CONTENTS Nuclear power and energy security: Indian contextbookstore.teri.res.in/docs/newsletters/ESI 1(1) March... · 2012-08-10 · nuclear power generation in the coming years

This issue of Energy Security Insights is timely in its coverage of nuclear developments

in relation to India. President George W Bush has just departed from India after having

inked a nuclear deal of historic significance to the future of energy in the world.

Admittedly, the US Congress has yet to ratify this agreement but the likelihood of it

having a positive outcome is very high for all the energy and environment arguments

put forward in this issue. As is to be expected with a large, visible, and sensitive matter

such as the nuclear cooperation agreement and its ramifications, there have been a

number of negative and/or cautionary voices raised both in the US and India, and

indeed in the rest of the world!

Undoubtedly, these notes of caution should be heeded to but the energy

imperative of India is currently so critical that structuring of the deal can, and should,

be viewed for its contributions to bringing the masses of India – one-sixth of the world

population – out of their energy poverty situation. This essential driver of economic

growth would make its impact not only on India but, through the ripple effects of

globalization, maintain a momentum of climate-friendly global development. India

today has 57% of its population unserved by electricity, and 90% of the cooking needs

in the rural India are met through biomass. To sustain its targeted economic growth of

8%–10% till 2030, India would need a total electricity-generating capacity of

500–600 GW (gigawatts) as against its current capacity of 135 GW. With limits on the

use of coal, both for domestic capacity as well as environmental reasons, and the

uncertainties associated with the hydrocarbon market, increased access to nuclear

capacity would definitely provide some relief.

However, India would be short-sighted to trade-off other energy options as a result

of nuclear access. India needs to continue to work with the hydrocarbon-rich West

Asian countries in a pact of mutually beneficial development that would necessarily be

based on, but will have to go beyond, energy trade! As a natural partner for countries

of this region, such cooperation would also go a long way in promoting stability in the

region, providing an outlet to India’s technical expertise to facilitate diversification of

growth opportunities for the region, and much-needed investments into the country.

Leena Srivastava

T E R I

Nuclear power and energy security: Indian context

The Energy and Resources Institute

w w w . t e r i i n . o r g

Volume 1 • Issue 1 • March 2006

Commentary 1

Nuclear power: the newglobal interest 2

Securing our emerging energy needs:what nuclear energy can do 4

Nuclear energy in India: key factorsfor growth 7

Nuclear power: no route to energysecurity 13

Access to nuclear technologies andmaterials under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and NuclearSuppliers Group 17

Looking beyond the nuclear deal 25

Accessing opportunities in achanging global nuclear order 28

Glossary of terms in nuclearenergy 31

C O N T E N T S

2 Energy Security Insights

It was 60 years ago that Dr Homi Bhabha,father of India’s nuclear programme, stated

that electricity from nuclear power plants wouldbe produced at prices ‘too cheap to meter’. Forreasons that one can identify in hindsight, notonly have we fallen short in producingsubstantial quantities of nuclear power but eventhe costs of energy produced have turned out tobe much higher than originally anticipated.Improvements in project management anddevelopments in technological capabilities inthis country have certainly helped in bringingdown the per unit costs of nuclear powercapacity and the energy produced, particularlywith the recent plants that have beenconstructed. In other countries, the experiencehas been mixed. In case of the US, technicalproblems, concerns about safety, and costoverruns have stalled the expansion of nuclearpower capacity over the past three decades. Incase of France, nuclear power has grownsubstantially to meet that country’s needs forelectricity and secure energy supply. Recentdevelopments in the global energy market have,however, sparked a worldwide interest in nuclearenergy, particularly over the past two years or so.

Two major factors have created this growinginterest in nuclear energy in the recent years. First,growing concerns arising out of scientific evidenceon climate change and its likely adverse impactsare pushing the developed countries to evaluatenuclear energy options far more seriously thanthey have done in the recent past. Some find thenuclear energy option as the only viable means toreduce the greenhouse gas emissions from powergeneration even during the first commitmentperiod of the Kyoto Protocol, that is, by 2012.Another important reason has been the improvedrecord of safety and overall performance of nuclearpower technology round the world. However, themost important factor impelling countries towardsgreater use of nuclear energy, I believe, is the issueof energy security. With oil prices hovering in theregion of 70 dollars per barrel and worldwidedemand for oil increasing, concerns have risen to anew height on the stability of oil prices in future.

The global oil market is very sensitive tosmall changes even in perceptions about thefuture, leading to substantial increases in prices,which translate into major economic problemsfor oil importing countries. In recent weeks,problems in Nigeria, which raise some questionsabout the stability of oil exports from thatnation, as well as current problems between theIAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency)with the Iranian government have raised furtherquestions about supply of oil from that nation aswell. These raise worries about exports at levelsagreed upon by the OPEC (Organisation ofPetroleum Exporting Countries) and resultantconstraints in meeting increases in demand infuture. Against this background, nuclear energynow appears an attractive option for a largenumber of countries. China’s plans for a majorincrease in nuclear power generation provide amajor source of assurance to the internationalcommunity, particularly because globally, Chinahas become the second-largest importer of oilafter the US. An increase in nuclear powergeneration in China also provides some relief tothose who are concerned about increased carbondioxide emissions from larger quantities of coalthat China would be compelled to burn for powergeneration to feed an ever-expanding economy inthe years ahead. The status of nuclear plants underconstruction in different countries of the world isprovided in Table 1.

Nuclear power: the new global interestR K PachauriT E R I , New Delhi, India

Table 1 Nuclear plants under construction

Country Number

China (planned) 30India 8Russia 4China (current) 2Ukraine 2Taiwan 2Argentina 1Finland 1Iran 1Japan 1Romania 1

Source International Atomic Energy Agency

3Energy Security Insights

If the agreement between president George WBush of the US and prime minister ManmohanSingh of India comes into existence, India maysee a significant surge in nuclear-power-generating capacity and a substantial increase innuclear power generation in the coming years.As shown in Figure 1, India and China arecurrently producing a very small percentage ofnuclear power in the total power that theygenerate.

Of course, a movement towards greaterdependence on nuclear power must also carrywith it questions on a secure supply of energy infuture. Nuclear fuels are still scarce and notreadily accessible to several countries of theworld. There is, therefore, understandably, ascramble for resources in different parts of theglobe so that those nations that are setting uplarge nuclear-generating capacities are in aposition to access adequate supplies of nuclearfuels in future. However, in this regard, Indiahas to contend with restrictions placed by theNSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group). Thus, theBush–Manmohan Singh agreement acquiresgreat importance not only for the supply ofnuclear fuels but also for the future of nuclearenergy developments in the country. ShouldIndia receive de facto recognition as a nuclearweapon state and should restrictions on thesupply of nuclear fuels and equipment beremoved, the country could become anattractive market for nuclear-power-generatingequipment for countries such as the US, Japan,and several members of the European Union.

If the objective of the countries seeking majorexpansion in nuclear power is to reduce

dependence on oil imports, then severalstructural shifts in their economic systems wouldbecome essential. For instance, given the realitythat the bulk of oil imports are meant to supplyroad transport systems, a shift of this activitytowards greater use of nuclear energy would pre-suppose a shift to electric traction, accompaniedby a commensurate increase in the nuclearenergy generated. Investments in nuclear energyper unit are significantly higher than inconventional electricity supply capacity becausenuclear power requires capital costs per unit,which is significantly higher than theconventional coal-based power plants andmarginally higher than investments in theIGCC (Integrated Gasification CombinedCycle) plants. The IEA (International EnergyAgency) estimates capital cost per kilowatt of800–1300 dollars for conventional coal,1300–1600 dollars for coal gasification, and1700–2150 dollars for nuclear power stations.

With growing constraints in mining andtransportation of coal in India as well asprospects of higher coal prices, bothinternationally and domestically in future, acountry such as India would find it attractive tosubstantially expand its nuclear power capacity.At the same time, coal-fired stations are likely tocontinue as the major form of new capacity forpower generation. The IEA estimates coal-firedcapacity additions during the period 2001–30 toexceed 1400 GW (gigawatts) worldwide. Theyestimate that half of these new plants will beestablished in China and India. Nuclear plantconstruction was estimated at 150 GW,concentrated largely in the Asian countries.However, these estimates are based on a 2003publication by the IEA as part of their WorldEnergy Outlook. Since then, increase in oil pricesas well as geopolitical changes, particularly inthe Middle East, have necessitated a second lookat nuclear power possibilities. Natural-gas-basedpower plants, which have a substantially lowercapital cost, would also look less attractive now,given the likely increase in natural gas pricesworldwide. It is significant that the Dabholpower plant, which has been shut for five yearsnow, is running into serious problems with thefuel supply because original prices of LNG(liquefied natural gas) to be supplied to theplant have now increased significantly since the

Figure 1 Current status of nuclear power generationSource International Atomic Energy Agency


original agreement collapsed, and newarrangements are having to be put in place bythe current owners of the plant who are sourcingnew LNG supplies.

While technological choices and the source ofenergy used can be diversified throughdeliberate policy and proper pricing, theseefforts are likely to remain unsuccessful unlessmajor reforms are carried out in the powersector of the country. Essentially, any capitalinvested, which requires legitimate returns frompower generation, would run into seriousconstraints if the electric utility industryremains financially weak and is unable to payfor the power purchased. The government haslimits to the amount of investment it cansustain as a service to be provided without

adequate financial returns. If the private sectoror even public sector investments are to beattracted for nuclear or any other form of powergeneration, revenues will have to be ensured topay for the power supplied. Hence, despiteinternational agreements and infusion of privatesector capital, nuclear power in this country canonly grow to provide energy security if it isaccompanied by substantial and rapid reformsin the power sector. Energy security, therefore,will grow only at a pace that is created by strongpolitical steps to reform and restructure thepower industry, which has remained largelystagnant in the country for over five decades.Energy security requires managed dependenceon oil imports, but even more importantly,purposeful domestic reforms.

Present Indian scenario

In spite of being among the top five electricity-producing countries in the world, India has a verylow per capita electricity consumption (aboutone-sixth of the world average). Only 55% of thehouseholds have access to electricity, and aboutone fifth of the villages are yet to be electrified. Tomeet the energy requirements of the economy, thepower policy aims at ensuring power availabilityfor all by 2012, electrification of all villagesby 2009, and access to electricity for allhouseholds by 2012. These objectives wouldrequire capacity addition of 100 GW (gigawatts)and total investments of about 180 billion dollarstill 2012. Long-term planning will involveensuring availability of fuels, systems (forgeneration and distribution), and markets.

According to a study by Goldman Sachs,India has the potential to show fastest growthover the next 30–50 years and could achieve a

growth rate higher than five per cent over thenext 30 years if infrastructure developmentproceeds successfully. Given this, requirements inthe electricity sector have been projected by theDAE (Department of Atomic Energy) as follows:P Per capita electricity generation is expected to

rise from 613 kWh (kilowatt-hours) in 2002 toabout 5305 kWh in 2052 (Figure 1 [a]).

P Growth of electricity has been projected to beabout 6.3% between 2002 and 2022, droppingto 4.9% between 2022 and 2032, 4.6% in thenext decade, and 3.9% between 2042 and 2052.

P Installed power capacity is projected to growfrom 138.73 GWe (gigawatt electric) in 2002to 1344 GWe in 2052 (Figure 1 [b]).

India’s energy resource base and role of nuclearenergy

India will continue to be heavily dependent oncoal and it will remain as the most importantenergy source as far as electricity-generating

Securing our emerging energy needs: what nuclearenergy can do*Anil KakodkarAtomic Energy Commission, and Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India

*Summary of a talk given on 25 November 2005 at TER I, New Delhi.


potential is concerned. With technologicalprogress and improvements on the commercialdeployment front, nuclear energy can play animportant role in the electricity sector. Thepotential for electricity generation from allavailable resources other than nuclear energyand coal is very meagre (Table 1). Nuclear

Figure 1 [a] Projected per capita electricity generation

Figure 1 [b] Projected installed power capacitySource Department of Atomic Energy

energy, particularly from the FBR (fast-breederreactors) and thorium reactors, has a hugepotential to augment this base. Nuclear power,by the DAE estimates, can contribute to about20% share in the total electricity generationsystem by 2052 (Figure 2).

India’s nuclear power programme

India has followed a three-stage nuclear powerprogramme, consisting of development of thefollowing stages:Stage 1 PHWRs (pressurized heavy water reactors),Stage 2 FBRs, andStage 3 thorium-based reactors.

Table 1 India’s energy resource base

Electricity potentiala

Energy resource Amount (GWe-year)

Coal 53.3 BT 10 660Hydrocarbon 12 BTb 5 833Uranium metal 61 000 TP In PHWR 328P In fast breeders 42 231Thorium-metal 225 000 T 155 502(in breeders)Hydro 150 GWe 69 per yearNon-conventional 100 GWe 33 per yearrenewable energy

BT – billion tonnes; T – tonnes; GWe – gigawatt electricPHWR – pressurized heavy water reactorsNote aAssuming all resources are used for generatingelectricity.bCurrently known resources (including coal-bed methane) are3 BT. However, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural gas has set atarget of locating at least 12 BT as per Hydrocarbon Vision 2025.

Figure 2 Projected installed power capacity by fuelSource Department of Atomic Energy

India is endowed with modest uraniumreserves, which can support 10 000 MWe(megawatt electric) of PHWR capacities. PHWRis the most efficient way of using naturaluranium. India’s first 540 MWe PHWR unitoperating at Tarapur is doing remarkably well.

India is following the path of firstconcentrating on the FBRs along with thePHWRs and then going on to develop thorium-


based reactors. Following this path will allowIndia to have fairly large electricity generationfrom domestic nuclear fuels. In order to proceedon to the next stage of the nuclear powerprogramme, certain basic objectives need to beachieved. These include completing the500 MWe PFBR (prototype fast-breederreactor) now under construction at Kalpakkam,closing the fuel cycle with fast reactors andmastering all aspects of the fuel cycletechnology, and incorporating feedback from theoperating experience of PFBR in the future fast-breeder reactors.

