PRIME MINISTER IN THE WELL OF DARKNESS OF KUDANKULAM REACTORS

PRIME MINISTER IS WRIGGLING IN THE DUNGEON OF DARKNESS OF

KUDANKULAM REACTOR SAFETY

Prof.T.Shivaji Rao, Director, Environmental Studies, GITAM University, Visakhapatnam.


http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2012/9789241503662_eng.pdf 

[Source Terms for Fukushima Accident deduced  by Experts]

During the British days we used to hate  a Prime Ministers like Sir Winston Churchill who used to staunchly oppose the grant of freedom to India by his indecent statements like

 "Power will go to rascals, rogues, freebooters…, All leaders will be of low caliber and men of straw…, They'll have sweet tongues & silly hearts…., They will fight amongst themselves for power and the two countries India and Pakistan will be lost in political squabbles…, A day would come when even air & water will be taxed."  

 Churchill could predict this because he could visualize what kind of political set-up, bureaucratic and Education system the Britishers are leaving behind them. After 65 years of Independence we are realizing that he made a true forecast of what was in store for the good people of a social welfare state.  Mahatma Gandhi also had a vision of the Indian Administration and its impact on the health and welfare of millions of people in our democratic social welfare state.

1] Gandhiji and Indira Gandhi wanted the educated people to fight against social evils

 In August 1947 when Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru was occupying the seat of power as Prime Minister Gandhiji warned us that “Today I am putting Nehruji on the thrown and I call him as the uncrowned Kind of India.  He is a human being.   To err is human.  During the administration of this country he is likely to commit some mistakes of omission and commission and they must be corrected in the larger interests of the people of this country with a great heritage.  Gandhiji questioned the people who gathered on the occasion “who will correct the mistakes being committed by Prime Minister? His Ministers will be embarrassed to correct such mistakes. His bureaucrats also will not come forward to correct such mistakes as obedient servants of the state.  Then who will take the responsibility of correcting the mistakes made by a Prime Minister who himself declares “I feel proud that I am the first servant of the people”.  Hence Gandhiji exhorted thus “It is YOU people of this great state who should unhesitatingly come forward to correct the mistakes committed by a Prime Minister and his office failing which you are unfit as responsible citizens of this great social welfare state for which thousands of patriotic people lost their lives and properties to liberate the holy motherland from the clutches of the despotic foreign rule. 

Even a patriotic and Environmentally oriented Prime Minister like Mrs.Indira Gandhi fully grasped the evolving new forces bent upon making illegal money at any cost within shortest possible time are eagerly waiting for taking up development projects that provide tonnes and tonnes of corruption money by planning and executing them by violating the Environmental ethics and the United Nations slogan of Development without destruction.  In order to safeguard public health and National interest she amended Article 51 A of the constitution by adding sub clause “g” stipulating that it is the fundamental duty of every citizen to protect the Environmental Assets like air and water resources, forests and wild life and to develop compassion for all creatures.   

http://indiankanoon.org/doc/867010/

2)  People must fight against wrong methods of development in preference to right methods:

 Inspite of all these constitutional provisions the states and Central Government are violating the rules and regulations of the Environmental protection Act and thereby paving the way for growing ecological destruction and accelerating Environmental pollution that cause increased levels of mortality and morbidity, poverty, unemployment and social unrest which are the enemies of peace and national prosperity.  Today the Prime Minister of India is on the path of committing mistakes in the administration by promoting national policies which are against national economy and public welfare and for this purpose he is under the pressure from vested interests like the business lobby the politicians and the bureaucrats who want to earn illegal money at any cost by taking up development projects through implementing of wrong methods that result in large scale health and economic losses in preference to the right methods of development that promote public health, national economy and sustainable development of the states and the nation.  In order to illustrate how the state and central Government are promoting unproductive, suicidal and wrong methods of development in preference to right methods of development in the case of improper development of nuclear power plants can be taken as an example.

http://parisaramahiti.kar.nic.in/PDF/Radio_talk_english/chapter_wise/biodiversity/bio6.pdf

3) Debate on safety of nuclear power and its negligible contribution to national power needs:

Recently the Prime Minister without attempting to know the true facts about the safety of nuclear power and its negligible contribution for the total electrical power production in India he is trying  to blame the NGO organizations who are showing their patriotic enthusiasm for safeguarding the public health and welfare against the onslaught of a killer nuclear power plant at Kudankulam which when exposed to an accident for one reason or the other  is going to cause ruination of public health and natural resources resulting in economic losses worth more than Rs.4 lakh crores.  The Prime Minister is thinking that Kudankulam nuclear plant is a holy cow and he does not know that the Shoreham Nuclear Power plant was closed down in USA just before it was likely to go into production of electricity for the reason that its functioning posed a threat to the lives of lakhs of people and their environment.   The Prime Minister is ignorant of the fact that many nuclear plants in USA were closed due to their malfunctioning and he is blind to the fact that the Indiana Nuclear Power Plant near New York is opposed by several non-Government organizations and also the national nuclear regulatory authorities because it was found that it is not feasible to implement the emergency response systems and disaster management consequent to a potential nuclear plant accident like the one at Fukushima.  Hence the contention of the nuclear plant promoters that nobody has a right to stop the operation of a completed nuclear reactor is highly wrong when people consider it as a threat to the lives and to the unique ecological systems over which they eke-out their livelihood.  The Prime Minister and Nuclear authorities should not forget that the people have got a right to life, a right to health and livelihood.  Infact the Prime Minister is kept in jails of darkness on nuclear safety by the vested interests in the atomic energy agency, the contractors, politicians and the officials who themselves are completely ignorant of what is meant by nuclear safety.

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2012/02/kudankulam-nuclear-bomb-over-tamilnadu.html

Prime Minister should realise that these concerns arose only  after millions of Indians watched on their TV screens, the traumatic nuclear disaster at Fukushima last year which made the thinking Chancellor of Germany to confirm that nuclear safety is a myth after discussions with the experts and ordered for phasing out of all the reactors in Germany by resorting to implementation of alternative energy source.   To brush aside such public concerns through a simplistic statement based on unscientific impressions and inappropriate briefing by DAE is to close one's eyes to the harsh reality of the most expensive and highly hazardous nuclear power and its inherent risks to mankind and natural ecological systems all over the world.   To say that the minority that supports nuclear energy is the only “thinking segment” of the population is to belittle the inherent intellect of the majority of the society whose consent has not been taken for enacting an anti-peoples law on nuclear liability which is intended to help the foreign suppliers of nuclear reactors by transferring the economic burden of compensating the victims of a nuclear accident over the poor Indians whose consent has not been taken for such a major decision effecting their health and economy.   This also amounts to belittle and blunt the voice of dissent in a democracy like ours.

