DANGERS OF INDO-USA NUCLEAR DEAL
The media build-up in favour of civilian nuclear technology 'transfer' and 'trade' between US and India is so systematic and clever, as to make the public in India see only benefits from it rather than disadvantages or hazards.
The media is aimed at making the Indo-US nuclear deal look like a golden opportunity without considering the national security needs of the country. Non of the supporters of the deal, may guarantee commitment of USA towards INDIA. Earlier USA chose to ignore its agreement with India on Tarapur Atomic Power Plant and declined in the seventies to supply nuclear fuel to Tarapur. Now it is nuclear fuel from Russia that helps to keep the Tarapur plant going. It seems that neither political parties nor the media have studied the deal thoroughly. All are supporting blindly without knowing the consequences.
USA INTENTIONS
According to Indian officials, the nuclear agreement breaches three red lines for Indian national security.
First, it would limit India's future ability to produce fissile material for the development and expansion of India's nuclear arsenal. India currently has some 70 nuclear warheads, and senior security officials have told UPI that the country needs "at least 300 warheads" to guarantee its future deterrence against Pakistan and China, its two nuclear-armed neighbors.
The current agreement would include India's next generation of fast-breeder nuclear reactors, which are said to be essential to the future production of fissile material. If they are brought within the IAEA system, this could limit India's capability to produce a larger arsenal. The Bush administration has agreed to leave outside the IAEA control system India's existing reactors that produce fissile material for military use. But these reactors are almost at the end of their working life and can produce enough fissile materials for only 20-30 more nuclear weapons.
Second, the agreement would bring Indian nuclear research laboratories under the IAEA's inspection and control regime. This has produced a revolt among India's nuclear scientists. They are prepared to allow IAEA controls over those parts of India's nuclear program that depend on international cooperation, but insist that India's homegrown nuclear research programs have to remain outside the IAEA system.
They fear in particular that India's pioneering and top-secret work on thorium as a nuclear fuel would be compromised under the IAEA regime, and that their researches would become available to potentially hostile countries. They claim they are close to a breakthrough on thorium technology which would make India independent of uranium supplies, and suspect that the U.S. draft of the agreement is really designed to block India's lead in this new area of nuclear technology.
Third, they oppose the U.S. insistence that the nuclear agreement be binding "in perpetuity."
"In a democracy, no government can be bound in perpetuity by decisions of its predecessors," one senior security official told UPI. "Everybody knows this. So there is a suspicion that this clause has been inserted to provide a justification for sanctions if a future Indian government decides to scrap the agreement. It looks like a trap."
It is difficult to exaggerate the depth of feeling among senior Indian officials who oppose the deal. They are suspicious of American motives, and they are now starting to question the goodwill that President Bush insists he is bringing to the long-term strategic partnership.
"We have been promised a great deal by President Bush in cooperation on space technology and on access to dual-use technology but so far we have seen zero from the American side," complained another senior official
IT IS BUSINESS
In USA, business interests dictate foreign policy in almost all fields including the civilian nuclear technology. In India, foreign policy assiduously builds the image of Indian nuclear establishment. The truth is, USA wants to make money by selling the disposable enriched uranium and weapon grade plutonium derived from the dismantling of some of their nuclear weapons, as nuclear fuel for power plants. Such is the case with Russia also. While supplying oil, the seller can at the most dictate its price and nothing more. But while supplying the nuclear fuel, the seller not only dictates its price but also can demand many more commitments from the buyers.
HAZARDS
It is false to say, nuclear power is clean and cheap. Nuclear reactors frequently release radioactive waste into the environment in the form of dust, mist, fumes, vapors/gases, Krypton-89, strontium-89, Xenon-137, Xenon-135 and cesium-135. Krypton-89, Xenon-137 and Xenon-135 are gases and may easily diffuse into the atmosphere. Radioactive elements when released into the environment, would ultimately enter into the food chain and cause drastic health problems due to the long lasting radioactivity which poses danger to all life forms on earth. One of the main effects on the environment that the heavy water reactors in India is that they release vast amounts of tritium (a radioactive isotope of hydrogen). Low doses of tritium have caused sterility, microcephaly , stunting
OTHER OPTIONS
India does not fall in the category of countries where nuclear power is a must to meet the growing energy needs. India is blessed with many rivers and has enormous hydro potential which is so far not exploited beyond thirty percent, wind energy, natural gas, bio-gas, solar energy and geothermal are also good options. It is the faulty Indian planning that makes the nuclear power look as a necessary to meet energy needs in India.
COST
Cost benefit analysis in Indian context does not show justification for building more nuclear power plants. They are expensive to run and build, and the decommissioning is also an expensive business.
INDIAN CONTEXT
India should not commit any more of its money to nuclear power, but exploit fully its hydro potential and explore the uses of alternate sources of energy such as solar, wind, tidal wave and geothermal, while taking strict measures and improvements on energy losses . If India places its emphasis on hydro power and alternate sources of energy, the climate change argument to favour nuclear power becomes irrelevant so far as India is concerned. Nuclear power while it gives electricity, is sure to leave behind radiation dangers which would last for thousands of years.
Today, it is in the strategic interest of US to cooperate with India in the civilian nuclear arena, which as we have argued above, is a sanction to produce as many nuclear weapons as India wants. Tomorrow, the strategic interests of US might change, since strategic interests are not based on any international law or morality, or ideas of the kind. Then, US would behave the same way with India, as it has done with Iraq, and now planning something similar for Iran.
SUGGESTIONS
In any case, nuclear power will begin to form a significant part of energy mix only after 2030. So, the benefits will not accrue to the masses immediately, or in the near future. And, we need power now. Hence, the accord solves nothing. Come summer, and India would be desperate for electricity, which is directly linked to the supply of water in most parts of the country. Hence, we need a power policy right now, and the policy must encourage alternate sources of electricity. Iran gas line project was a good option for our current energy needs. But USA has prevented us from acquiring that deal, because it was a precondition from USA to leave Iran deal.
LASTLY
It is strange, why is this government ignoring all negatives of the deal? Why are they looking more as brokers of USA? USA is giving us obsolete uranium technology ,which is unsuitable and unreliable for India. Thorium technology is much better for India with lesser side effects; moreover. India will not dependent on USA for fuel in future, There are two competing thorium designs. One that is a multi step process where thorium is bred to U233, which is then extracted and burned in a second reactor, its at least a decade off and India is perfecting it. Then there is a design that one that an American company has worked on for 13+ years and is to the point of commercialization, it would easily power the VVER-1000 reactors India is building on Indian thorium in very short order. The technology can’t be transferred in the absence of the 123 agreement. Thorium is safer to burn than Uranium on several fronts, its waste has an extremely short half-life, it melts at 500 degrees higher than uranium, it stays in the reactor for much longer between re-fueling resulting in much less waste by mass per unit output. Thorium is a great energy source, but India will have to wait until they have their own overly complicated system up and running.