There are various technologies that are beingresearched upon and would help India in meetingits nuclear energy needs. These include the following.P AHWR (advanced heavy water reactor),

which would derive two-thirds of its energyfrom thorium. Development of the AHWRhas given India an opportunity to incorporateseveral passive safety features in the design ofthis reactor; for example, heat removal bynatural circulation. These features are nowbeing incorporated by other countries in thefourth-generation systems. It would also helpIndia in gaining experience in large-scalehandling of thorium.

P The ADS (accelerator-driven systems), whichwould support growth with thorium systemsand require long-term R&D (research anddevelopment) efforts, is one area that hasattracted several international groups tocollaborate with India to use vast expertmanpower resources.

P Steady-state super-conducting Tokamak hasgiven India the technological capability toparticipate in ITER.1

Changing approach to nuclear energy technologyin international arena

There has been a shift in the approach tonuclear energy in the industrialized world today.Until recently, open fuel cycle was a preferredoption among most countries. However, closedfuel cycles are now being preferred, as they aremore efficient from the point of view of energysustainability and credible waste management.

These are also more environmentally friendly aswaste can be recycled back for use. There is nowa convergence on the need to move towardsclosed fuel cycle as is obvious from variousprogrammes initiated, such as INPRO(International Project on Innovative NuclearReactors and Fuel Cycles), GEN IV (GenerationIV), and MNA (Multilateral Nuclear Approaches),etc. All along, India has based its strategies onclosed fuel cycle and this should continue to be aformal part of India’s national policy.

Investment in nuclear energy sector

With regard to investment in the nuclear energysector, the initial R&D investment should be ledby the government. The approach should be tofollow the RD3 philosophy, that is, research,development, demonstration, and deployment.After the prototype demonstration, the firstcommercial unit can be financed on a 1:1 debt–equity basis and subsequently, one could moveto 2:1 debt–equity ratio.

Costs of nuclear energy

Nuclear power stations have been set up at acapital cost of approximately 50 million rupees/MWe. The unit cost, inclusive of the cost ofdecommissioning, is about 2.50 rupees/unit for afreshly constructed nuclear power station and2.65 rupees/unit for the Tarapur Power Station.Nuclear energy is far more competitive forpower generation than the other energy sources.Capital cost of nuclear power plants is high butfuelling cost is low and so it is less subject toinflationary pressures. Moreover, nuclear fuel,being of high calorific value, can be easilytransported and stored.

Fuel supply situation

On the fuel supply situation, reactors nowoperating and under construction will take thenuclear installed capacity to 7280 MWe.Installed capacity of about 20 000 MWe isexpected to be achieved by 2020 throughPHWRs, FBRs, and eight LWRs (light waterreactors). Fuel supply for the PHWRs and FBRswill be based on the domestic sources but for

1 To start with, ITER was an abbreviation for International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. However, it has now been

decided to drop the full form and just retain the name ITER, which in Latin means ‘the way’.


LWRs, fuel has to be imported. So far, fuelsupply has been tied up for the two LWRs underconstruction at Kalpakkam. For the remainingreactors, so far, no tie-ups have been made.

Policy directions for futurePolicy directions and strategies, which Indiashould follow to meet its emerging nuclearenergy needs, should include the following.P The 540 MWe PHWR design should be

scaled up to 700 MWe.P Uranium exploration efforts should be

stepped up.

P Metal-alloy-based fuels should be developedfor FBR by 2020.

P The 500 MWe FBR should be completed onschedule and four similar units should beconstructed before 2020.

P Research in the area of ADS and fusionsystems should be stepped up to speedilyexploit vast thorium resources.

P High temperature reactors and technologiesshould be developed to produce, store,transport, and use hydrogen.

Nuclear energy in India: key factors for growthR B Grover*Knowledge Mgt Group - Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and Strategic Planning Group, Department of Atomic Energy, Mumbai, India

Energy security is an important issue for a largecountry like India. It can only be provided by apolicy that supports a diversified portfolio ofenergy sources. Nuclear energy is riding a waveof interest internationally, particularly in India,due to a combination of factors, including therising prices of fossil fuels, limits to continuedavailability of fossil fuels, climate change issues,and other environmental concerns. It is in thiscontext that we briefly discuss various nucleartechnologies and fuels used in the nuclearenergy programme in India.

We argue in this paper that growth of nuclearenergy in India in the years ahead will bedetermined by several factors, includingP success in locating additional sources of

uranium,P success achieved in domestic R&D (research

and development),P opening up of civil nuclear cooperation with

other countries, andP success in the ITER (International

Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) project.

India’s future energy mix and place of nuclearenergy

The two key policy issues in planning for secureenergy futures are (i) adopting a scenario-based

approach and (ii) adopting an integrated energyframework and strategy. While the scenario-based approach can help identify all possibletrajectories, an integrated energy framework canhelp in delineating the steps to be taken fordevelopment of various technology options. Witha view to define the role to be played by thenuclear energy in the coming decades, the DAE(Department of Atomic Energy) developed ascenario about the possible growth of energyrequirements in the country in the coming fivedecades and looked at all sources of energy toexamine as to how the energy requirementscould be met (Grover and Chandra 2004). Theconclusion is that energy requirements of thecountry are so large that whatever maximumcould be produced based on nuclear energyshould be the target. Growth scenarios for theperiod up to 2031/32 have been made by thePlanning Commission (Planning Commission2005a) as well and their draft report is availableon Internet.

The Planning Commission report givestwo growth scenarios for power capacitytill 2031/32, and projections by the DAE liein between these two scenarios. Withregard to nuclear, Planning Commissionreport says

*E-mail [email protected]


Nuclear, on the other hand, offers India the mostpotent means to long-term security. Promotingnuclear through its three-stage development processdescribed in the main report is critical if India hopesto tap vast thorium resource and become truly energyindependent beyond 2050 (Planning Commission2005b).

Thus, considering the likely growth scenarioand examining all sources of energy, one cannotescape the conclusion that nuclear energy has avery important role to play in India’s growth.This role becomes all the more important if oneconsiders the fact that nuclear power plants emitno greenhouse gases. However, despite therealization of importance of nuclear energy,there are certain constraints imposed by thedomestic nuclear fuel resources. Consideringthese constraints, it is clear that fossil fuels willcontinue to have a dominant share for the nextfive decades and India will perhaps beconsuming more coal than any other country ina few decades from now (Srinivasan, Grover,and Bhardwaj 2005). Therefore, it is desirablethat all steps be undertaken to ensure that thenuclear sector plays a greater role in country’sgrowth. This will entail making a detailedassessment of various issues involved and takingappropriate policy measures to address them. Inthe next section, we discuss nuclear technologychoices in India, given both the concerns of fuelsecurity and credible waste management.

Some fundamentals

Nuclear fissionTo start with, it is necessary to understandcertain fundamentals about nuclear technology.There are two different nuclear reactions viz.,fission and fusion, which can be used to produceenergy. So far, only nuclear fission has beenused for production of energy on a commercialscale: certain heavy isotopes split into lighternuclei and neutrons when bombarded withneutrons. During the process of splitting orfission, energy is also released, which is used toproduce electricity. Uranium-235 is the onlynaturally occurring isotope that is fissile and canbe used in nuclear reactors to produce energy byfusion. There are other naturally occurringnuclei that can be converted into fissile isotopes

and then used for producing energy by theprocess of nuclear fission. Two fertile isotopesfound in nature are uranium-238 and thorium-232 that can be converted to correspondingfissile isotopes plutonium-239 and uranium-233.The process of conversion of fertile isotopes intofissile isotopes is known as breeding. Neutronsproduced by a fission reaction have high kineticenergy. In thermal reactors, they are first sloweddown by a moderator and then cause fission bycolliding with a fissile isotope. Fast reactors aredesigned in a way that the process of fissiontakes place when neutrons are at a high speed.The process of breeding occurs more efficientlyin fast reactor systems.

Natural uranium consists of two isotopes viz.,uranium-235 and uranium-238. As indicatedabove, while uranium-235 is a fissile material,uranium-238 is not. Almost all reactors now incommercial operation are thermal reactors andgenerate energy from fission of uranium-235,which constitutes only 0.7% of the naturaluranium. Broadly, present-day commercialreactors can be classified into two categories:The first category uses natural uranium withheavy water moderator and the PHWRs(pressurized heavy water reactors) fall in thiscategory. The second category uses uranium asfuel, which has been enriched in the isotopeuranium-235 to about four per cent. Suchreactors are called LWRs (light water reactors).In both cases, the net result is that less than oneper cent of the total energy potential of theuranium ore is used. When uranium fuel isirradiated in the reactor, a fraction of uranium-238 gets converted to plutonium-239, a fissilematerial, which can be used as fuel. In an opencycle system, no attempt is made to increase thefraction of uranium-238 converted toplutonium-239, or to recover and recycle thisplutonium. If one could follow an approachwhere most of the uranium-238 is converted toplutonium-239 and is used for energygeneration, then the presently available uraniumcan provide energy for the entire world forseveral centuries. The predicted nuclearrenaissance cannot be sustained by thecontinued use of open cycle concept. Onlybreeder reactors based on a closed cycle


approach can theoretically use the full energypotential of uranium ore by multiple recyclingand are being studied by all countries havinginterest in nuclear energy. The closed cycleapproach, by which fertile material recoveredfrom the spent fuel is recycled, also significantlyreduces the radioactive waste per unit of energyproduced. It also facilitates recovery of certainuseful isotopes, such as cesium-137 andstronitium-90, from the fission products.

Besides uranium, another heavy metaloccurring in nature is thorium-232. It cannot beused to fuel nuclear reactors as such andbreeding is necessary to convert fertile thorium-232 into fissile uranium-233. Strategies basedon closed fuel cycle are necessary, both forenergy sustainability and for credible wastemanagement (see Figure 1 for details).

Nuclear fusion

Another phenomenon that can be utilized toproduce energy is fusion, which powers the sunand stars, and is potentially an environmentallyresponsible and intrinsically safe source ofessentially limitless energy. Fusion is a processin which light atoms fuse together to produce aheavier element along with the release of hugeamounts of energy. Very high temperatures,above 100 million degrees Celsius, are requiredfor fusion reaction to take place for energyproduction. Gas raised to such hightemperatures becomes ‘plasma’ whereinelectrons are completely separated from the

atomic nuclei (ions). Fusion reaction between twoisotopes of hydrogen – D (deuterium) andT(tritium) – provides the basis for development ofa first-generation fusion reactor as other fusionreactions require even higher temperatures. EachD–T fusion reaction produces an alpha particle(that is, helium) and a high-energy neutron. Alphaparticles maintain plasma at the desired hightemperature by re-depositing energy in it.Neutrons escape from plasma and are sloweddown in a ‘blanket’ surrounding the plasma.Within this blanket, lithium is transformed intotritium, which is used as fuel, and the heatgenerated by neutrons can be used to producesteam and thereby electricity.

Planning for nuclear technology choices in India

India has modest reserves of uranium andplentiful reserves of thorium. While otherdeveloped nations realize the importance ofbreeder reactors and are pursuing R&D torealize similar objectives, India has planned itsthree-stage programme, which is based onpursuing a closed fuel cycle right at theinception of its nuclear programme in view ofpoor availability of uranium resources in thecountry and international embargo on civilnuclear commerce.

The nuclear power technology plan of theDAE is given in Table 1. It includes possibleimport of six reactors, in addition to the two atKudankulam of 1000 MWe (megawatt electric)capacity each before 2020.

Looking beyond this plan, one can make thefollowing three comments about the nuclearenergy growth in India.P Near-term growth will be determined by the

success in locating additional uraniumresources in the country based onintensification of efforts to explore uraniumas planned by the DAE and opening up ofinternational civil nuclear commerce withIndia.

P Medium-term growth will come from FBRs(fast-breeder reactors) and adoption ofclosed fuel cycle.

P Long-term growth will depend on thedevelopment of technologies for deploymentof thorium and fusion technology.Figure 1 Indian nuclear fuel cycle


While growth aspects resulting from locatingadditional deposits of uranium in the country isan obvious fact, the remaining issues will beexamined one by one.

Breeders and closed fuel cycle

In early days of nuclear energy when uraniumprices were high, there was a worldwide interestin FBRs and several demonstration reactorswere built. These include Dounreay DFR1

(UK, 15 MWe, shut down in 1977), Phenix(France, 250 MWe), BN-350 (Kazakhstan, 90MWe shut down in 1999), Dounreay PFR (UK,250 MWe, shut down in 1994), Monju (Japan,280 MWe), and FBTR (India, 40 MWt).Another demonstration CEFR (China, 25 MWe)is under construction. Full-scale industrialreactors include BN-600 (Russia, 600 MWe),Superphenix (France, 1200 MWe, shut down in1998), PFBR (India, 500 MWe, underconstruction), and BN-800 (Russia, 800 MWe,

under construction). Interest in fast reactorsdeclined due to perceived proliferation concernsand availability of uranium at competitiveprices. However, rising uranium prices andincreasing energy demand have rekindledinterest in FBRs with a closed fuel cycle.

Generation IV International Forum,2 aUS-led multi-nation initiative, has selected sixreactor concepts for detailed study and theseinclude concepts based on closed fuel cycle andfast reactors (Anonymous 2003). The selectionsare gas-cooled fast reactor, lead-cooled fastreactor, molten salt reactor, sodium-cooled fastreactor, supercritical water-cooled reactor (twooptions: open thermal and closed fast), andvery-high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (opencycle). Thus, majority of the concepts are basedon fast reactors and closed fuel cycle.