The Prime Minister may have realised by now that the Fukushima accident has already cost the Japanese tax payer US$ 16 billion and the liability is likely to increase further in the coming months, whereas the Indian Civil Nuclear Liability law that has been enacted at his behest places a ceiling of only Rs.1,500 crores (equivalent to US$ 300 million) on what India can claim from the foreign reactor suppliers, in the event of a similar accident.  The nuclear reactor suppliers in United States do not believe in the safety of their own reactors and hence are not in a position to convince the American Insurance companies to  provide them with Insurance to cover the costs of paying the compensation to the victims of a nuclear accident and hence have influenced the US Government to legislate on Price-Anderson Act which pays to the victims about $12 billion as compensation and the US Government will ultimately have to pay additional amount from the national budget and thereby pass on the burden over to the heads of the poor tax payers.  Thus when the nuclear safety is not believed by the very manufacturers how can any thinking Indian Prime Minister blindly believe  the wrong advise being given to him by the ecologically illiterate experts of the Department of Atomic Energy on matters of nuclear safety as envisaged by the experts of the International Atomic Energy Agency.  Without placing the detailed environmental impact analysis reports and the risk analysis reports of Kudankulam nuclear plant before the intellectuals and the general public of the region how can the Prime Minister blame that some vested interests are agitating against the nuclear plant while the concerned activists themselves are fighting for public safety to ensure their right to life and the right to livelihood which are being threatened by the ill-conceived location of hazardous major nuclear reactors in a vulnerable area around Kudankulam.   The common people have abundant commonsense and hence they can rightly think what is a right method  of development as distinguished by a wrong method of development that either contributes to their wellbeing or destroys their livelihood and they alone should make the proper choice. 

4) Prime Ministers wrong assessment on energy contribution of Kudankulam reactors:

Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh is highly wrong in stating that with regard to the Kudankulam plant NGOs, mostly  based in the United States, don't appreciate the need for our country to increase the energy supply. Prime Minister is kept in ignorance by his ministers and officials who promote scams like the 2G spectrum for making money as they are not patriotic nor accountable to the people.   If there are honest thinkers in his advisory group, they would have told him that the Energy needs are met to an extent of 64, 23, 10 and 3 percent are provided by Thermal, hydro-power, renewable and Nuclear power respectively and hence if we increase thermal power from 64 to 68 percent, we do not need Nuclear power at all as it is a highly risky and most costly option.  Instead of importing nuclear reactors, we can as well import additional fossil fuels to protect public health and National economy.

Moreover the Nuclear power authorities are merely bluffing on the safety of Reactors inspite of the accidents in USA, Russia and Japan.  People are right in fighting against Kudankulam as they have a right to life and right to livelihood which are bound to be affected by the Kudankulam reactors which are hazardous

5)  Nuclear safety is not only reactor safety but also public safety as envisaged by the guidelines of the IAEA and  npcil is ignorant of safety:

Nuclear Reactor safety is not only based primarily on proper design and construction of the nuclear plant including the engineered multi-layered safety features under the policy of defence indepth but also secondarily by demonstration of the proof in terms of the skills and abilities of the nuclear plant authorities and the local state government and panchayat institutions to not only chalk out but also implement the public health protection measures has contemplated by the emergency preparedness plans to be activated during the course of the travel of the radioactive plume caused by the accidental nuclear plant explosion..  

http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/emergency/petitionforrulemaking22012.pdf

http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1273_web.pdf

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2012/02/kudankulam-nuclear-bomb-over-tamilnadu.html

Nuclear safety consists of firstly reactor safety secondly operational safety and thirdly Environmental safety.  Public safety deals with Environmental safety that involves the preparation of an Environmental Impact Assessment reports including risk analysis, reactor accident scenario and Emergency Response and Management and Emergency Evacuation Drill which established the feasibility or failure of Emergency system as originally contemplated by the plant authorities as and the public whose lives and properties must be protected by providing the required measures of unfailing safety and security.   Nuclear plant properties are propagating reactor safety only and do not speak on operational safety that deals with human failure as and they do not speak about Environmental safety that deals with human and animal populations and their properties as reflected by the Emergency Planning zones of the first order coming upto 16km and ingestion zone of the second order covering upto 80km from the reactor accident site.  According to the principles of Nuclear safety stipulated by IAEA guidelines ten aspects of safety have to be fulfilled as formulated under the website.   It is not feasible to implement even Environmental safety either the reactor sizes must be down graded or the location for the plant has to be changed after placing the EIA and Risk Analysis reports before the people for public hearing to suggestions  from them. Since no  hearing has been held as per rules.  The plant cannot be permitted to be opened at all and  it needs to be closed immediately without knowing these facts Prime Minister cannot propagate on safety of the plant and should scrap it at once.

6)Prime Ministers wrong views on energy and safety aspects of Kudankulam nuclear plant:

There are two crucial points that are worrying the Prime Minister on Kudankulam Nuclear plant crisis.  The first doubt raised by the Prime Minister is to question that the NGO’s agitating against the Kudankulam plant do not appreciate the need of our country to increase energy supply.  The second doubt of the Prime Minister is reflected in the words of Nuclear Energy promoter Dr.Kakodkar who said that it is strange that a large project ready for implementation (Kudankulam reactors) which has met all safety requirements even environmental  and when the tremendous shortage of electricity. The country is development should become the hostage to anti-nuclear agitators under foreign influences.  Even high school students who think naturally in national interest and the interests of their future generations will provide simple solutions to the above problems. Firstly all the people including the anti-nuclear activists do greatly appreciate the need of the country to increase its energy supplies.  The only difference between the strategies to be followed for the purpose are based on right methods of energy supplies by the anti nuclear activists who present alternative energy sources while the nuclear proponents follow the wrong methods of power supplies by means of the killer nuclear plants which are not only very costly but are also highly risky as can be seen from the facts and figures and the websites.  Today out of the total electricity produced by thermal, hydro-power, renewable sources and nuclear power respectively.  Hence if only w increase the power production by increasing the use of thermal power generation, there is no need at all to use the most riskiest, highly expensive and environmentally destructive nuclear power plants.  Hence the Government can follow the right in place of the wrong methods of development for producing more energy at the least cost.   See websites:

