal of radio-active waste on which governments, environmentalists and the nuclear power industry are at loggerheads.

These problems can only take a far more aggravated dimension in Indian conditions.

The measly record whereby, after 60 years after Independence, there are only 3310 MWs of nuclear power on the ground, makes nonsense of all talk of building 20,000MW to 40,000 MW by 2025 (at 1,500-3,000 MW per year) or even by 2050 (at 500-800 MW in a steady and sustained manner), even assuming that financial resources of the order of Rs 300,000-600,000 crore (at Rs 15 crore per megawatt of construction) can be mobilised, transfer of technology, delivery of equipment, machinery and key components, and supply of uranium fuel will proceed without a hitch from beginning to end and regulatory authorities will keep a tight hold on safeguards without succumbing to temptations and pressures.

As one who was a member of the Expert Group on Energy in the mid-1980s and earlier for 15 years in the energy sector, I feel that the share of nuclear power cannot be raised to any significant extent by the nuclear deal and the best course for India is to take the path, as advocated by Mr Abdul Kalam, of energy-independence via the three stage thorium route.

B. S. RAGHAVAN