It is interesting to note that the USabandoned fuel reprocessing in the 1970s,considering its high cost and perceived

1 DFR – Dounreay fast reactor, BN – stands for fast neutrons in the Russian language; PFR – prototype fast reactor; FBTR – fast-

breeder test reactor; CEFR – Chinese experimental fast reactor; PFBR – prototype fast breeder-reactor.2 Design of nuclear reactors has evolved since the 1950s through evolutionary changes to improve safety and economics. Initial

demonstration reactors could be classified as first-generation reactors. Based on operating experience with first-generation

reactors, large-scale deployment of nuclear reactors took place and all these reactors are still in operation. These could be

classified as second-generation reactors. Following accidents at Three-mile Island and Chernobyl, several evolutionary changes

were made in the design of reactors to further improve safety. The EPR (European pressurized water reactor) now being built by

the French company Framatome in Finland belongs to this category and is being called as the third-generation reactor. Other

reactors such as the ABWR (advanced boiling water reactors) also belong to this category. Reactors now under design aim to

make further significant improvements in safety by introducing passive safety features and are being called as the fourth-

generation systems. This classification is not as yet very well accepted.

Table 1 Nuclear power programme till 2020

Capacity Cumulative capacityReactor type and capacities (MWe) (MWe)

Fifteen reactors at six sites under operation at Tarapur, Rawatbhata 3 360 3 360

Kalpakkam, Narora, Kakrapar, and Kaiga

Five PHWRs under construction at Tarapur (1 x 540 MWe) 1 420 4 780

Kaiga (2 x 220 MWe), and Rawatbhata (2 x 220 MWe)

Two LWRs under construction at Kudankulam (2 x 1000 MWe) 2 000 6 780

PFBR under construction at Kalpakkam 500 7 280

Projects planned till 2020: PHWRs (8 x 700 MWe), FBRs (4 x 500 MWe) 13 900 21 180

LWRs (6 x 1000 MWe), AHWR (1 x 300 MWe)

Total by 2020 21 180 MWe

AHWR – advanced heavy water reactor; FBR – fast-breeder reactor; LWR – light water reactor; MWe – megawatt electric;

PFBR – prototype fast-breeder reactor; PHWR – pressurized heavy water reactor


proliferation concerns. However, the US has justannounced the Global Nuclear EnergyPartnership (NucNet 2006), which has sevenelements, one of them being ‘DAE developingand deploying new nuclear recyclingtechnologies’, thereby reversing its policy onreprocessing.

A study carried out by the French utilityEdF (Electricité de France) envisages industrialdeployment of a first series of fast reactors byabout 2040 (Carre 2005). The Russian viewpoint(Anonymous 2005) is that ‘mass-scaleconstruction of fast reactors shall not be delayedany longer’ as reserves of both ‘cheap and costlyuranium will be exhausted between 2030 and2050’. They advocate finishing development workfor the next generation of fast reactors within adecade and start batch production of fast reactorsby 2020. Nations are thus deciding the time framefor deployment of fast reactors depending upontheir energy needs and uranium availability. Indiaplanned to go in for fast reactors in the secondstage of its three-stage programme in view ofmodest domestic reserves of uranium. Though thiswas visualized five decades back (Bhabha 1954),its logic has become all the more important now inview of the burgeoning demand for energy. Groverand Chandra (2004) estimate that in about fivedecades from now, electricity requirements will bean order of magnitude higher than the presentrequirements, and known domestic fossil fuelresources would have been exhausted unlesssupplemented by new discoveries or breakthroughtechnologies.

Fast reactors can make a significantcontribution to India’s energy requirements butthe rate of increase in fast reactor installedcapacity has to follow a certain growth path asplutonium-239, the fuel for fast reactors, getsgenerated in nuclear reactors. Thus, the rate ofnew fast reactor capacity addition has to bedetermined by the rate at which plutonium canbe bred. Breeding depends upon fast reactordesign and chemical form of plutonium fuel.Metallic fuel gives much higher breeding ratioand the DAE is pursuing research in thisdirection. While the PFBR now underconstruction will use plutonium in oxide form,it is planned to use plutonium metal as fuel in fast

reactors to be constructed after 2020. ConsideringIndia’s energy requirements and the current stateof research on this topic in the world, India has topursue independent R&D and protect theintellectual property so developed.

Thorium technologies

The DAE has already irradiated thoriumbundles in the PHWRs and set up a facility forreprocessing thorium. It has designed an AHWR(advanced heavy water reactor), which aims toderive two-thirds of its power from thorium.Implementation of the AHWR project anddevelopment of associated fuel cycle facilitieswill provide industrial-scale experience in thehandling of thorium. There are certain otherpossibilities for thorium utilization, whichinclude the ADS (accelerator-driven systems).ADS have two main components: an acceleratorand a reactor. A reactor system using onlythorium as fuel cannot become critical asthorium is not a fissile material. To make itcritical, an external supply of neutrons isneeded. A ‘spallation’ source can provide anexternal source of neutrons to achieve criticalityin an otherwise sub-critical system. Protons,when accelerated to high energy in anaccelerator and made to collide with a target ofhigh atomic number element (such as lead,tungsten, uranium, etc.), cause detachment of alarge number of neutrons from these nuclides ina process called spallation. Development ofappropriate proton accelerators is the first steptowards development of the ADS and efforts inthis direction have already been launchedworldwide as well as in India (Anonymous 2001).

Molten salt reactor first studied in the 1960sled to a proposal to set up 1 GWe (gigawattelectric) MSBR (molten salt breeder reactor) andmolten salt reactors are one of the six systemsretained by the Generation IV International Forum(David 2005). This could be another system toenable thorium utilization, but needs to be studiedin detail before one can arrive at any conclusion.

Fusion

Based on the experiments conducted in variouslaboratories (Smith, Llewellyn, Todd,et al. 2005) around the world, scientists have


convincingly concluded that fusion could bemastered to produce power. These experimentsinclude the JET (Joint European Torus) of the EUand the TFTR (Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor) ofthe US. The ITER is the next step in fusionresearch towards achieving fusion-based powerplant. The ITER programme was initiated in 1988in collaboration with four parties: the US, the EU,Japan, and the Russian Federation (then USSR)under the auspices of the IAEA (InternationalAtomic Energy Agency). The physics andengineering design of ITER was completed in2001 and subsequently, three more parties viz.,China, South Korea, and India have joined theITER consortium. The design goal of ITER is toproduce at least 500 MW of fusion power, with aplasma heating input of about 50 MW. The ITERwill be located at Cadarache in south of Franceand aims to develop a plant for demonstratinggeneration of electricity based on fusion. Fusiontechnology is expected to make large-scalecontribution in the second half of this century.

India joined the ITER as a full partner inDecember 2005 and this would involvecontributing about nine per cent of the machinecost. Being a full partner, India will have accessto this complex technology as and when it isready for commercial deployment. In view of thepotential of this technology, and the sizeableongoing programme in fusion research at theInstitute for Plasma Research, Gandhinagar, thedecision of the Government of India to join theITER programme is well advised.

It is difficult to predict the exact timeframefor deployment of the ADS and fusion reactors,but it is likely that both the technologies will bein deployment in the second half of this century.In any case, considering the large-scale energyneeds of India and the world, R&D has to bepursued to deploy both the technologies.

Concluding remarks

Thus, to conclude, growth of nuclear energy inIndia in the years to come will be determined byseveral factors, includingP success in locating additional uranium

resources in the country based onintensification of efforts to explore uraniumas planned by the DAE;

P success achieved in domestic R&D• with regard to developing fast reactors

with advanced fuels (having shortdoubling time, high burn up) andassociated fuel cycle technologies toensure multiple recycling of fuel,

• development of technologies for utilizationof thorium,

P opening up of civil nuclear cooperation withIndia; and

P success in the ITER project.

While opening up of the civil nuclearcooperation can lead to immediate gains,long-term outlook will be determined byongoing R&D in the country. Policy frameworkhas to seek a balance between short- , medium- ,and long-term interests. A country of the size ofIndia cannot plan its economy on the basis oflarge-scale import of energy resources or energytechnology. While trade in energy technologiesand fuel resources is welcome, indigenousdevelopment of energy technologies based onfuel resources available domestically or thosewhich can be procured at competitive pricesshould be a priority for us.

ReferencesAnonymous. 2001Shaping the Third Stage of the Indian Nuclear PowerProgramme[DAE Report No. 03]

Anonymous. 2003Generation IV: to 2030 and beyondModern Power Systems: 28–29

Anonymous. 2005Russian & NIS Nuclear Fuel Cycle Front-end IndustryMoscow: International Business Relations Corporation

Bhabha H J. 1954General plan for atomic energy development in IndiaIn Conference on Development of Atomic Energy for PeacefulPurposes in India[New Delhi, November 1954]

Carre F. 2005Fast reactors R&D strategy in France for asustainable energy supply and reduction ofenvironmental burdens[JAIF International Symposium, Tokyo, 24 March 2005]Details available at <http://www.pinenet.jp/f-symposium/PINE-PDF/03_Carre_JAIF.pdf>, last accessed inFebruary 2006


David S. 2005Future scenarios for fission based reactorsNuclear Physics A751(2005): 429c–441c

Grover R B and Chandra S. 2004A Strategy for Growth of Electrical Energy in India[DAE Report No. 10][Also accepted for publication in Energy Policy]

NucNet. 2006US plans N-fuel deals for nations who forgoenrichment, reprocessing [News no. 31]Details available at <http://www.worldnuclear.org/PDFAnsicht.cfm?NN_Flash=0&ID=ACFDDB1.pdf>,last accessed in February 2006

Planning Commission. 2005aDraft Report of the Expert Committee on IntegratedEnergy Policy, [Table 2.4]New Delhi: Planning Commission, Government of India

Planning Commission. 2005bDraft Report of the Expert Committee on IntegratedEnergy Policy [December, Page viii]New Delhi: Planning Commission, Government of India

Smith, Llewellyn C, Todd T, Ward D. 2005JET, ITER and beyondModern Power Systems: 11–15

Srinivasan M R, Grover R B, and Bhardwaj S A. 2005Nuclear energy in India: winds of changeEconomic and Political Weekly 40 (49) 5183–5188

Nuclear power: no route to energy securitySuchitra J YInstitute of Social and Economic Change, Bangalore, India

M V Ramana*Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Environment and Development, Bangalore, India

After decades of poor performance, atomic energyseems to have received a second wind, especiallyafter the joint statement of 18 July 2005 by theIndian prime minister Manmohan Singh and theUS president George W Bush. Many pro-nuclearadvocates now aver that a large-scale expansion ofnuclear power is the only way to meet ourelectricity needs and ensure energy security. Anexamination of the history of atomic energy inIndia shows, however, that this is not a new claim.Since its inception, the DAE (Department ofAtomic Energy) has been promoting nuclearpower as the answer to our energy needs. As perthe DAE’s predictions, by 2000, there should havebeen 43 500 MW of nuclear-generation capacityin the country. But only 3310 MW (megawatts)has been realized, which is less than three per centof the installed electricity generation capacity.Even by the DAE’s projections, it will not becomea significant fraction of India’s electricity for thenext few decades. And, as we argue below, nuclearpower does not enhance our energy security.

Energy security connotes the capacity to satisfythe energy needs of all sections of society without

excessively compromising safety, the environment,or the well-being of future generations. Thisimplies that electricity generation technologiesshould be economical, not run the risk ofcatastrophic accidents, be minimally polluting,and not leave long-lasting harmful legacies—nuclear power does not meet these criteria.

Economic and environmental costs

The DAE claims that nuclear power would becheap and its costs compare very favourablywith electricity from coal-fired thermal powerplants. However, a comparison of the costs ofthe two using the standard discounted cash-flowmethodology shows that nuclear power iscompetitive only for low discount rates (seeFigure 1); for a wide range of realisticparameters, nuclear power is significantly moreexpensive (Ramana, D’Sa, and Reddy 2005).The discount rate is a measure of the value ofcapital, and given the multiple demands oncapital for infrastructural projects, including forelectricity generation, very low discount ratesare not realistic. A larger proportion of nuclear



capacity, therefore, implies that poorer sectionsof society cannot afford electricity, at leastwithout greater subsidies, which would bedetrimental to energy security.

Results shown in Figure 1 are based on costsof generating electricity at the Kaiga atomicpower station and the RTPS (Raichur ThermalPower Station) VII: both base load plants ofsimilar size and vintage in Karnataka. Coal forthe RTPS VII is assumed to come from mines1400 kilometres away. The largest component ofthe cost of producing electricity at nuclearreactors is the capital cost of the reactor, whichincludes construction cost (18 160 millionrupees for Kaiga I and II, and 27 270 millionrupees for Kaiga III and IV), and the costs ofthe initial loading of uranium fuel and heavywater used in reactor. The corresponding capitalcost in case of the RTPS VII is 4910 millionrupees (all of the capital costs mentioned do notinclude the interest during construction).

This economic comparison is largely basedon assumptions favourable to nuclear power. Inparticular, cost of coal-generated electricityinternalizes the cost of disposal of fly ash in anenvironmentally responsible fashion, but nuclearcosts do not include cost of dealing with

radioactive wastes. Despite more than half acentury of intensive research, no one has founda way to render these wastes non-radioactive.This unsolved problem has caused manycountries to reconsider the nuclear option. TheDAE treats spent nuclear fuel by reprocessing itand segregating the waste into differentcategories on the basis of their radioactivity.Reprocessing also allows separation ofplutonium, which, with further treatment, canbe used as fuel in breeder reactors.Reprocessing, however, is expensive: as per ourestimates, the cost of reprocessing each kilogramof spent fuel from the DAE’s heavy water reactorsis 20 000–30 000 rupees. The Nuclear PowerCorporation does not include reprocessing costsin its tariff estimates; if included, it wouldincrease the unit cost by 0.40 to 0.60 rupee.

Apart from the economic cost, becausewastes stay radioactive for tens of thousands ofyears, they pose a potential health andenvironmental hazard to the future generations.This is clearly iniquitous as these generationswould bear the consequences while we use theelectricity generated by these reactors.