7) Prime Minister must discuss with German Chancellor on myths of nuclear power:

Like a doubting Thomas the Prime Minister is half heartedly propagating that nuclear power is very safe but he is refusing to know the true facts on nuclear safety by discussing the subject matter with his counter- part the Chancellor of Angela Merkel who confirmed that safety of nuclear power is a myth and decided to phase-out all  nuclear plants in Germany within the near future.  The Prime Minister can also discuss with a patriotic Chief Minister like Mamata Banerjee to know that nuclear safety is a myth and hence she refused permission to locate a nuclear plant in West Bengal.  The Prime Minister can also obtain detailed information on how the people of Andhra Pradesh were educated through mass media on the hazards of nuclear power plant proposed at Nagarjunasagar dam during 1990’s and how the anti-nuclear activists could stop the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh and the Prime Minister of India to give up the proposed nuclear plant under these circumstances the Prime Minister must realize that in democracy it is the people that are the masters and not the selfish bureaucrats, politicians, contractors and officials who can dictate on what development projects promote public health and welfare and national economy and what projects results in public health and economic ruination of the states and country in the long run so one has to think twice before one takes to a blind leap.

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/kudankulam-nuclear-plant-explosion.html
http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/09/why-indian-nuclear-plants-are-bound-to.html
http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/people-question-experts-on-safety-of.html
http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/08/diaster-consequences-of-kovvada-nuclear.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/violation-of-nuclear-accident-emergency.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/why-nuclear-accidents-are-difficult-to.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/jaitapur-nuclear-plant-explosion.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2010/04/nuclear-plant-risks-srikakulam-district.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2012/02/kudankulam-nuclear-bomb-over-tamilnadu.html

 http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/violation-of-nuclear-accident-emergency.html  

 http://www.qfpost.com/file/d?g=bcd0d58ef8

NUCLEAR SAFETY IMPOSSIBLE EVEN WITH ADVANCED REACTORS

Prof.T.Shivaji Rao,

Director, Center for Environmental Studies, GITAM University, Visakhapatnam
 http://www.ib.cnea.gov.ar/~protrad/biblioteca/3Accidentes.pdf     
see details undder Serial Nos.369,722,729,812,857,877,and 1012[Accidents ,Nuclear]
http://archive.greenpeace.org/comms/nukes/chernob/rep02.html 
[accidents ,nuclear]

http://www.uottawa.ca/services/ehss/ionizconversion.htm  [conversion Units]

http://www.klimaatkeuze.nl/wise/monitor/644/4 (Safety impacted by terrorist attacks)

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/kudankulam-nuclear-plant-explosion.html 

http://www.tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/why-nuclear-accidents-are-difficult-to.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/09/why-indian-nuclear-plants-are-bound-to.html

http://www.dianuke.org/koodankulam-nuclear-plant-risk-analysis-and-what-to-expect/   

http://www.dianuke.org/koodankulam-sasikumar/

http://www.dianuke.org/koodankulam-sasikumar-3/

http://www.dianuke.org/koodankulam-nuclear-plant-risk-analysis-on-spent-fuel-part-4/

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/people-question-experts-on-safety-of.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2010/04/nuclear-plant-risks-srikakulam-district.html  

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/08/diaster-consequences-of-kovvada-nuclear.html

http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2011/09/disaster-planning-due-to-nuclear.html 

http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2011/09/us-reactolrs-have-security-but-europes.html

http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2011/09/shalll-indians-go-bankrupt-if-one.html

http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2011/08/unsafe-nuclear-reactors-in-india.html

http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2011/08/nuclear-power-is-inherently-hazardous.html

AS  AN IRRITATED SNAKE  KILLS A MAN, NUCLEAR PLANTS SILENTLY  KILL  MANKIND AND NATURE FOR  FINANCIAL GAINS BY CONTRACTORS,OFFICIALS& POLITICIANS ?

Nuclear Plants are just silent killers of man and Nature created by the GOD. In nature the Uranium ore contains 99.3% of Uranium-238 and the remaining 0.7% is Uranium-235.  Uranium-238 and Uranium-235  in nature are least harmful.  But business people and other vested interests dig the iron ore and  convert  the least harmful Uranium-235  into the fuel form of Uranium-235  by purifying it to make a fuel by enriching it to about 4% of Uranium-235 that is packed in pellets and inserted into the core of the nuclear reactor for producing both electricity and material for making the bombs.   The reactor  when the nuclear atom is given a blow  by a neutron, enormous heat and other poisonous Radio-active atoms like Xenon, Barium, Cesium, Strontium, Plutonium and other dangerous radioactive substances are produced.  These radioactive substances are discharged into the air and water by several ways and  when they enter into the environment consisting of air, water and soil and foods like vegetables, fishes, prawns they ultimately get into human beings and produce cancers and birth defects in generations of people for many decades to come.  These poisonous radioactive substances  destroy natural and human life and culture and convert lands upto hundreds of kilometers into permanent nuclear burial grounds for ever.

How harmless Uranium ore materials in nature are converted into destructive and killer materials by man can be understood by the following simple example. For instance king cobras live in nature in anthills in forests and lead their normal life peacefully by catching their prey for food during nights But greedy people go and poke their iron rods into their abodes and disturb the Cobras when they become angry and bite the trespassers to inflict death over them by their poisons.   Similarly, the selfish people are mining the harmless Uranium and converting it into harmful  Enriched Uranium and then using it to produce electricity by means of the Nuclear plants and in the process they are producing Radioactive pollutants that poison man and nature slowly due to routine releases of radioactivity into the environment.  In course of time if an accident occurs in the Nuclear plant due to several reasons like in Fukushima or Chernobyl, the poisonous pollutants are thrown into the atmosphere and they kill thousands of people slowly and inflict cancer to millions of people living downstream upto hundreds of Kilometers as in case of Fukushima and Chernobyl accidents. The Nuclear plant operators are misleading the public by stating that Nuclear power is safe and cheap just like the medical representatives of various pharmaceutical companies praise before the doctors about the virtues of their medical tablets and tonics as part of their sale promotion activity the nuclear authorities are praising the nuclear plants as safe and cheap energy producers which is wrong.  This misinformation is dangerous to public health and welfare because in European states almost all people agree that safety of Nuclear (power is a Myth as accepted by Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany. She had consulted the genuine experts on nuclear plants and realized that nuclear safety is a myth and ordered for gradual closure of all the nuclear plants in Germany.  If Indian Prime Minister and Union Cabinet Ministers including the Chief Ministers of the state want to know the truth about the safety of the nuclear power plants they must go and visit advanced countries like Germany and Japan  and discuss the issue with foreign experts  so that they can refrain from promoting nuclear plants as is done by the peoples leader like Mamata Banerjee, Chief Minister of West Bengal.   For more scientific details see the above web sites on this topic prepared by independent experts.