Finally, reactors are not the only source ofpollution. Large quantities of radioactive andother toxic material are released into thebiosphere at different stages of the nuclear fuelcycle. Thus, the nuclear fuel cycle is polluting,albeit in a way different from coal power.

Safety

Nuclear power also poses a risk to energysecurity because it is susceptible to catastrophicaccidents. Chernobyl is the best-known instanceof such a disaster. It resulted in several thousanddeaths and contamination of tens of thousandsof km2 (square kilometres) of land withradioactive elements like cesium-137.Agriculture across large parts of Ukraine andBelarus had to be suspended, over a hundredthousand people were relocated, and theeconomy of Belarus was devastated. Suchaccidents can happen in other (non-reactor)facilities too. In 1957, a tank containingradioactive wastes from the Mayak reprocessingplant in the erstwhile Soviet Union exploded

Figure 1 Levelized cost (the bare generation cost, whichdoes not include other components of electricity tariff likeinterest payments and transmission and distributioncharges) of Kaiga I & II (operating reactors), Kaiga III & IV(reactors under construction; projected costs), andReichur Thermal Power Station VII (operating thermalplant) as a function of real discount rate1

1A measure of the value of capital after taking out the effects of inflation.


and contaminated 20 000 km2 of land. India,still a largely agriculture-dependent economy,can simply not afford the risk of such disasters.

It is often stated that safety issues have beenadequately addressed after the Chernobylaccident. However, basic features of nuclearreactors remain the same. It is a complextechnology, involving large quantities ofradioactive materials where events can spin outof control in a very short time. In studying thesafety of nuclear reactors and other hazardoustechnologies, sociologists and organizationtheorists have come to the pessimisticconclusion that serious accidents are inevitablewith such complex high-technology systems(Perrow 1984; Sagan 1993). The character ofthese systems makes accidents a ‘normal’ part oftheir operation, regardless of the intent of theiroperators and other authorities. In suchtechnologies, many major accidents haveseemingly insignificant origins. Because of thecomplexities involved, all possible accidentmodes cannot be predicted and operator errorsare comprehensible only in the hindsight.Adding redundant safety mechanisms onlyincreases the complexity of the system, allowingfor unexpected interactions between subsystemsand increasing new accident modes. All thismeans that it is not possible to ensure thatreactors and other nuclear facilities will not havemajor accidents.

There is an experiential basis for concern aboutsuch accidents within India. Practically, all nuclearreactors and other facilities associated with thenuclear fuel cycle operated by the DAE have hadaccidents of varying severity (Chanda 1999;Rethinaraj 1999). A few examples are theunexplained power surge at the Kakrapar reactorin 2004, the 1993 fire at Narora, and the collapseof the containment at Kaiga in 1994. Because ofthe reasons mentioned in the earlier paragraph,many of these accidents could well have becomethe basis for a major radioactive release.

A further source of concern is that the AERB(Atomic Energy Regulatory Board), which issupposed to oversee safe operation of all civiliannuclear facilities, is not independent of theDAE. Further, as the former chairman of theAERB has observed, ‘The AERB has very few

qualified staff of its own, and about 95% of thetechnical personnel in AERB safety committeesare officials of the DAE whose services are madeavailable on a case-to-case basis for conductingreviews of their own installations. Theperception is that such dependency could beeasily exploited by the DAE management toinfluence the AERB’s evaluations and decisions’(Gopalakrishnan 2002).

Uranium shortage and dependence on importsThe growth of nuclear capacity is contingent onthe availability of fuel for reactors. Most of thenuclear reactors of DAE are fuelled usinguranium from the Jaduguda region of Jharkand.These require over 400 tonnes of uraniumannually. The current uranium production fromJaduguda has been estimated at less than 300tonnes a year. The DAE has been continuingoperations by using stockpiled uranium, which islikely to be exhausted by 2007.

Given this domestic resource crunch, the DAEwill soon have to depend on imported uranium torun its reactors. This is one of the primarymotivations for the Indo–US agreement. As anofficial stated in an interview on 26 July 2005 tothe BBC, ‘The truth is we were desperate. We havenuclear fuel to last only till the end of 2006. If thisagreement had not come through, we might haveas well closed down our nuclear reactors and byextension, our nuclear programme.’ Just as powergeneration from natural gas and oil is dependenton importing these fuels, electricity from nuclearreactors will become increasingly import-dependent. Imports of uranium and other nuclearmaterials like heavy water have been subject topolitical considerations. The US, for example,refused to supply enriched uranium fuel for theTarapur I and II reactors, following the 1974nuclear test and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Actpassed by the US Congress in 1978. Therefore, ifnuclear power is to expand significantly, electricityproduction could be subject to disruption byexternal events.

The alternative to importing uranium is to relyon breeder reactors fuelled by plutonium oruranium-233 derived from thorium. However,despite 50 years of ambitious plans, the DAE is yetto build a single industrial-scale breeder reactor. Ifand when they are built, because of greater safety


requirements, they will likely be more expensive tobuild and operate than reactors so far constructedby the DAE. They will thus be capital-intensive,fuelled by materials produced through expensivereprocessing, and have higher maintenance costs,making electricity from these reactors very costly.

Poor economics and safety concerns havecaused many western countries to abandon theirbreeder programmes. Even countries like Franceand Japan, where governments have longsupported breeder programmes, are reconsideringtheir strategy. In France, a high level officialcommission examined the future of reprocessing(necessary for construction of breeder reactors),and found it more expensive than other options(Charpin, Benjamin, and Pellat 2000). Japan hasnot restarted the Monju breeder reactor, whichwas shut down in 1995 after a major sodium leakand a resultant fire; no new ones are underconstruction.

Conclusion

Nuclear establishment in India has long promisedmuch; however, in spite of unstinted governmentsupport, delivered little. The DAE budgets havehistorically been high, at the cost of promotingother, more sustainable sources of power. In2002/03, for example, the DAE was allocated33 516.9 million rupees, dwarfing in comparisonthe 4735.6 million rupees allocated to the MNES(Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources),in charge of developing solar, wind, small hydro,and biomass-based power. Nevertheless, installedcapacity of these sources was 4800 MW (ascompared to 3310 MW of nuclear energy). Whiletheir contribution to actual electricity generatedwould be smaller because these are intermittentsources of power, they have much lowermaintenance costs. Further, exploitation of mostof these sources started in earnest only recentlyand there is ample scope for improvement.

Increased investment in renewable sources ofenergy is clearly desirable. Owing to the increased

research and development investments andcumulative operational capacity, capital costs ofseveral RETs (renewable energy technologies)have been declining. This trend is likely tocontinue because unlike mature technologies likethese pertaining to coal and nuclear power, RETcan improve considerably. These technologies arealso amenable to the decentralized, community-based production and cause much lessenvironmental damage than fossil fuels andnuclear energy. An increased reliance on the RETsand improvements in energy efficiency offer abasis for a robust energy strategy.

In light of the modest performance of nuclearpower, in addition to the associated high costsand environmental and safety hazards, Indiashould reconsider the nuclear option as it doesnot ensure true energy security.

References

Chanda N. 1999The perils of powerFar Eastern Economic Review

Charpin Jean-Michel, Benjamin D, and Pellat R. 2000Economic Forecast Study of the Nuclear Power OptionParis: Office of the Prime MinisterDetails available at <http://fire.pppl.gov/eu_fr_fission_plan.pdf>, last accessed in February 2005

Gopalakrishnan A. 2002Evolution of the Indian nuclear power programAnnual Review of Energy and Environment 27: 369–395

Perrow C. 1984Normal Accidents: living with high-risk technologiesNew York: Basic Books

Ramana M V, D’Sa A, and Reddy A K N. 2005Economics of nuclear power from heavy water reactorsEconomic and Political Weekly 40 (17): 1763–1773

Rethinaraj T S G. 1999In the comfort of secrecyBulletin of the Atomic Scientists 55 (6): 52–57

Sagan S D. 1993The Limits of Safety: organizations, accidents andnuclear weaponsPrinceton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press


Access to nuclear technologies and materialsunder the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty andNuclear Suppliers GroupM P Ram Mohan*Regulatory Studies and Governance Division, T E R I , New Delhi, India

Introduction

In this energy-constrained world, it is often thepolitics and not the economics that definesaccess to energy resources. Growing energydemand of the Asian countries, and inparticular, countries where conventional fuelchoices are inadequate, are prompting them tolook for newer energy options and supplysources, including nuclear energy. To attain theeconomic levels of western countries, andconsidering the nature of world oil politics,governments of many developing countriesbelieve that nuclear energy could possiblybecome an indigenous source of power, whichwould enable their economies to develop rapidlyand more securely, and usher in a new era ofprosperity.

Development of nuclear energy in the 1960sand thereafter, and in particular, development ofnuclear weapons, brought out the real dangerthat unrestricted and uncontrolled nuclearprogramme could have in the world. To avoidsuch a nightmare, in the 1960s and much laterin the 1970s, the then nuclear-weapon countriesdecided to agree on the terms and conditions ofaccess to nuclear technology and materials byother countries in the form of the nuclear NPT(Non-proliferation Treaty) and NSG (NuclearSuppliers Group). This paper critically evaluatesthese two treaties in light of constraints imposedon access to technology and fuel choices.

The Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty

BackgroundThe NPT is second only to the United NationsCharter in the number of states that are party toit. It was signed in 1968 and entered into forcein 1970. The treaty provided in Article X for aconference to be convened 25 years after its

entry into force to decide whether the treatyshould continue in force indefinitely, or beextended for an additional fixed period/periods.At the NPT Review and Extension Conference inMay 1995, state parties to the treaty agreedwithout a vote on the treaty’s indefiniteextension, and decided that review conferencesshould continue to be held every five years.

One-hundred-and-eighty-eight states areparty to the NPT; only India, Pakistan, andIsrael are outside the treaty regime. Adherenceto the treaty by 188 states, including five NWS(nuclear-weapon states), renders the treaty themost widely adhered to multilateraldisarmament agreement. Since its entry intoforce, NPT has been the cornerstone of theglobal nuclear non-proliferation regime. The treatyis the only security agreement that permits twoclasses of members: states acknowledged topossess nuclear weapons and committed tonegotiate their elimination, and states barred fromacquiring them. As a disarmament and globalcooperation mechanism, the NPT is a landmarkinternational treaty whose purpose is to preventthe spread of nuclear weapons and weapontechnology, to promote cooperation in the peacefuluses of nuclear energy, and to further the goal ofachieving nuclear disarmament and general andcomplete disarmament.

The state-parties under the treaty are classifiedin to following two categories.P NWS consisting of the United States, Russia,

China, France, and the United KingdomP NNWS (non-nuclear-weapon states)

The basic objective of the treaty is to preventnuclear proliferation. Classifications of countriesare meant to eliminate nuclear weapons in a time-bound manner. This is done by persuading (1) the



existing NWS to disarm, (2) the NNWS states torefrain from acquiring nuclear weapons, and(3) providing access to technologies and materialsto the NNWS for peaceful use under the IAEA(International Atomic Energy Agency) safeguards.

Most important to the NPT is the concessionof the NNWS to refrain from acquiring nuclearweapons and in exchange, the NWS agree tomake progress on nuclear disarmament andprovide unrestricted access to nuclear energy fornon-military uses.1 The treaty establishes asafeguard system under the responsibility of theIAEA to further the goal of non-proliferationand as a confidence-building measure betweenstate parties.2 Safeguards are used to verifycompliance with the treaty through inspectionsconducted by the IAEA.3 Safeguards do notapply to the NWS. Article IX defines an NWSas one that has manufactured and exploded anuclear weapon or other nuclear explosivedevices prior to 1 January 1967, that is, theUnited States, the Soviet Union (now Russia),the United Kingdom, (these three from thebeginning), and France and China (becameNWS two decades later). The set of five NWSparties to the NPT are the same set ofpermanent members of the Security Council.For India, Israel, and Pakistan, all known to orsuspected to possess nuclear weapons, joiningthe treaty as the NNWS would require that theydismantle their nuclear weapons and place theirnuclear materials under internationalsafeguards.4 South Africa followed this path toaccession in 1991. The NPT thus seeks toinhibit the spread of nuclear weapons bypromoting peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Access to nuclear technology and resources

The NWS and NNWS under the NPT regimeare obliged not to acquire nuclear weapons or totransfer nuclear weapons and other nuclearexplosive devices or their technologies to any

NNWS. Article I of the treaty provides that theNWS agree not to help the NNWS develop oracquire nuclear weapons, and under A.II, theNNWS permanently forswear the pursuit ofsuch weapons.

Article III provides that the NNWS partiesundertake not to acquire or produce nuclearweapons, nuclear explosive devices, or divertacquired technology for the weapon programme.They are also required to accept safeguards todetect the diversion of nuclear material forpeaceful purposes such as power generation tothe production of nuclear weapons or othernuclear explosive devices. This article establishessafeguards for transfer of fissionable materialsbetween the NWS and NNWS. This must bedone in accordance with an individual safeguardagreement between each NNWS party and theIAEA.5 To verify these commitments and ensurethat nuclear materials are not being diverted forweapon purposes, Article III tasks the IAEAwith the inspection and verification of NNWS’nuclear facilities. Under this agreement, allnuclear material in peaceful civil facility underthe jurisdiction of the state must be declared tothe IAEA whose inspectors have routine accessto the facility for periodic monitoring andinspection. States transferring nucleartechnology, material, or equipment that could beof some relevance in a weapon developmentprogramme make the acceptance of safeguards acondition for such transfer. For importantinstallations, most suppliers impose an evenmore stringent condition of ‘full-scope’ or‘comprehensive safeguards’ in that the recipientcountry accepts the IAEA safeguards over all itsrelevant nuclear activities. Safeguards are, thus,in most situations, a verification processimposed by the nuclear technology suppliersunder the NSG guidelines. They require aguarantee that their exports will not contributeto nuclear weapon development.