Environmental Impact Analysis report are fabricated by consultants according to the national Green Tribunal and also according to the Chief Justice of India, S.H.Kapadia  who said “If you leave report preparation to the project proponent, I am sorry to say the person who pays will get the answers he asks for” and hence he called for a change in the system of preparation of EIA reports for the development projects.  See website:  http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2886141.ece

 

The Nuclear Power Corporation of India and Atomic Energy officials are taking a anti national stand by propagating that the large sized advanced nuclear plants with passive nuclear safety reactors are absolutely safe.  In fact they are propagating that the Kudankulam nuclear plant is indeed one of the safest nuclear plants built in the world.  The reactor contains multiple overlapping safety features including passive safety systems like passive heat removal systems, hydrogen recombines and core catchers which make it a unique Engineering feat which can withstand the most stressful condition and avoid catastrophic events like the Fukushima reactor explosions.  The above false claims being made by the officials of the Atomic Energy establishment for the proposed multiple unit reactors at Kudankulam, Jaitapur, Kovvada and Bhavnagar may one day cause Fukushima type accidents due to several causes including Bombing by terrorists http://www.tmia.com/old-website/threat.html]  [http://www.klimaatkeuze.nl/wise/monitor/554/5315] and  missile attacks, sabotage, meteor-hits, electrical, mechanical and  human failures. Russian Reactors are known to be prone to accidents of different grades [ http://www.klimaatkeuze.nl/wise/monitor/408/4041 ]  and the VVER reactors from Russia are likely to have similar accident –prone components in the Kudankulam Reactors Even most of the existing nuclear plants in India are CANDU reactors  using high pressure heavy water are located in Tamilnadu, Gujarat and Rajasthan and these reactors have already proved that they are not at all safe reactors to ensure public health and welfare and  their pollution levels in the environment are highly under-estimated by the Indian Nuclear Authorities and the same may be verified by browsing through the following websites to find out the true emissions from similar reactors in other countries abroad.

http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/Global/canada/report/2007/6/tritium-hazard-report-pollu.pdf

http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/Global/canada/report/2006/3/nuclear-reactor-hazards-ongoi.pdf

Thus the claims of Indian Atomic Energy experts on safety of existing reactors are unbelievable.

VIOLATION OF NUCLEAR SAFETY NORMS AND ENVIRONMENTAL  REGULATIONS:  

 The Government authorities are violating the regulations under the Environmental Protection Act and also the Atomic Energy regulation Acts in preparing the relevant reports on nuclear safety, nuclear plant explosion scenarios, risk analysis, Emergency Response Plans including disaster management. Even while considering nuclear reactor safety problems they are ignoring the potential pathways for causation of small accidents, medium accidents and large scale accidents which may lead to large scale explosions that cause national economic losses estimated at Rs.5 lakh crores   and such failures may make the Indian states and the nation to become not only economically bankrupt but also convert the healthy and prosperous land into nuclear burial ground.  In order to avoid this man-made disaster the millions of Indian people must understand how even the advanced nuclear reactors may fail in the long run.

http://www.tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2012/02/nuclear-safety-is-misunderstood-by.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/violation-of-nuclear-accident-emergency.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2011/10/kudankulam-nuclear-plant-explosion.html

 PASSIVE NUCLEAR SAFETY IMPOSSIBLE EVEN IN ADVANCED REACTORS:  

It must be understood that passive nuclear safety is merely a safety feature of a nuclear reactor that does not depend upon operator actions or electronic feed back to shut it down safely in case of an accident usually caused by overheating consequent to a loss of coolant accident.  These modern reactors rely on engineered components so that the anticipated behavior according to laws of physics will be slow rather than accelerate the nuclear reaction in those circumstances.  But in the case of older reactor designs the natural tendency for the reaction is to get accelerated rapidly due to increased temperatures so that either operator triggered intervention or electronic  feedback was needed to prevent damage to the reactor.  In considering the safety aspects of an advanced reactor the words “Passively Safe Reactor” is to be considered more as a description of the methods and strategy  employed to maintain a degree of safety rather than it is a description of the level of safety as clarified in the following examples.

 Whether a passive safety reactor is really safe or dangerous depends upon the criteria used to evaluate the safety level.   Advanced designs use both active and passive safety systems to make them more safer than older designs.  Reactor manufacturers brand them as “Passively safe” but this term causes confusion as compared with “inherently safe reactors” in the public view.  Actually there are no “Passive safe rectors or passively safe systems but only passively safe components  of safety systems exist.  Such safety systems are employed to control the reactor when it goes outside normal working conditions due to anticipated operational small scale failure occurrences or accidents while the control systems are used to operate the reactor under the normal working conditions.  A system sometimes combines both features.  Passive safety refers to various components of the safety system whereas  inherent safety refers to control system processes irrespective of the presence or absence of safety specific subsystems.  In an advanced reactor the passively safe reactors are the concrete walls and the steel liner while active systems operate by use of components like valves for prompt closure of the piping leading outside the containment, feed back of the reactor  status to the external instrumentation and control systems both of which need external power to function. 

The degree of passive safety of components are classified into 4 categories namely, A,B,C and D depending upon what the system does not make use of the parameters;

1. No moving working fluid,                2. No moving mechanical part

3. No signal inputs of intelligence,     4. No external power plant

Under Category A (1+2+3+4) falls the fuel cladding that uses none of these four parameters and the fuel cladding is always closed and maintains the fuel and fission products inside and is not open before it reaches the reprocessing plant.  

 Under category B (2+3+4) comes the surge line that connects the hot leg with the pressurizer and helps to control the pressure in the primary loop of a pressurized water reactor and it uses a moving working fluid to fulfill its mission. 

Under category C (3+4) comes the accumulator which does not require signal output of intelligence or external power.  When the pressure in the primary circuit drops below the set of point of the spring loaded accumulator valves, the valves open and the water is injected into the primary circuit by   compressed nitrogen.   

 Under   category   D (4 only) comes the scram which uses moving working fluids, moving mechanical parts and the signal inputs of intelligence but not the external power or forces.  The control rods drop by being driven by gravity once they have been released from the magnetic clamp.

Unfortunately nuclear safety engineering is never that simple.  Even when the rod is thus released it may not fulfill its function because it may get stuck up due to earthquake conditions or due to deformed core structure.  This clearly shows that though it is a passively safe system and has been properly actuated it may not fulfill its mission and nuclear engineers have considered this aspect.  Infact only a fraction of the rods dropped are enough to shut down the reactor.  Passive safety components are seen in almost all nuclear power plants like the containment, hydro-accumulators in the pressurized water reactors or pressure suppression systems in boiling water reactors.  The important issue is that no pumps are required to fulfill the function of a safety system and all the active components like valves and other components of the systems work with electric power from the batteries.

Passive safety is not synonymous with reliability or availability and even less with assured adequacy of safety features although several factors potentially adverse to anticipated performance can be more easily counter acted through passive design as per public perception.  But active designs using variable controls do permit much more precise fulfillment  of safety functions and this may be particularly useful under accident management conditions.   Many water cooled and moderated reactors when scramed cannot remove residual production and decay heat without either process heat transfer or the active cooling system.  In other words while the inherently safe heat transfer process provides a passive safety component and prevents excess heat in operational mode “ON” the same process does not provide a passive safe component in operational mode  “OFF  SCRAM”. The accident at Three Mile Island  nuclear plant exposed this design deficiency.  The reactor and steam generator were “OFF” but with loss of coolant it still suffered a partial melt down.  In the case of Kudankulam reactors although passive core cooling system provides some extra additional degree of safety components it has still a minor flaw of possible rusting  related to containment structure liner.  When the dome rusts through the shell and if it remains unattended for sometime in the highly corrosive coastal atmosphere at Kudankulam there is a definite possibility of expulsion of poisonous radioactive  pollutants into the atmosphere.  These new technologies do not take it into full consideration their design basis for handling the Tsunami type scenarios as underestimated in the case of Fukushima where multiple safety systems failed simultaneously.  Similar failures occurred in Bhopal industrial plant disaster.  Reactors with a few centimeters thick iron shell first  and many inches thick concrete shell on top of it can perhaps withstand the impact of only light airplane  crashes or other moving objects but cannot withstand serious missile attacks or meteorite crashes,  particularly when the reactor contains several soft pockets in and around the nuclear containment shell.  Infact about 15 to 25 pipeline penetrations in the containment shell allow process fluids to move from containment to turbine building and back.  Further more penetrations for compressed air system, instrumentation and control systems and power supply cable connections are provided and the designers must analyse the risk problems associated with the failure of these penetration plants.  During  the pipe rupture analysis certain assumptions that breakages will occur in these penetrations are made.  The reactors are located at lower level in the containment shell and if the containment is exposed to tsunami waves these penetrations may fail due to the impact of debris and other floating materials and consequently the containment gets flooded and the failure of critical components and systems become inevitable.

IF NUCLEAR REACTOR  SUPPLIERS DO NOT BELIEVE IN SAFETY, WHY SHOULD INDIANS BELIEVE IN IT?

The western countries like United states and Germany do not believe that nuclear power is safe.  The proof is provided by a few illustrations.  In Germany the Chancellor Ms.Angela Merkel discussed nuclear safety with the experts in the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear reactor explosion and concluded that nuclear safety is a myth and hence decided to phase out nuclear power plants in Germany.  Germans  are taking steps to provide energy to the people by means of alternative sources like wind, solar power, hydro-power and other fossil fuels which are safer and cheaper.  Infact the people in the United States and the nuclear power industry itself does not believe in the safety and economy of the nuclear power.  Consequently  after Three Mile Island  accident US has not promoted nuclear power for 3 decades .  That American contractors  do not believe in nuclear safety is proved by the enactment of the Price-Anderson Nuclear industries indemnity Act of 1957 which was expected to expire in 1967 but was recently extended to be in operation upto 2025.  This Act was passed in USA because no private Insurance company was willing to come forward  to grant insurance policy for nuclear plants to cover the true costs of the risks of nuclear reactor accidents.  If the American nuclear power industrialists plan to convince the public that nuclear  power is absolutely safe they must actively campaign to repeal the Price-Anderson Act and express their willingness to pay the real costs of compensation to the victims of the accident caused by the risky behavior of the plant.  It was originally expected that within 10 years from 1957 the reactor manufacturers would be able to overcome all the problems connected with nuclear safety and thereby demonstrate the insurance companies about the safety of the reactors and purchase the required private insurance policies at market rate without depending upon any Government subsidies or interventions to protect the hazardous nuclear industry at the cost of the public health welfare and national economy. 

NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY CANNOT BE CENT PERCENT SAFE AS ACCIDENTS ARE BOUND TO OCCUR:

The concept of absolute safety of a nuclear reactor verges on the idealistic level while the achievement of a relatively safer reactor will always be possible.  Any system process or product is only as safe as our current knowledge of how to test for safety is balanced against our need to make it economically viable, ecologically sound and socially useful and acceptable. 

Even destructive testing is limited  to “known unknowns” because one cannot test for what one has not anticipated.  There will be always “unknown unknowns” to challenge the state of art in safety design and engineering.  For instance in the case of reactors nobody is going to design a reactor to withstand even the remote chances of a direct hit by a large meteorite or a freak powerful lightening strike that disables all electronics or an aerial bombing directly over the reactor that is powerful enough to rip most of the structures of a nuclear plant. 

The question on safety of reactors is not whether the present designs are safer and if so to what degree because any measures  taken will only just reduce the risk but do not eliminate it.  The actual danger with the nuclear reactors is not the likelihood of an accident but the potentially catastrophic consequences of the problem and thus truly safe reactor can never be achieved.  Even if the reactor failure occurs once in 1000 years for a Fukushima like accident it is still far too high because affected area due to radioactive contamination becomes uninhabitable in case of plutonium contamination for the next 2.5 lakh years.  Unlike most other forms of disaster like a dam collapse, a fire accident or an aeroplane crash there is no second chance after nuclear accident. 