1 NPT Articles 2, 4, and 62 Article 33 Ibid4 India, Israel, and Pakistan that have never signed and ratified NPT (Non-proliferation Treaty), could thus technically be

classified into a third category of states not party to the NPT.5 India has consented for such International Atomic Energy Agency safeguard inspection for only six of its reactors – RAPs-1 and 2,

TAPs-1 and 2, and Kudamkulam 1 and 2 – as they have imported nuclear facilities.


As far as rights of the NNWS under the NPTregime are concerned, Article IV (treatyprovision expanded in the Box 1) acknowledgesthe ‘inalienable right’ of the NNWS to research,develop, and use nuclear energy for non-weaponpurposes. It also supports the ‘fullest possibleexchange’ of such nuclear-related informationand technology between the NWS and NNWS.Article V, now effectively obsolete, permits theNNWS access to the NWS research anddevelopment on the benefits of nuclearexplosions conducted for peaceful purposes.Article V of the NPT, concerning peaceful nuclearexplosions, has been overtaken by Article VIII ofthe CTBT (Comprehensive Nuclear Test BanTreaty), which prohibits such explosions, as theperceived utility of peaceful nuclear explosions hasdiminished over time, and with the new CTBTregime in place, relevance of this clause has lost itsvalue. It is now the CTBT that places restrictionson all nuclear explosions. The five NWS aresignatories of the CTBT.

Thus, Article IV acknowledges state partiesto provide for transfer of information andtechnology to assist countries in their civiliannuclear programmes under theArticle III safeguards and makes the IAEA themain multilateral channel for expansion ofapplication of nuclear energy for peacefulpurposes. It is under these provisions that India,though not party to the NPT, but a volunteer toaccept the IAEA safeguards and verification ofits declared civilian nuclear facilities, couldaccess nuclear technologies and fuel from the

United States. The NPT itself does not barsignatories from providing civilian nuclearenergy to non-signatories. But the AmericanCongress went beyond the NPT by enactingNuclear Non-proliferation Act of 1978 (NNPA,PL 95-242), which imposed tough newrequirements for the US nuclear exports toNNWS, which involved full-scope safeguardsand termination of exports if such a statedetonates a nuclear explosive device or engagesin activities related to acquiring ormanufacturing nuclear weapons, among otherthings. To make the Indo–US nuclearcooperation work, the relevant export licensingrequirements of the US need to be amended asalso the NSG guidelines regarding nuclearexport controls (detailed explanation in the nextsection).

Nuclear Suppliers Group

Background

The NPT granted NNWS access to nuclearmaterial and technology for peaceful purposes aslong as they committed to not developingnuclear weapons. Recognizing that materials andtechnologies used in peaceful nuclearprogrammes could be used to develop weaponsas well, several NPT nuclear supplier statessought to determine in relation to the treaty,what specific equipment and materials could beshared with NNWS and under what conditions.These supplier states formed the ZanggerCommittee in 1971, to reach commonunderstandings on how to implement Article

Box 1 NPT Article IV

1 Nothing in this treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the ‘inalienable right’ of all parties to the treaty to develop

research, production, and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with

Articles I and II of this treaty.

2 All parties to the treaty undertake to facilitate, and have the right to participate in the fullest possible exchange of

equipment, materials, and scientific and technological information for peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Parties to

the treaty in a position to do so shall also cooperate in contributing alone or together with the other states or

international organizations to the further development of applications of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes,

especially in territories of non-nuclear-weapon states party to the treaty, with due consideration for the needs of the

developing areas of the world.


III.26 of the NPT. This is in view to facilitateinterpretation of the obligations arising fromthat article to institute the IAEA safeguards beforebeing allowed imports of certain items that couldbe directly used to pursue nuclear weapons. Theseitems were collectively referred to as the ‘triggerlist.’7 The trigger list governs export, direct orindirect, of those items to the NNWS that are notparty to the NPT. The Zangger understandingsestablished three conditions for supply: a non-explosive-use assurance, an IAEA safeguardsrequirement, and a re-transfer provision thatrequires the receiving state to apply the sameconditions when re-exporting these items.8

In response to India’s explosion of a nucleardevice in 1974, several Zangger Committeemembers joined with France, which was not amember of the NPT at that time, to establish in1975 the NSG to further regulate nuclear-related exports. The NSG is a group of nuclearsupplier countries, which seeks to contribute tonon-proliferation of nuclear weapons throughimplementation of guidelines for nuclear exportsand nuclear-related exports. Each participatinggovernment implements the NSG guidelines inaccordance with its national laws and practices.Decisions on export applications are taken at thenational level, in accordance with the nationalexport-licensing requirements. The NSG addedtechnologies for control to the original ZanggerCommittee’s ‘trigger list’. This became Part I ofthe NSG Guidelines. In addition, NSG membersagreed to apply their trade restrictions to allstates, not just those outside the NPT.

NSG comprises 44 nuclear supplier states,9

including China, Russia, and the United Statesthat have voluntarily agreed to coordinate theirexport controls governing transfers of civiliannuclear material and nuclear-related equipmentand technology to NNWS.

Operating guidelines

The NSG Guidelines first published in 1978comprise two parts, each of which was created inresponse to a significant proliferation event (seefootnotes 10 and 11 below) that highlightedshortcomings in the then existing export controlsystems (as detailed in Box 2). Both Part 1 and 2 ofthe NSG Guidelines aim to ensure that nucleartrade for peaceful purposes does not contribute tothe proliferation of nuclear weapons or explosivedevices while not hindering such trade.

The Part I Guidelines govern exports of nuclearmaterials and equipment, which require theapplication of IAEA safeguards at the recipientfacility. The Part 1 nuclear control list is the ‘triggerlist’ because export of such items ‘triggers’ therequirement for the IAEA safeguards.10

The Part II Guidelines govern export ofnuclear-related dual-use equipment andmaterial. The NSG Guidelines also controltechnology related to both nuclear and nuclear-related dual-use exports. Part II basicallyidentifies dual-use goods, which are non-nuclearitems with legitimate civilian applications thatcan also be used to develop weapons.11

The NSG Guidelines introduce a degree oforder and predictability among suppliers, and

6 Article III.2 of the NPT states that

Each state party to the treaty undertakes not to provide

(a) source or special fissionable material or

(b) equipment or material, especially designed or prepared for processing, use, or production of special fissionable material to

any non-nuclear-weapon state for peaceful purposes, unless the source or special fissionable material shall be subject to the

safeguards required by this Article.’7 IAEA document INFCIRC/209.8 International Atomic Energy Agency, Communication of 10 May 2005 received from the Government of Sweden on behalf of

participating governments of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, Information Circular, INFCIRC/539/Rev.3 (30 May 2005).9 Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia,

Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta,

Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain,

Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States.10Part I responded to India’s diversion of nuclear imports for supposedly peaceful purposes to conduct a nuclear explosion in 1974

and is published in 1978.11NSG members adopted Part II in 1992 after discovering how close Iraq came to realizing its nuclear weapon ambitions by

illicitly employing dual-use imports in a covert nuclear weapon programme before the 1991 Persian Gulf War.


harmonize standards and interpretations ofsuppliers’ undertakings with the aim of ensuringthat the normal process commercial competitiondoes not lead to outcomes that furtherproliferate nuclear weapons. Consultationsamong NSG participants are also designed toensure that any possible impediments to theinternational nuclear trade and cooperation arekept to a minimum. Thus, to be eligible forimporting Part I items from an NSG member,states must have comprehensive IAEAsafeguards, covering all their nuclear activitiesand facilities. Thus, for the transfer of Part Iitems to an NNWS, the controls require full-scope safeguards of the IAEA on all nuclearactivities of the recipient country. In case ofPart II goods, the IAEA safeguards are onlyrequired for specific nuclear activity or facilitythat the import is destined for.

Access to nuclear materials under the NuclearSuppliers Group

As described earlier, NSG participants implementNSG Guidelines in accordance with its nationallaws and practices. At the national level, decisionson export applications are made in accordancewith the national export-licensing requirements.This is the prerogative and right of all states for allexport decisions in any field of commercial activityand is also in line with the text of Article III.2 ofthe NPT, which refers to ‘each state party’, andthus emphasizes the sovereign obligation of anyparty to the treaty to exercise proper exportcontrols. In context of access to the US

technologies by India, this restriction along withapplication of the US domestic law12 restrains theUS from doing nuclear trade and exchange tilldate with a NNWS that is not party to the NPT.The NSG countries meet regularly to exchangeinformation on issues of nuclear proliferationconcern and how these impact the national exportcontrol policy and practice. However, it isimportant to remember that NSG does not have amechanism for limiting supply or for coordinationof marketing arrangements, and does not takedecisions on licence applications as a group. Again,to make the Indo–US nuclear cooperation work,the US government will need to amend itsdomestic law and also take the NSG members intoconfidence before any physical transfer takes place.

In 1992, the NSG added full-scope IAEAsafeguards as a condition of nuclear supply to theNNWS, and established nuclear-related dual-useguidelines and a control list. In 1995, the NSGadded controls on nuclear technology for items onthe trigger list. The requirement that no transfer oftrigger list items to the NNWS takes place unlessthe recipient state has full-scope safeguards on allits nuclear activities, is particularly pertinentbecause it establishes a uniform standard of supplythat is based on IAEA’s international verificationsystem. In 1997, IAEA strengthened its safeguardssystem to improve the agency’s ability to exerciseits verification role. Under the NSG operatingprocedure, contacts and briefings take place withnon-participating countries. This is in addition tothe outreach activities conducted with potentialNSG participants. NSG’s dialogue with non-NSG

12Nuclear Non-proliferation Act of 1978

Box 2 NSG Guidelines

Guidelines for nuclear transfers (INFCIRC/254, Part I)

The first set of NSG Guidelines governs the export of items that are especially designed or prepared for nuclear use.

These include (i) nuclear material, (ii) nuclear reactors and equipment therefore, (iii) non-nuclear material for reactors,

(iv) plant and equipment for reprocessing, enrichment, and conversion of nuclear material and for fuel fabrication and

heavy water production; and (v) technology associated with each of the above items.

Guidelines for transfers of nuclear-related dual-use equipment, materials, software and related technology

(INFCIRC/254, Part II)

The second set of NSG Guidelines governs the export of nuclear-related dual-use items and technologies, that is, items

that can make a major contribution to an unsafeguarded nuclear fuel cycle or nuclear explosive activity, but which have

non-nuclear uses as well, for example in industry.


member-countries is part of its ‘outreach’programme that seeks to engage in consultationswith non-member countries on domestic exportcontrols on nuclear goods, resulting inproliferation concerns. The visit of the NSG teamto India in 2004 and again in April 2005 is a partof this process.

The flexibility is that states can choose toadhere to the guidelines without being obliged toparticipate in the NSG.13 At the May 2004plenary meeting, NSG members adopted a ‘catch-all’ mechanism, which authorizes members toblock any export suspected to be destined to anuclear weapon programme even if export doesnot appear on one of the control lists.

The NSG regime is voluntary. NSG membersmay ultimately export what they wish. Forinstance, Russia transferred nuclear fuel to Indiain January 2001 even though 32 of the 34 NSGmembers earlier declared that the shipment wouldcontradict Russia’s NSG commitments. Membersare supposed to report their export denials to eachother so that potential proliferators cannotapproach several suppliers with the same requestand get different responses. NSG states areexpected to refrain from making exportsidentical or similar to those denied by othermembers. All NSG decisions are made byconsensus.

India–US agreement on civilian nuclearcooperation under the Non-proliferation Treatyand Nuclear Suppliers Group

India is neither a party to the NPT nor amember of the NSG unlike the United States. Infact, as discussed above, NSG is the successor tothe Zangger Committee, and was initiated at thebehest of the United States, immediately afterIndia’s nuclear explosion in 1974. As per thepresent NPT provisions, India could belong tothe NNWS. NPT never visualized a countrywith nuclear weapon being out of treatymechanism. India being both, that is, non-

recognized nuclear weapon state and not being aparty to NPT falls outside the NPT frameworkand could be classified differently. This will bethe classification which the India-US civilnuclear cooperation will bestow India into theworld civil nuclear energy cooperation.Definition of an NWS for the purpose of NSG isthe same as that in the NPT; namely, that whichhas exploded a nuclear device before 1 January1967. From NSG’s perspective, therefore, India,Pakistan, and Israel are the NNWS.

The NPT and NSG both, without full-scopesafeguards, bar state parties to transfertechnology and material to non-state parties.With regard to India, except Tarapur andRajasthan reactors, and related facilities that areunder facility-specific safeguards, India’s entirenuclear-fuel cycle has been indigenous,autonomous, and free from foreign inspectionsand thus has not accepted the full IAEAsafeguards. It is in this context that India andthe US have agreed to collaborate in civilianuses of nuclear energy. What does the India–USjoint strategic agreement mean and how doesthe civilian nuclear cooperation work in contextof the present international regime?

As per the text of the statement,14 the US wouldP work to achieve full civil nuclear energy

cooperation with India as it realizes its goalsof promoting nuclear power and achievingenergy security,

P seek agreement from Congress to adjust theUS laws and policies,

P work with friends and allies to adjustinternational regimes to enable full civilnuclear energy cooperation and trade withIndia, including but not limited toexpeditious consideration of fuel supplies forsafeguarded nuclear reactors at Tarapur, and

P encourage its partners to also considerIndia’s request expeditiously to join ITER(International Thermonuclear ExperimentalReactor) and a willingness to contribute.15

13NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group) gives status of ‘unilateral NSG adherents’. Both Israel on 1 July 2004 and Pakistan on

23 September 2004 have made their export laws in conformity with the NSG Guidelines and have communicated their domestic

export laws to the IAEA: the IAEA circular INFCIRC/632 and INFCIRC/636, respectively. This is the first step towards the

NSG’s recognition of their non-proliferation credentials.14Text of India–US joint statement (July 2005) available at http://www.dae.gov.in/jtstmt.htm.15In December 2005, India became full party to ITER Project. See, Joint Press Release Twelfth ITER Negotiation Meeting, Jeju,

Korea, 6 December 2005. Details available at <http://www.iter.org/N_12_Joint_Press_Release.htm>.


considered a step closer to the NPT parameters.One of the key requirements of the SecurityCouncil Resolution is that export controls andother legislative measures to preventproliferation-related activities under such a lawshould be effective against ‘non-state actors’ andagents of terrorism as well. Another importantstep that would be required by India is to agreeto meet the Guidelines, Part I of the NSG,which refer to control on transfer of ‘trigger list’,and Part II Guidelines, which refer to nuclear-related dual-use items. Part I attracts full-scopesafeguards of the IAEA on ‘all peaceful nuclearactivities’ of an NNWS in the sense of the NPTand Part II attracts islanded safeguards ontransferred equipment or material. That is, fromthe point of this commitment, India needs toseparate its civilian and military nuclearfacilities for impending the IAEA safeguards andinspections. India’s impeccable record on non-proliferation creates a strong case to convincethe NSG in relaxing its rules. This is evidentfrom the fact that though India is not party toNPT and NSG, its domestic export controlshave not been less stringent than the guidelinesof the NPT, NSG, and MTCR.

The US, on its part, to make this agreementwork, needs to convince the NSG members to makesuitable regulatory adjustments as the decision isbased on consensus and would require the USCongress to amend its domestic legislation onexport and licencing to allow the transfer oftechnologies and materials. This shift in policy willallow several NSG countries to collaborate withIndia in the civilian nuclear programmes.

Conclusion

The NPT and NSG clearly provide for transfer ofnuclear technologies and materials for peacefulnuclear applications. But between the 1970s and2000s, the world has changed its geo-politicalcharacter. Moreover, the 21st century sawdramatic advances in nuclear physics, which madesome of the provisions redundant. Adding to it,inequality developed in interpretation of its

16Supra 1317Bill No. 70 of 2005

The Preamble of the Bill also describes India as nuclear weapon state

‘Whereas India is determined to safeguard its national security as a Nuclear Weapon State’

And in turn, India would16

P identify and separate civilian and militarynuclear facilities and programmes in aphased manner and file a declarationregarding its civilian facilities with the IAEA,

P take a decision to place voluntarily its civiliannuclear facilities under the IAEA safeguards,

P sign and adhere to an additional protocolwith respect to the civilian nuclear facilities,

P continue India’s unilateral moratorium onnuclear testing,

P work with the US for conclusion of a multilateralFMCT (Fissile Material Cut off Treaty),

P refrain from transfer of enrichment andreprocessing technologies to states that donot have them and support internationalefforts to limit their spread,

P ensure that necessary steps have beenundertaken to secure nuclear materials andtechnology through comprehensive exportcontrol legislation as well as throughharmonization and adherence to the MTCR(Missile Technology Control Regime) and theNSG Guidelines.

The US recognition of India as a ‘responsiblestate with advanced nuclear technologies’ hasgiven India the status of a de facto NWS outsidethe NPT. This along with the civil nuclearcooperation agreement with bindingcommitments on both the parties, will increasethe integration of India into the global nucleargame. India, on its part, agreed ‘to assume thesame responsibilities and practices and acquirethe same benefits and advantages of otherleading countries with advanced nucleartechnologies.’ This would require India to alignher laws and regulations with the IAEAsafeguard agreements and NSG guidelines.

As a first step, the Indian enactment of ‘TheWeapons of Mass Destruction and TheirDelivery Systems (Prohibition of UnlawfulActivities) Bill, 2005’17 fulfils India’s obligationsunder the United Nations Security CouncilResolution 1540 of 28 April 2004. This is


provisions, non-implementation of treatycommitments by the NWS, and the indefiniteextension of the treaty without any seriouscompliance with regard to the nucleardisarmament obligations by the NWS added morepessimism to the entire process. Though with greatlimitations, NSG, a creation of more informalarrangements, played a major role in persuadingthe nuclear supplier countries to the commitmentsof non-proliferation of weapons but in the meantime, it committed itself to have peaceful uses ofnuclear energy programme through the non-binding guidelines.

To have a credible nuclear energy programmethat addresses proliferation, and security andaccess to peaceful civilian nuclear energyprogramme, the present NPT regime needs far-reaching changes. The developing countries, withgenuine aspirations of progress, would require anenergy source that is largely indigenous andadequate towards achievement of economic andsocial development that the countries in the Westhad the benefit of. The current world nuclearenergy inequity needs to end.

Bibliography

Barletta M and Sands A (eds). 1999Nonproliferation Regimes at RiskCalifornia: CNS, Monterey Institute of InternationalStudies

Einhorn R. 2005Should the US Sell Nuclear Technology to India?Part IYaleGlobal OnlineDetails available at http://www.ycsg.yale.edu/global/index.html, last accessed on January 2006.

International Atomic Energy Agency. 2005Communication of 10 May 2005 received from theGovernment of Sweden on behalf of the participatinggovernments of the Nuclear Suppliers Groups[Information Circular, INFCIRC/539/Rev.3]Nuclear Suppliers Group

Jo D-J and Gartzke E. 2003Determinants of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation: aquantitative model?Seoul National University

John S (ed). 2004NPT Briefing BookUnited Kingdom: The Mountbatten Centre forInternational Studies

Johnson R. 2005aPolitics and Protection: why the 2005 NPT reviewconference failedDisarmament Diplomacy 80 (Autumn 2005)

Johnson R. 2005bThe 2005 NPT Conference in crisis: risks andopportunitiesDisarmament Diplomacy 79 (April/May 2005)

Joseph R G. 2005Toward US–India Civil Nuclear Cooperation[Prepared remarks before the Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee Washington, DC. Hearing on US–India CivilNuclear Cooperation Initiative]Details available at <http://www.state.gov/t/us/rm/55968.htm>, last accessed in January 2006

Kanwal G. 2005Indo-US Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement:Implementation Hurdles [ORF Policy Brief #3]New Delhi: ORF

Mitra S K. 2002Emerging Major Powers and the InternationalSystem: significance of the Indian view[Paper presented at the 2002 RAAF Aerospace Conference onConflict, the State and Aerospace Power: New Perspectives forthe Third Millennium, Canberra, May 2002,Royal Australian Air Force

Table 1 provides a time line of nuclear activities from1957 to 2006.

Year Event

1957 Setting up of IAEA (International Atomic EnergyAgency)

1970 NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) enteredinto force

1971 Formation of Zangger Committee

1974 First nuclear explosion by India

1975 Creation of NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group)

1978 Adoption of Part I NSG Guideline

1992 Adoption of Part II NSG Guideline

1995 Indefinite extension of NPT Review Committee

1996 Adoption of the CTBT (Comprehensive Nuclear-Test Ban Treaty)

1998 Second nuclear explosion by India

2001 Russian transfer of nuclear fuel

2005 India-US Joint Strategic Agreement

2005 India joined ITER (International ThermonuclearExperimental Reactor) Project

2006 India-US nuclear deal signed


Mian Z and Ramana M V. 1998Serving a Nuclear Summons: how to make thenuclear weapons states negotiate disarmament[Paper presented by M V Ramana at the Pugwash meetingon Eliminating Nuclear Weapons, New Delhi, March 1998,Pugwash Meeting]

Ram Mohan M P. 2004Is the NPT still an effective instrument to prevent theproliferation of nuclear weapons?[Thesis submitted to OECD Nuclear Energy Agency,Paris, France]

Squassoni S. 2005US Nuclear Cooperation with India: issues for CongressWashington, DC: Congressional Research Service Reportfor Congress

Zuberi M. 2005The Nuclear Deal: India cannot be coerced[ORF Policy Brief #3]

Websiteshttp://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.com

http://disarmament2.un.org/

http://www.iaea.org

http://www.bbc.co.uk/

http://cns.miis.edu/

http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/NSG.asp#notes2

www.indianexpress.com

http://www.hinduonnet.com/

http://www.rediff.com

http://www.globalresearch.ca/

http://www.dae.gov.in/jtstmt.htm

Looking beyond the nuclear dealSiddharth Varadarajan*The Hindu

Though there are manifest difficulties innegotiating the recent India–US agreement onthe civilian nuclear cooperation through thetwin thickets of the US legislative process andthe NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group), it isreasonable to assume that the Indian nuclearenergy industry is likely to avail of imported fueland equipment in the not too distant future.

That such an eventuality is at all possible isdue, primarily, to three reasons. First, thegrowing economic and strategic significance ofIndia in a world that is in transition from onesystem of order to another. For the US, whichintends to weather this transition with itshegemonic power intact if not augmented,nuclear cooperation with India forms thebedrock of a wider set of strategic interactionsaimed at harnessing the Indian strategiccapabilities. Indeed, strategic factors have over-determined the American approach to theIndian nuclear question to such an extent thatIndia’s nuclear weapons are probably consideredan asset for the US rather than a liability in theglobal balance. This has enabled realists in theAmerican policy planning system to overcome

the non-proliferation theologians and push forthe mainstreaming of India’s nuclear capabilitieseven if this means accepting many conditionslaid down by the Indian nuclear scientists, suchas excluding the fast breeder programme fromthe purview of international safeguards for thetime being.

Second, the rise of India and China isexerting tremendous pressure on theinternational hydrocarbon market as far as theUS and western oil majors are concerned. Thisis not so much due to the current levels ofdemand – indeed, it is a fallacy that demandgrowth in these two countries is an important,let alone pivotal, cause of the recent upwardstrend in the international oil prices – as to thehedging strategies that China and India haveembarked upon. These strategies are aimed atsecuring a major upstream presence throughequity oil acquisitions as well as establishmentof new transportation infrastructure, such astranscontinental and trans-regional pipelines.India, in particular, is seriously examiningprospects of a strategic natural gas pipeline fromIran via Pakistan. If completed, such a project



would fill a major gap in the emerging Asianenergy architecture and open the possibility forgeneralized outflow of Central Asian andCaspian oil and gas southwards towards thePersian Gulf and hence to Asia, rather thanexclusively westwards via the US-promotedpipelines like Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan.

Third, the US nuclear reactor constructionindustry has been in doldrums since 1976 and islooking towards China and India as a majorsource of new demand. Although the Indiannuclear establishment would be morecomfortable sourcing reactors from Russia orFrance, it is highly unlikely that lifting of theembargo on civil nuclear cooperation with Indiaat the urging and initiative of the US will notresult in some contracts going to the Americancompanies. The US would also be lookingforward to leveraging the nuclear agreement tosecure a greater share of the growing Indianarms market.

The fact that none of these three reasonssound particularly appetizing – indeed allreasons suggest that the offer of civil nuclearcooperation comes with a collateral price tag insome other area – is by itself not a sufficientground to reject or oppose such a historic deal,which offers the Indian nuclear industry achance to end more than 30 years of isolation.But they do suggest the policy areas whereutmost caution is required.

If unreasonable expectations of the US – on thestrategic front, energy security front, and tradefront – are met fully or even partially, many of thegains stemming from resumption of civil nuclearcooperation will be lost. This newsletter is perhapsnot the best forum to address the first and thirdfronts but energy security is a question thatdemands utmost clarity and it is to this subjectthat I will now turn.

Simply put, India must reject the notion thatthere can be any trade-off between the prospectsof greater civil nuclear cooperation and those ofcooperative hydrocarbon ventures of the kindthe country is looking at with Iran, Pakistan, andeven China. That the US is looking at these twoas a trade-off should be amply evident both fromthe timing of US Secretary of State CondoleezzaRice’s initial offer of an energy dialogue in

March 2005 as well as from the pronouncementsmade since then by her, by the US ambassadorto India David Mulford, and by the sundryofficials and legislators in the US. The USpresident George W Bush’s remarks inIslamabad on 4 March 2006 that the US has aproblem not with the Iran pipeline but withIran’s nuclear ambitions is not a shift in line assome have suggested but a clevererreformulation of the same objection.

Oil and, particularly, natural gas willcontinue to be an important part of the Indianenergy mix in the short and medium term, andnuclear power can be seen as a substitute only inthe long term. Up until the middle of thiscentury then, finding and securing new sourcesof hydrocarbons will have to be a key aspect ofIndia’s quest for energy security. Given theenormous reserves of natural gas in Iran, thatcountry is a natural partner for India andmultiple forms of transport infrastructure –including pipelines and LNG (liquefied naturalgas) tankers – will be needed between the twocountries. The presence of Pakistan is not aproblem but an opportunity for India becauseinvolving Islamabad in a trilateral or evenmultilateral energy grid is an excellent way ofraising the level of economic interaction betweenthe two neighbours who have traditionally beenat loggerheads with one another. Ever sinceprime minister Manmohan Singh came underfire for suggesting in an interview to theWashington Post in July 2005 that the Iranpipeline might never take off, his governmenthas been careful to reiterate its commitment tothe project, provided it is found to be financiallyviable. While financial viability is important,particularly when comparing alternative modesof transportation or indeed imports, thereshould be no underestimation of politicalbenefits that the pipeline might also bring.These benefits will accrue in three distinct andmutually reinforcing ways. First, India andPakistan will experience the burden of mutualdependency for the first time in decades.Second, Iran will get to develop a stable andsecure export market for its natural gas. Third,the Iran–Pakistan–India pipeline might become acatalyst for a wider network of pipelines


criss-crossing the Asian heartland and connectingareas of supply with areas of demand in a mannerunmediated by the outside influence.