No technology can be made 100% safe and accidents happen at anytime and anywhere.  Nothing can never be truly safe and the risks associated with nuclear plant failure can be reduced and mitigated.  Moreover the risks associated with nuclear waste disposal will last for such a long time extending over decades and centuries that any other alternative energy sources must be used even if they are costly.  No sane people living in present society have the right to take  such a risk in order to protect future generations because the Indian constitution provides guarantee to the right to life and the right to livelihood as well.

If the experts of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India and the Atomic Energy Commission, the Union Cabinet and the members of Parliament and state legislature honestly believe that nuclear plants are absolutely safe let them agitate for cancellation of the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act 2010 and prove to be millions of Indians that they are  truly known as patriotic in serving the cause of the nation as Mahatma Gandhi and other leaders who laid their lives in fighting for securing the freedom of India from the tyrannical rule of the imperialistic Britishers for ushering in a true welfare  state that uphold the traditional Indian slogan “SARVE JANA SUKHINO BHAVANTHU”

NUCLEAR SAFETY IS MISUNDERSTOOD BY INDIAN AUTHORITIES

Prof.T.Shivaji Rao,

Director, Center for Environmental Studies,

GITAM University,  Visakhapatnam.

http://www.tshivajirao.blogspot.in/2012/02/kudankulam-nuclear-bomb-over-tamilnadu.html

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jan2012/2012-01-04-091.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/17/opinion/is-indian-point-the-next-fukushima.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/kudankulam-nuclear-plant-explosion.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/09/why-indian-nuclear-plants-are-bound-to.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/10/people-question-experts-on-safety-of.html

http://tshivajirao.blogspot.com/2011/08/diaster-consequences-of-kovvada-nuclear.html
 http://bhujangam.blogspot.in/2012/02/nuclear-accident-in-usa-example-for.html
http://webthing.greenpeaceusa.org/nuclear_locator/?action=show_reactor&nuclear_reactor_id=39

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price%E2%80%93Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Liability_Bill

http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/aging/nrdcaccidentip1011.pdf

http://www.dianuke.org/why-concerned-people-and-not-government-experts-should-decide-on-safety-aspects-of-a-nuclear-plant/

http://www.dianuke.org/why-indian-reactors-are-bound-to-explode-in-the-longrun/

http://www.dianuke.org/koodankulam-unwarranted-and-misleading-official-rhetoric/

http://www.dianuke.org/npcil-experts-please-respond/

http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/aging/nrdcaccidentip1011.pdf
 

AS  AN IRRITATED SNAKE  KILLS A MAN, NUCLEAR PLANTS SILENTLY  KILL  MANKIND AND NATURE FOR  FINANCIAL GAINS BY CONTRACTORS,OFFICIALS& POLITICIANS ?

Nuclear Plants are just silent killers of man and Nature created by the GOD. In nature the Uranium ore contains 99.3% of Uranium-238 and the remaining 0.7% is Uranium-235.  Uranium-238 and Uranium-235  in nature are least harmful.  But business people and other vested interests dig the iron ore and  convert  the least harmful Uranium-235  into the fuel form of Uranium-235  by purifying it to make a fuel by enriching it to about 4% of Uranium-235 that is packed in pellets and inserted into the core of the nuclear reactor for producing both electricity and material for making the bombs.   The reactor  when the nuclear atom is given a blow  by a neutron, enormous heat and other poisonous Radio-active atoms like Xenon, Barium, Cesium, Strontium, Plutonium and other dangerous radioactive substances are produced.  These radioactive substances are discharged into the air and water by several ways and  when they enter into the environment consisting of air, water and soil and foods like vegetables, fishes, prawns they ultimately get into human beings and produce cancers and birth defects in generations of people for many decades to come.  These poisonous radioactive substances  destroy natural and human life and culture and convert lands upto hundreds of kilometers into permanent nuclear burial grounds for ever.

How harmless Uranium ore materials in nature are converted into destructive and killer materials by man can be understood by the following simple example. For instance king cobras live in nature in anthills in forests and lead their normal life peacefully by catching their prey for food during nights But greedy people go and poke their iron rods into their abodes and disturb the Cobras when they become angry and bite the trespassers to inflict death over them by their poisons.   Similarly, the selfish people are mining the harmless Uranium and converting it into harmful  Enriched Uranium and then using it to produce electricity by means of the Nuclear plants and in the process they are producing Radioactive pollutants that poison man and nature slowly due to routine releases of radioactivity into the environment.  In course of time if an accident occurs in the Nuclear plant due to several reasons like in Fukushima or Chernobyl, the poisonous pollutants are thrown into the atmosphere and they kill thousands of people slowly and inflict cancer to millions of people living downstream upto hundreds of Kilometers as in case of Fukushima and Chernobyl accidents. The Nuclear plant operators are misleading the public by stating that Nuclear power is safe and cheap just like the medical representatives of various pharmaceutical companies praise before the doctors about the virtues of their medical tablets and tonics as part of their sale promotion activity the nuclear authorities are praising the nuclear plants as safe and cheap energy producers which is wrong.  This misinformation is dangerous to public health and welfare because in European states almost all people agree that safety of Nuclear (power is a Myth as accepted by Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany. She had consulted the genuine experts on nuclear plants and realized that nuclear safety is a myth and ordered for gradual closure of all the nuclear plants in Germany.  If Indian Prime Minister and Union Cabinet Ministers including the Chief Ministers of the state want to know the truth about the safety of the nuclear power plants they must go and visit advanced countries like Germany and Japan  and discuss the issue with foreign experts  so that they can refrain from promoting nuclear plants as is done by the peoples leader like Mamata Banerjee, Chief Minister of West Bengal.   For more scientific details see the above web sites on this topic prepared by independent experts.

Environmental Impact Analysis report are fabricated by consultants according to the national Green Tribunal and also according to the Chief Justice of India, S.H.Kapadia  who said “If you leave report preparation to the project proponent, I am sorry to say the person who pays will get the answers he asks for” and hence he called for a change in the system of preparation of EIA reports for the development projects.  See website:  http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2886141.ece

According to the Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhiji, there are 7 social evils as enunciated by him:[Web site: http://www.mkgandhi.org/mgmnt.htm#commerce

1.Wealth without Work,

 2.Pleasure without Conscience,

 3.Knowledge without Character,

 4.Commerce  without Morality,  

 5. Science without Humanity,

 6.Religion without Sacrifice,

7.Politics Without Principle.