Though a recent convert to the cause ofpipelines, India has begun to compensate for itsearlier lack of interest with an ambitiousproposal for an Asian gas grid that would takethese two connections – Iran–India andKazakhstan–China – and extend them in a waythat links Asia’s major energy-producing and-consuming regions to one another. At themeeting in New Delhi in November 2005 ofprincipal north and central Asian energy-producing and -consuming countries, Indiaunveiled an ambitious 22.4-billion-dollarpan-Asian gas grid and oil-security pipelinesystem. The grid has four principal elements.The first would extend the existing Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline system – originallyconceived by the US as a means of shippingcentral Asian hydrocarbons westwards – down tothe Red Sea via Syria, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia,allowing Caspian crudes to be exported easily tothe Indian Ocean littoral. Second is the famousIran–Pakistan–India pipeline, with thepossibility of two additional sourcing spurs, onefrom the Caspian–Turkmenistan region to Iran,the other from Turkmenistan via Afghanistan.The third element would be a pipeline systemconnecting eastern India to Myanmar andsouth-western China with one connectionrunning from Sittwe on the Burmese Bay ofBengal coast to Mizoram, Manipur, and Assaminto China, eventually connecting up to theWest–East China gas pipeline near Shaanxi, theother from Yangon to Kunming. The fourthelement would involve the laying of pipelinesthat would connect the Sakhalin deposits inRussia to Japan, China, and South Korea.

Pipelines aim to deliver gas, crude, orproducts between discrete points but this doesnot mean they have to be a zero-sum game. Theunderlying economic logic of a grid is thatcapital costs can be more easily absorbed andamortized and energy supplies calibrated tomatch demand variations in the consumingcountries without too much effort. But there is apolitical logic as well. As the Asian grid willcreate mutual dependencies, giving countries a

stake in the political and economic stability ofone another, it will hasten the process ofregional integration. If at all Asia is to makeprogress towards creating an Asian counterpartto the IEA (International Energy Agency) anddeveloping a regional market for energy with itsown price markers, construction of physicalinfrastructure such as pipelines is essential.

While the Iran–India energy link is crucial tothe emergence of any Asian gas grid, Sino-Indian collaboration will likely be the platformon which any wider energy architecture in Asiawill emerge. The two countries have travelledsome distance in reaching an agreement inJanuary 2006 for the joint bidding of oil and gasassets in third-world countries but there aremany more areas for cooperation that can andshould be explored. India, in particular, mustnot lose interest in this aspect of energy securitynow that the nuclear deal with the US looksincreasingly likely to come through.

Above all, India and China need to keep inmind the big picture: evolution of an Asianmarket for crude and products with long-termsupply contracts and stable prices, and,eventually, an Asian Energy Union. AsMani Shankar Aiyar, who was India’s petroleumand natural gas minister until 30 January 2006,pointed out in a recent lecture to the Chineseenergy specialists in Beijing, the EuropeanUnion started life as a coal and steel unionbefore growing eventually into a full-fledgedeconomic and political community. Couldenergy play the same role in Asia, with India andChina serving as sheet anchors in the wayFrance and Germany did in Europe? With Indiaand China committed to building strategicpetroleum reserves, South Korea offering towork on an ‘Inter-Asia Oil and GasTransportation System’, and Iran planning itsown hydrocarbon bourse, such an idea is nolonger far-fetched.

Linked to an Asian oil market is the billion-euro question of non-dollar denominated energytrade. Asian countries collectively hold morethan two trillion dollars worth of foreignreserves, the overwhelming share of which is indollar-denominated instruments. Prudentialnorms suggest that diversification of the Asian


reserve portfolio is overdue. In China, the SAFE(State Administration of Foreign Exchange) hassignalled its intention to explore the more‘efficient use’ of the country’s forex reserves andin India, commentators like S Venkitramananhave suggested the Reserve Bank of India startthinking along similar lines. One way to sustainthis shift would be to consider yen- or euro-based trading in energy. The economicdynamism of Asia for the foreseeable futuresuggests that what is needed is a strategic ratherthan a tactical change in composition ofreserves. Huge and unsustainable deficits beingrun by the US are undermining the ‘oilstandard’ that has been central to the hegemonyof both the dollar and Washington for more thanthree decades. Relying exclusively on the dollarfor energy trade will hurt Asia’s producers and

consumers alike in the long run and there isneed for a shift in some other direction.

To conclude, India’s quest for energy securitycannot be considered in a unidimensionalmanner in which sectors and timeframes arecollapsed in an unrealistic manner. The Indianeconomy will require both hydrocarbons as wellas nuclear power, not to speak of other sourcesof conventional and non-conventional energy.The biggest mistake that policy planners cancommit is to consider one source as a trade-offfor another, especially given the differingtimeframes. As a stand-alone deal, the nuclearcooperation agreement with the US has much tocommend it. But its costs will start adding up if,as a consequence, we turn away from the Iranpipeline and from the wider agenda of an Asianenergy grid and energy market.

Accessing opportunities in a changing globalnuclear orderCentre for Research on Energy Security team, T E R I , New Delhi, India

India has, for a large number of years, been thetarget of a global nuclear technology blockade ordenial regime, given its decision not to sign theNuclear NPT (Non-proliferation Treaty).Operationally, this means that India has beenout of the technical and commercial loop onpeaceful uses of energy, which otherwise, theNPT member states were eligible for; but itsobverse is that it has encouraged India todevelop an impressive indigenous capability.Despite this, it is evident that there is a fuel, safety,and a technical constraint, in terms of meetingIndia’s power needs through the nuclear route inits larger plan to secure energy needs.

India has a limited resource availability ofuranium, to the tune of about 70 000 tonnes; butit has one of the largest resources of thorium in theworld, amounting to 360 000 tonnes. Therefore,India chose to adopt a programme in which thefuel cycle maximizes energy yield of the nuclear-energy-producing ores. The programme involvesthree stages, described as follows:

P Stage I Construction of natural-uranium-based pressurized heavy water moderated andcooled reactors; spent fuel from thesereactors can be reprocessed to obtainplutonium

P Stage II Construction of FBRs (fast-breederreactors) fuelled by plutonium produced inStage I; these reactors are also to breedU-233 from thorium

P Stage III Power reactors using U-233/thorium as fuel

India is currently in the second phase wherethe FBRs are to be commissioned. India’suranium resource base can only support10 000 MW (megawatts) of power generationthrough the PHWR (pressurized heavy waterreactor) route, which is Stage I of India’snuclear programme.

Inadequate fuel in Stage I would not onlyaffect the nuclear contribution towardsalleviating the energy deficit but also the


India’s nuclear programme for strategic andcommercial reasons cannot be denied.

The Indo–US joint statement of 18 July 2005issued by the US president George W Bush andthe Indian prime minister Manmohan Singhpromised efforts by the Bush administration topass a legislation, which would allow the US toprovide full civilian nuclear technologycooperation to India. India’s pressing energyneeds and its non-proliferation record present agreat test case to enable this re-entry into anotherwise closed international order. The jointstatement is perceived as giving India duerecognition in the global nuclear order,acknowledging the existence of its strategicprogramme while being invited to be a partnerin the international civil nuclear energycooperation. This opportunity was being offeredin exchange for India placing its civilianfacilities under the IAEA (International AtomicEnergy Agency) safeguards and ring-fencingthese from its weapons programme. In thedomestic debate that followed, this originalstatement became embroiled in worries thatthere was an effort to cap the strategicprogramme. In his speech to the Parliament on28 February 2005, prime minister ManmohanSingh did refer to an initial separation planidentifying 65% of its installed nuclear capacityas civilian by the end of the plan. This civiliandomain would be under the IAEA safeguards.But he did state that the indigenous fast breederprogramme would not be put under safeguards.This was in fact the way it was when theIndia–US nuclear deal was agreed upon betweenthe US President and the prime minster of Indiaon 2 March 2006. The deal accepts a separationplan that will place 14 of India’s nuclearreactors under international safeguards in aphased manner by 2014 while eight remainoutside of these for defence purposes. SeeMap 1 for location of various atomic energyestablishments in India. Further, it has beenconveyed that India will not accept safeguardson the PFBR (prototype fast breeder reactor)and the FBTR (fast breeder test reactor), whichare located at Kalpakkam1. The US governmenton its part reaffirmed its assurance to create

three-stage nuclear programme. In Stage II, theFBR route will require plutonium derived fromStage I. This has technological implications. Ifthe FBRs are fuelled by using metallic fuel, therate of plutonium generation is twice as fast asthe MOX (mixed oxide) route, which willgenerate the required fuel for rapid growth ofthe FBRs. India currently has the experienceand capability to use only MOX-derived fuelsand it needs to invest in the development ofmetallic-fuel-based reactors. Therefore, itcurrently needs international cooperation tomeet its fuel requirements in Stage II so that theFBRs become self-sustaining. The third issuerelates to safety aspects of reactors and India’sneeds for some form of cooperation on safetyissues. But given the nature of nucleartechnology, collaboration on safety issues doesinvolve sharing of the reactor technology and,hence, is difficult under the NPT regime and theNSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group) Guidelines.

The current search for ways of increasingIndia’s room to manoeuvre in the internationalnuclear order has to be seen in the context offuel, safety, and technological constraintstowards expanding the scope and potential ofnuclear energy to address India’s energyconcerns. This re-engagement that India seeks isat an appropriate time, given that the globalnuclear order is poised to change, driven byconcerns with a fossil-fuel-induced climatechange, shortages of oil and gas, emerginggeopolitics of oil, and the need for alternativeenergy fuels and sources. There is a growing andemerging interest in new bilateral andmultilateral nuclear arrangements by countriessuch as France, Russia, and the US, includingthe UK and China, which also have a keeninterest in wanting to obtain a share of therapidly growing nuclear energy market. Theconfluence of strategic and commercial interestsis fitting for India to use strategically to itsadvantage to meet the needs of its three-stagenuclear programme. Over the past year, therehave been new overtures from Canada, France,Russia, and the US to re-examine nuclearenergy collaborations. These vary in form andcontent but the spirit of wanting to engage with

1 Details available at <http://www.dae.gov.in/press/suopm0703.htm>, last accessed on 8 March 2006.


necessary conditions for India to obtain full,uninterrupted, and continual access to fuelsupplies from the international fuel market forthe safegaurded reactors. Again to make theagreement workable for the life term of nuclearreactors, the US is prepared to undertakemeasures such as incorporation of agreementprovisions under Section 123 of the US AtomicEnergy Act, work with IAEA for an India-specific fuel supply arrangement, help develop astrategic nuclear fuel reserve, and work withRussia, France, and UK to commit fuel supplywithout any disruption.2 This would end theblockade and give a large impetus to the nuclearenergy programme, thereby increasing India’senergy options for future.

The Indo–Canadian joint statement of26 September 2005 ends many years of non-cooperation with Canada as it suspended allnuclear cooperation after the 1974 nuclear testsand formally ended its nuclear relations withIndia in May 1976. The announcement includesthe following measures.3

P Agreement by both governments to develop amutually beneficial bilateral framework;support by both governments for scientificand technical contacts on a broader range ofcivilian nuclear issues within the publicdomain; and agreement by Canada to allowthe supply of nuclear-related dual-use itemsto the Indian civilian nuclear facilities underthe IAEA safeguards, in accordance with therequirements of the NSG’s dual-useguidelines.

P Agreement by both governments to pursuefurther opportunities for development ofpeaceful uses of nuclear energy, bothbilaterally and through the appropriateinternational forums, consistent with theirinternational commitments.

Russia provided assistance with two1000-MW light-weight reactors for the

Kudankulam nuclear power plant in Tamil Naduin 2000, despite considerable internationalpressure to suspend it, given its commitments asa member of the NSG. The question of how toexpand cooperation between Russia and India inthe civilian nuclear energy, however, figuredprominently in the summit between the Indianprime minister and Russian president Putin on6 December 2005, probably as a direct result ofthe opportunity that the Indo–US deal creates.The decision to cooperate was placed on a firmfooting in March 2006, when enhanced civilnuclear cooperation figured prominently in talksbetween the prime ministers of Russia andIndia. This went a step further when Moscowagreed to supply uranium to the safeguardedreactor at Tarapur Atomic Power Station.

On 20 February 2006, India and Francesigned a declaration on Development of NuclearEnergy for Peaceful Purposes, following up on ajoint statement issued by the president of Franceand the prime minister of India in September2005.4 This was to work towards adjustment ofinternational civil nuclear cooperationframework with respect to India.

In December 2005, India joined the ITER(International Thermonuclear ExperimentalReactor) project as a full member. The ITERnuclear fusion project promises to provide cleanand safe energy in future. The consortium of ITERinvolves six other partners: China, South Korea,Japan, Russia, the EU, and the US. Involvement ofIndia is considered to be beneficial to all parties,given the development in the domestic nuclear,scientific, and technological capabilities.

While international debate on India’sinclusion in the global nuclear order is stilltentative, domestic debate rages between thosewho believe that these deals (especially theIndo–US deal) may cause India to lose some ofits independence in the nuclear choice-making,cap its strategic programme, as well as lockIndia into greater imported nuclear fuel

2 Implementation of the India–US Joint Statement of 18 July 2005: India’s Separation Plan tabled in Parliament on

7 March 2006.3 Details available at <http://w01.international.gc.ca/MinPub/Publication.asp?Language=E&publication_id=383095> and

<http://meaindia.nic.in/parliament/ls/2005/11/30ls08.htm>, last accessed on 28 February 2006.4 Details available at <http://meaindia.nic.in/speech/2006/02/19jdol.htm>, last accessed on 28 February 2006.


dependency over time, and those who argue thatit will lead to a greater energy security due togreater access to fuel and technology, andperhaps even a toning down of the weaponprogramme, which, it is argued, is large enough.