 Out of these social evils, the one on Science without Humanity seems to be more applicable in the present case of  nuclear plant authorities who are unscientifically justifying nuclear power proliferation Dr.Abdul Kalam who visited Nuclear Plant at Kudankulam where he asserted that there was no need for any panic as the reactor had sophisticated safety features and hence there is no need for panic since it is only a boon to the future generation.  He emphasized “I am a scientist, I am technologist, I support nuclear energy along with solar and wind power as it is a clean and green energy which is very much required for the country’s rapid growth now”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koodankulam_Nuclear_Power_Plant

The authorities  further stated that the reactors located at 13.5 m height would not be effected even by a Tsunami nor would an earthquake threaten them, as Kudankulam is not within any seismic zone.  The scientists have taken into account all these natural calamities before designing and fabricating the plant.  While 99% of the spent fuel would be processed for reuse in the reactors, the remaining one percent would be converted and protected within a thickly walled underground concrete containment and no waste from the reactor will be dumped in the sea.   The two 1,000 MWe VVER rectors are being constructed at Kudankulam with Russian assistance at an outlay of Rs.13,171 crores. The above statements made by Dr.Abdul Kalam clearly show that as a scientist and technologist , he is certifying the safety angle along with the non-environmental scientists and engineers of the nuclear power agencies. 

SAFETY PRINCIPLES SPECIFIED BY INTERNATIONAL EXPERT BODY TO BE FOLLOWED BY ALL COUNTRIES:

But according to the fundamental safety principles of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) there are 10 safety principles formulated by the experts on the basis of which safety requirements are developed and safety measures implemented to ensure comprehensive safety of the plant and the environment for ensuring sustainable development for public health and national prosperity.

 [http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1133_scr.pdf

http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1133_scr.pdf

1) First principle is Responsibility for safety must rest with the plant management responsible for facilities and activities that give rise to radiation risks.

2]Second principle pertains to role of the Governments that promotes an effective legal Governmental framework for safety including an independent regulatory  body to be established and sustained.

3]Third principle pertains to establishing and sustaining of an effective leadership and management for safety in the Organisational authorities dealing with the plant and its activities that are responsible for radiation risks.

4] Fourth principle deals with justification of facilities and activities that give rise to radiation risks and they must be planned to yield an overall benefit.

5] Fifth principle deals with environmental protection such that the protection must be optimized to provide the highest level of safety that can be achieved by  the right methods of planning in preference to wrong methods of planning the siting of the reactors for national prosperity.

 6] Sixth principle deals with limitation of risks to individual persons and the people living in the zone of influence of the reactors by taking measures for controlling radiation risks so that no person bears an unacceptable risk of harm even under accidents due to natural or man-made hazards

7] Seventh principle deals with protection of present and future generations of people and their environment against radiation risks by proper selection of sites for the reactors based upon the environmental  carrying capacity of the region.

8]Eighth principle deals with prevention of accidents by taking all practical steps to prevent and mitigate nuclear or radiation accidents by proper design of the plant including redundancy and engineered safety features.

9] Ninth principle deals with Emergency preparedness and response system for nuclear or radiation incidents by taking practical measures in case of routine incidents and by preparing emergency preparedness and response plans in case of radiation risks to the public during an emergency and these emergency plans have to be implemented through periodical exercises on the basis of informed consent of the people living upto specified zones extending to about 80 km as specified under the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission standards.

10]Tenth principle deals with protective actions to reduce existing or unregulated radiation risks and the actions must be justified and optimized including remediation measures due to uncontrolled release of radio nuclides into the air, water, soil and environment for restoring the damaged eco-systems.

NUCLEAR PLANT SAFETY FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AND PUBLIC HEALTH PROTECTION:

Among the vast majority of common people, there is no proper understanding about what is meant by Nuclear plant safety and what constitutes adequate safety of a hazardous nuclear plant.  It is apparent that nuclear plant safety is not merely a pure technical matter and it is not simply calculating risk and comparing the results with a numerical  target.  First of all, who are the persons who should have  a say in deciding on nuclear plant safety? Obviously, it is the nuclear plant management, the designer, the regulator, the public enquiry inspector, the responsible Ministers, concerned Members of the Parliament and the state legislatures and the public.  Of course, the legal responsibility for the safety mainly rests with the  plant operating organization while all the other parties are part of a chain of accountability and are expected to make a decision on the safety of the plant based upon its imp[acts on the present and future generations of the people and their environment.  While the plant operators view safety as mainly concerned with technical matters, modern thinkers recognize that any technical basis for the management of risks must be supported by a broader social view of how safety should be provided by recognizing that the opinions of the public should underlie the evaluation of the risks which will impact the people and their environment.  It is essential to consider three basic public safety goals.

1)       THE FIRST GOAL OF PUBLIC SAFETY deals with  the suitable legal frame work that governs the rules and regulations for preventing, controlling and managing the hazards due to the establishment and operation of nuclear plants which is basically the ALARP (as low as reasonably possible) requirement of radiation emissions into the environment.

2)      THE SECOND GOAL OF PUBLIC SAFETY pertains to plant management set up which deals with formulation of technical safety goals to satisfy the technical people but which as a philosophical basis can be explained and justified to the public.  It consists of the plant operators and the nuclear regulatory authorities with a regulated dialogue between them for continuous safety assessment which needs to be open and comprehensible so that the experts can recognize that the public will gain confidence in the plant management and the public get a feeling that all possible means are employed to secure their safety.

3)      THE THIRD GOAL OF PUBLIC SAFETY deals with the safety net which includes an efficient emergency plan that will come into action in the event of a nuclear plant accident.  The public generally believe that what can happen will happen one day or the other and hence they must be prepared to face the consequences of an accident and consequently the plant management must prepare the relevant risk analysis, disaster scenario and Emergency Preparedness plans and present them before the public for obtaining their responses for taking necessary remedial actions and for obtaining their consent for the successful operation of the plant in the long run.  The technical safety goals involve probabilistic safety Assessment[PSA] with information about the nuclear incidents, minor accidents and maximum credible accidents and their impacts on public health, public injuries and potential deaths in case of an explosion for man-made and natural disasters including sabotage, terrorist attacks as had happened in September, 2011 at the world Trade Center In USA, the bomb attacks by the British over the dams in Germany and natural disaster like earthquakes, tornadoes, tsunamis and extreme floods.

The nuclear plant authorities and Dr.Abdul Kalam have not taken into consideration all the different principles of nuclear safety and all the relevant goals of public safety pertaining to the Kudankulam nuclear plant. In fact the crucial reports pertaining to Environmental Impact Analysis including the risk analysis, disaster scenario due to nuclear accidents and the Emergency preparedness plans have not been prepared as per national laws and guidelines followed at International level for ensuring safety of the plant, the public and their environment.  In fact the cost-benefit analysis of the plant including the economic implications of the Civil liability Act,2010 and the Price-Anderson Act of USA for nuclear plant accidents have been perhaps ignored .  Consequently the approach of the nuclear plant authorities and  Dr.Abdul Kalam in assessing the environmental and economic impacts of the plant are highly under estimated due to misinformation furnished to him by the  Kudankulam nuclear plant authorities.  No attempt has been made on the feasibility of implementation of disaster management plans as envisaged by the National laws and International guidelines.

NUCLEAR REACTOR PROMOTERS ADMIT INDIRECTLY THAT NUCLEAR SAFETY IS A MYTH:

The Nuclear Plant promoters know that they cannot believe in the safety of their own Nuclear plants in both United states and India. In USA ,the Nuclear  plant owners pay only two percent of the costs of damage to the victims of a nuclear reactor accident and the rest of the compensation is paid by the subsidies provided by the Price-Anderson Act and the US Government which means the  tax payers money. Similarly, the Indian Government is planning to pay the victims of Nuclear accident from the taxes paid by the common man. Thus safety of Nuclear plants is not accepted by the  Nuclear plant operators or the suppliers from foreign countries and the poor man in India is going to be heavily taxed for the sake of the nuclear industry and this is highly unjust to subsidize the industry that is a slow killer  of mankind and Nature. It is beyond comprehension how the nuclear plant authorities and even a highly educated person like Dr.Kalam chose to ignore these realities about hazards of Nuclear power and how can any patrriot promote a risky industry to the detriment of the life and culture of  Indian population?

KUDANKULAM NUCLEAR PLANT AS A SOCIAL EVIL:

Under the circumstances the declared views of the nuclear plant authorities  and assertion of Dr.Kalam on safety, economy and feasibility and public acceptability of the nuclear plant at Kudankulam from the Gandhian perspective seems to be that of a scientist without humanity and consequently becomes one of the seven social evils.  Since the impact of such a tunnel-visioned one sided scientific view without a human face about the advantages and disadvantages of the nuclear plant from the perspective Gandhian ideology  falls under the category of one of the seven social evils and thereby the nuclear plant authorities and Dr.Abdul Kalam can be considered to have unknowingly committed a social crime because such a non-comprehensive view supporting a major silent killer industry constitutes a major environmentally unethical act and a social crime against mankind and nature.  Such misdeeds by people in power to the detriment of mankind and nature makes the experts fall into the category of irresponsible citizens of India under Article 51 A(g) of the Indian Constitution.  If these scientists considered themselves as experts they must first of all verify their credentials as experts under Sections 45 and 51 of the Indian Evidence Act so that they can present their expert views before the concerned people whose genuine doubts about the safety of the reactors and their damaging impacts on public and the environment promote the right to life of the people and the right to health and the right to livelihood as guaranteed by constitution of India.  First of all public hearings must be held to explain the salient features of the plant and also inform the people that as per International Standards as followed in USA the emergency preparedness plans prepared for a maximum credible accident are adequate enough to evacuate the people upto 80km distance around the plant for being shifted within the stipulated time of 1 or 2 days to safer places far away from the plant.  The authorities must also justify their plans for emergency preparedness by conducting mock drills of evacuation and convince the public that their schemes are quite feasible and can be implemented without any problem.  In the United States the Indian point nuclear plant was stopped from getting a license to operate the plant because it is failed in proving that the emergency response system devised by them is implementable under field conditions.  

VIENNA Declaration by European States on Nuclear plants, May 25, 2011, Vienna

Ministers and Heads of Delegations of Austria, Greece, Ireland, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta and Portugal, responding to the challenges posed by another severe nuclear accident, met in Vienna today, in order to enhance co-operation and contribute further to the discussions as regards environment, combating climate change as well as developing safe and sustainable energy systems without necessarily relying on nuclear power.

Ministers and Heads of Delegations reiterated their utmost sympathy for the plight of the Japanese people as well as their solidarity. They underlined their readiness to learn jointly from this event.

The disastrous earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011, and the subsequent events in the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant which has now been classified as a level 7 accident on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES), once more demonstrated that the risks of nuclear power outweigh any potential benefit.

The principal issues discussed at the meeting were environmental aspects of nuclear power, climate change policies, the potential for phasing out nuclear power, nuclear safety, nuclear security and safeguards; the expectations regarding the stress tests for nuclear power plants; the need for more and better information to be provided to countries neighbouring nuclear states; issues of transparency and participation regarding nuclear plans and projects; but in particular alternatives to nuclear power and the need to ensure the development and provision of safe and sustainable energy supplies and services.

In their discussions, Ministers and Head of Delegations

1)      Emphasised their view that nuclear power is not compatible with the concept of sustainable development and underlined their conviction that nuclear power does not provide a viable option to combat climate change.

2)       Reiterated that the very significant safety, security, environmental and proliferation risks associated with the nuclear power option remain, and need to be further addressed by the international community, including co-operation between nuclear and non-nuclear states in assessing the risks, exchanging information on their management, and enhancing preparedness for responding to nuclear emergencies.

3)       Stressed the need to fully draw the lessons from the events in Japan, and that such lessons are promptly acted upon, in particular for the European energy policy, to ensure that the highest standards for nuclear safety are implemented - including the closure of installations which cannot be upgraded within a reasonable time frame and that renewable energy and energy conservation play a major role.

4)      Welcomed that comprehensive and transparent risk and safety assessments (stress tests) will be performed within the European Union, and supported the EU´s invitation to its neighbouring states and worldwide to do likewise.

5)       Appreciated that external and internal initiating events, even if extremely unlikely, as well as a combination of these are considered and that the potential interaction of several installations at the same site is duly taken into account.

http://www.nirs.org/international/declarationofnon-nuclearcountries2011-05-25.pdf