It is in this context that the GNEP (GlobalNuclear Energy Partnership) needs to be viewed.This is a US-led initiative to enable expansion ofnuclear energy for electricity generation. It seeksto address several policy objectives: (i) climatechange concerns, (ii) new fuel sources, (iii) non-proliferation, and (iv) reduction of radioactivewaste. The last is linked to the fact thatpartnership envisages the provision of fuel sources– fresh and those recovered from used fuels – bynuclear-capable states to those less capable butwho agree to use the fuel for power generationonly. There is sufficient, highly enriched uraniumavailable from the international nuclear arsenal,

which were dismantled in the early 1990s.Recovery of fuel from used nuclear fuel willreduce waste and the need for wastedepositories. GNEP is being seen as a way ofmeeting all the above policy objectives. Theissue that bothers those in the ‘not so capable’group (and it is not clear if India is beingclassed in this group) is that it might create anew dependency on imported nuclear fuel,which could at a later stage, have all of theattendant geopolitical risks. Separation linesbetween the beneficial and non-beneficial usesof nuclear power are perceived as thin, andparties are wary of transgressions or impositions.It is clear that any international initiative (as inoil and gas) on the nuclear energy trade frontneeds to have some confidence-buildingmeasures woven into it if it is to take off in a waythat would make all parties comfortable.

Glossary of terms in nuclear energy

Advanced gas-cooled reactor

It is the second generation of British gas-coolednuclear reactors using graphite as the neutronmoderator and carbon dioxide as coolant.

BWR (boiling water reactor)It is a light water reactor used in some nuclearpower stations. In a BWR, steam is produced inthe reactor core and goes directly to the steamturbine.

Burn-upMeasure of thermal energy released by nuclearfuel relative to its mass, typically GWd/tU(gigawatt days per tonne of uranium).

CANDUCanadian deuterium uranium reactor,moderated and (usually) cooled by heavy water.

Chain reactionA reaction that stimulates its own repetition, inparticular, where neutrons originating from

nuclear fission cause an ongoing series of fissionreactions.

CoreThe central part of a nuclear reactor containingfuel elements and moderator.

Critical massThe smallest mass of fissile material that willsupport a self-sustaining chain reaction underspecified conditions.

CriticalityCondition of being able to sustain a nuclearchain reaction.

CTBT (Comprehensive Nuclear Test BanTreaty)This treaty bans nuclear explosions in allenvironments for military or civilian purposes. Itwas adopted by the UN General Assembly on10 September 1996. According to the recentdevelopments (as of 17 March 2006), there are


176 member states to the treaty with totalratifications of 132. The latest signatory state tothe treaty is Lebanon and the latest ratifyingstate is Vietnam as of 17 March 2006.Additionally, it is yet to be ratified by Colombia,China, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, and theUS, and signed and ratified by India, Pakistan,and Korea, which is required for the treaty toenter into force.

DecayDisintegration of atomic nuclei resulting inemission of alpha or beta particles (usually withgamma radiation).

DecommissioningRemoval of a facility (for example, reactor) fromservice, also the subsequent actions of safestorage, dismantling, and making the siteavailable for unrestricted use.

Depleted uraniumUranium having less than 0.7% of naturalU-235. As a by-product of enrichment in thefuel cycle, it generally has 0.25%–0.30%U-235, the rest being U-238; can be blendedwith highly enriched uranium (for example,from weapons) to make reactor fuel.

Deuterium‘Heavy hydrogen’ is a stable isotope of hydrogenhaving one proton and one neutron in thenucleus. It has the same chemical properties ashydrogen but physical properties may differ.

Fast breeder reactor/fast neutron reactorA type of fast neutron reactor that produces morefissile material than it consumes using uranium-238 as substrate. Alternative fast and thermalbreeder reactors are also possible using thorium. Afast neutron reactor, commonly called fast reactor,uses no moderator but instead relies on fastneutrons to sustain its chain reaction with the useof high-grade fuel such as enriched uranium orplutonium as fuel. Once the reaction has beenprovided for the initial start-up, the reactorproduces its own fuel and the surplus can be usedto sustain other breeders. A fast neutron reactor orsimply a fast reactor is a category of nuclearreactor in which the fission chain reaction is

sustained by fast neutrons. Such a reactor needsno neutron moderator, but must use fuel that isrelatively rich in fissile material.

Heavy waterWater containing an elevated concentration ofmolecules with deuterium (heavy hydrogen) atoms.

Heavy water reactorA reactor, which uses heavy water as itsmoderator; for example, Canadian CANDU.

High-level wastesExtremely radioactive fission products andtransuranic elements (usually other thanplutonium) in spent nuclear fuel. They may beseparated by reprocessing the spent fuel, or thespent fuel containing them may be regarded ashigh-level waste.

Highly (or high)-enriched uraniumIt is uranium enriched to at least 20% U-235(which in weapons is about 90% U-235).

ITER (International ThermonuclearExperimental Reactor)It is an international tokamak (magneticconfinement fusion) experiment, planned to bebuilt in France and has been designed to showthe scientific and technological feasibility of afull-scale nuclear fusion power reactor. It hasbeen built upon research conducted on devices,such as TFTR, JET, JT-60, and T-15, and will beconsiderably larger than any of them. Theprogramme is anticipated to last for 30 years –10 years for construction and 20 years ofoperation – and costs approximately 10 billioneuros. After many years of deliberation, theparticipants announced in June 2005 that theITER will be built in Cadarache, France. Theconsortium of ITER involves seven otherpartners: China, South Korea, Japan, Russia, theEU, the US, and India.

Light waterOrdinary water as distinct from heavy water.

LWR (light water reactor)A common nuclear reactor cooled and usuallymoderated by ordinary water.


MOX (mixed oxide fuel)Reactor fuel, which consists of both uranium andplutonium oxides, usually about five per centplutonium, which is the main fissile component.

ModeratorA material such as light, heavy water, or graphiteused in a reactor to slow down fast neutrons bycollision with lighter nuclei.

Natural uraniumUranium with an isotopic composition as foundin nature, containing 99.3% U-238, 0.7%U-235, and a trace of U-234; can be used as fuelin heavy-water-moderated reactors.

Neutron The uncharged particle, which remains in thenucleus of an atom is called a neutron.

NPT (Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty)It obligates five acknowledged nuclear weaponstates (USA, France, Russia, UK and China) notto transfer nuclear weapons, nuclear explosivedevices, or their technology to the non-nuclearweapon states. The treaty entered into force on 5March 1970.

NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group)A multi-national body concerned with reducingnuclear proliferation by controlling the exportand re-transfer of materials that may beapplicable to nuclear weapon development andto improving safeguards and protection on theexisting material. It was founded in 1975 inresponse to the Indian nuclear test of theprevious year.

Nuclear fissionIt is a process by which the nucleus of an atomsplits into two or more smaller nuclei as fissionproducts, and some by-product particles. Theby-products include free neutrons, photonsusually in the form of gamma rays, and othernuclear fragments such as beta particles andalpha particles. It is an exothermic reaction andcan release substantial amounts of useful energyboth as gamma rays and as kinetic energy of thefragments.

Nuclear fusionThe process by which atoms of elements fusetogether to produce another element along withthe release of huge amount of energy andneutrons. Neutrons released in the process canbe re-utilized in breaking atoms of the elementwith further release of nuclear energy. Twoisotopes of hydrogen (tritium, deuterium) fusetogether to produce helium and release neutronand huge amounts of energy.

Nuclear reactorIt is a device in which nuclear chain reactionsare initiated, controlled, and sustained at asteady rate. Nuclear reactors are used for manypurposes. The most significant current use ofnuclear reactor is for the generation of electricalpower.

PHWR (pressurized heavy water reactor)It is a nuclear power reactor that usesunenriched natural uranium as its fuel andheavy water as a moderator (deuterium oxide[D2O]). While heavy water is expensive, thereactor can operate without expensive fuelenrichment facilities which balances the costs.The fuel elements are located in the pressuretubes, which are located in a steel vessel (calledthe calandria) and the heavy water circulatesthrough the pressure tubes and is preventedfrom boiling.

ProtonThe positively charged particle, which remainsin the nucleus of an atom is called a proton.

PWR (pressurized water reactor)It is a nuclear power reactor that uses ordinary lightwater as coolant and for neutron moderation. In aPWR, the primary coolant loop is pressurized sothat water does not achieve bulk-boiling and heatexchangers called steam generators are used totransmit heat to a secondary coolant, which isallowed to boil to produce steam either for warshippropulsion or for electricity generation. In havingthis secondary loop, the PWR differs from the BWR(boiling water reactor), in which the primarycoolant is allowed to boil in the reactor core anddrive a turbine directly.


Pool-type reactorIt is a type of nuclear reactor that has a coreimmersed in an open pool of water. The reactorcore, consisting of fuel elements and the controlrods, is situated in an open water pool. Wateracts as a moderator, cooling agent, and radiationshield. The layer of water above the reactor coreshields radiation completely so that operatorsmay work above the reactor in total safety. Thisdesign has two major advantages: the reactor iseasily accessible and the whole primary coolingsystem, that is, pool water, is under normalpressure.

Pu-239: PlutoniumIt is a fissile element which on undergoingnuclear fission generates huge amounts ofnuclear energy and is, therefore, used in makingnuclear bombs.

RadioactivityIt is a nuclear phenomenon by which atoms ofradioactive elements undergo decay by formingnew elements with the emanation of alpha, beta,and gamma rays. It is unaffected bytemperature, pressure, chemical and physicalchanges.

Re-processingChemical treatment of spent reactor fuel toseparate uranium and plutonium from the smallquantity of fission product waste products andtransuranic elements, leaving a much reducedquantity of high-level waste.

U-235: Enriched uraniumIt is a radioactive element which on undergoingnuclear fission gives two more uranium elementsand large number of neutron to sustain thenuclear reaction.

Vitrification It is a process of converting a material into aglass-like amorphous solid which is free of any

crystalline structure, either by the quick removalor addition of heat, or by mixing with anadditive. Solidification of a vitreous solid occursat the glass transition temperature. In case ofnuclear energy, vitrification process is used inincorporation of high-level wastes intoborosilicate glass and is designed to immobilizeradionuclides for waste disposal.

WMD (weapons of mass destruction)These generally include nuclear, biological,chemical, and increasingly, radiologicalweapons. The term first arose in 1937 inreference to the mass destruction of Guernica,Spain, by aerial bombardment. Following thebombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, andprogressing through the Cold War, the termcame to refer more to non-conventional weaponsusing nuclear energy.

ZircaloyIt is a group of zirconium alloys. One of themain uses of zircalloys is in nuclear technologywhere it is frequently used as cladding of fuelrods in nuclear reactors. The alloying elementsof zircaloy are tin, niobium, chromium, iron,nickel and hafnium.

Bibliography

Hore-Lacy I. 2003Nuclear Electricity (7th edn)Published by the Uranium Information Centre Ltd and theWorld Nuclear Association

IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency). 2004Annual Report of IAEA, 2004 IAEA

Stoiber C, Baer A, Pelzer N, Tonhauser W. 2003Hand Book on Nuclear LawInternational Atomic Energy Agency

Website

<http://en.wikipedia.org/>, last accessed on1 January 2006


Map 1 Atomic energy establishments in IndiaSource <www.dae.gov.in/publ/indmap.htm>


CeRES (Centre for Research on Energy Security) was set up on 31 May 2005. The Centre will conduct research and provide

analysis, information, and direction on issues related to energy security in India. It will track global energy demands, supply,

prices, and technological research/breakthroughs – both in the present and for the future – and analyse their implications for

global as well as India’s energy security, and in relation to the energy needs of the poor. It will engage in international, regional,

and national dialogues on energy security issues, form strategic partnerships with various countries, and take initiatives that

would be in India’s and the region’s long-term energy interest. Energy Security Insights is a quarterly bulletin of CeRES that

seeks to establish a multi-stakeholder dialogue on these issues.

The introductory issue that focused on oil and energy security issues is available at

<http://www.teriin.org/div/esi01.pdf>.

Steering CommitteeChairmanDr Vijay Kelkar, former Adviser to the Finance Minister

MembersP Mr Talmiz Ahmad, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Government of India

P Mr Mukesh D Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries Ltd

P Mohammad Hamid Ansari, Distinguished Fellow, West and Central Asia Programme, Observer Research Foundation

P Mr R K Batra, Distinguished Fellow, T E R I

P Mr Suman Bery, Director-General, National Council of Applied Economic Research

P Ms Preety Bhandari, Director, Policy Analysis Division, T E R I

P Mr Satish Chandra, former Deputy to the National Security Adviser, National Security Council

P Mr Raj Chengappa, Senior Journalist

P Mr Shekhar Dasgupta, Distinguished Fellow, T E R I

P Dr Prodipto Ghosh, Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India

P Mr A M Gokhale, Secretary, Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources, Government of India

P Mr C P Jain, Chairman and Managing Director, National Thermal Power Corporation Ltd

P Mr Shreyans Kumar Jain, Chairman and Managing Director, Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd

P Dr Anil Kakodkar, Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission

P Mr Vikram Singh Mehta, Chairman, Shell Group of Companies in India

P Mr P C Parakh, Secretary, Ministry of Coal, Government of India

P Mr Subir Raha, Chairman and Managing Director, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd

P Dr C Rajamohan, Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University

P Prof. Indira Rajaraman, RBI Chair Professor, National Institute of Public Finance and Policy

P Mr R V Shahi, Secretary, Ministry of Power, Government of India

P Mr Rajiv Sikri, Special Secretary (East), Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India

P Dr Leena Srivastava, Executive Director, T E R I

P Mr S Sundar, Distinguished Fellow, T E R I

P Mr R Vasudevan, former Secretary, Ministry of Power, Government of India

The Centre for Research on Energy Security

For further details, contact

Pragya JaswalCentre for Research on Energy Security Tel. 2468 2100 or 2468 2111

T E R I Fax 2468 2144 or 2468 2145

Darbari Seth Block India +91 • Delhi (0) 11

I H C Complex, Lodhi Road E-mail [email protected] Delhi – 110 003 Web www.teriin.org

© The Energy and Resources Institute, 2006.

Printed and published by Dr R K Pachauri on behalf of The Energy and Resources Institute, Darbari Seth Block, IH C Complex, Lodhi Road,

New Delhi – 110 003 and printed by him at Grand Prix and published at New Delhi.

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