STRENGTHENING THE AERB (GFILES)
Radiation risk management necessitates international cooperation to promote and enhance global safety and mitigate harmful consequences. In order that the radiation regulator acts independently, countries such as Australia, Canada, France, the United States of America and even Pakistan have conferred legal status on their nuclear regulating bodies as stressed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Radiation risk management necessitates international cooperation to promote and enhance global safety and mitigate harmful consequences. In order that the radiation regulator acts independently, countries such as Australia, Canada, France, the United States of America and even Pakistan have conferred legal status on their nuclear regulating bodies as stressed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
In India, the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) was set up in 1983 to carry out regulatory and safety functions as envisaged in the Atomic Energy Act, 1962. Surprisingly, the AERB remains a subordinate authority under the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) though India has ratified the Convention on Nuclear Safety.
A regulatory body must be equipped to exercise its key regulatory functions, namely, standard-setting, authorisation, inspection and enforcement and must possess the core values of competence, independence, stringency and transparency.
A review of the performance of the AERB recently by the PAC found glaring deficiencies and lacunae with respect to the regulatory framework for nuclear and radiation facilities; development of safety policy, standards and codes; weak monitoring of radiation facilities, and so on.
AERB’s independence is circumscribed by the absence of institutional separation of regulatory and nonregulatory functions; absence of a fixed term of office of the Chairman of AERB; dependence on DAE for budgetary and administrative support; and apparent conflict of responsibilities as the Chairman, AERB, reports to the Chairman, AEC.
The penalty for contravention of the provisions of the Act and Rules made thereunder remains abysmally low at a maximum fine of `500, which by no stretch of imagination can be construed as a deterrent. More so, the penal provisions were never invoked, rendering it virtually a dead letter.
The need for hastening the process of development of safety documents, codes, standards, guides and manuals was stressed by the Meckoni Committee Report way back in 1987 and the Raja Ramanna Committee in 1997.
A consolidated safety policy document is yet to be brought out.
It is noteworthy that, subsequent to the Fukushima nuclear incident, the AERB set up a high-level committee on nuclear safety but the recommendations are said to be under implementation. Another serious problem bedevilling the AERB is lack of manpower, compounding the gap in the regulating and monitoring regime. This needs to be addressed as the nation can illafford to take any risk, given the constantly increasing application of radiation, especially in fields like medicine, industry and agriculture. There is no system in place for monitoring the expiry of authorisations and their renewals with instances of protracted delays for periods as long as 24 years. Alarmingly, 70 out of 135 Gamma Chamber units continue to function without valid authorisations. Subsequent to the Mayapuri incident of April 2010, the AERB has taken steps to ensure that operational gamma chambers are subjected to close regulatory monitoring and nonoperational ones are safely disposed of within a reasonable timeframe.
THE PAC noted that the regulatory mechanism concerning X-ray units was virtually non-existent. Out of a total of 57,443 medical X-ray facilities operating in the country, only 5,270 units had been registered and were under the regulatory control of the AERB. In other words, 52,173 units or 91 per cent of the total units are operating without registration. The AERB admitted that, with its very limited workforce, it was impossible to regulate so many X-ray machines. The accelerated usage of ionising radiation, such as medical X-rays, as an essential diagnostic tool poses grave risks to the health of medical workers and the public in the vicinity of these facilities. Surprisingly, even after the Supreme Court directive in 2001 for setting up a Directorate of Radiation Safety (DRS) in each State for regulating the use of medical diagnostic X-rays, only Kerala and Mizoram have complied so far.
From 2005-06 to 2011-12, regulatory inspections had been made of only 15 per cent of both industrial radiography and radiotherapy units having high radiation hazard potential. Apart from this alarming shortfall, the frequency of regulatory inspections of such facilities is yet to be fixed in spite of prescribed international benchmarks.
As regards radiological exposure of the public, it is heartening to note that during the period 2005- 2010, the effective exposure was far less than the prescribed annual limit of one mSv (Milli Sievert) in all nuclear facility sites. However, as the Health, Safety and Environment Group of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) carries out environmental surveillance through its Environmental Survey Laboratories (ESLs), the authority of the AERB with regard to environmental surveillance apparently weakens. Safe disposal of radioactive waste is another concern, exacerbated by the tragic Mayapuri incident in 2010, where one person died and several were injured. Of course, the incident was a case of a legacy source, which occurred before the regulating regime came into being. It is also heartening to note that the radioactive waste control management of our nuclear power plants (NPPs) and fuel cycle facilities has an impeccable record and the same needs to be maintained scrupulously.
Given the wide uses of radiation in various fields apart from the stateowned NPPs, the AERB should be accorded independent legal status for effective monitoring so as to ensure radiological protection of workers in NPPs, and entrusted with the responsibility of environmental surveillance with the close cooperation of ESLs. A comprehensive inventory needs to be prepared of all radioactive radiation sources across the country indicating the suppliers/manufacturers and suitable awareness created for safe handling and disposal of radioactive waste and to be updated regularly.
Systemic and well conceived linkages need to be established with schools and colleges and communities for disseminating greater awareness about the advantages of atomic energy and the safeguards provided against radiation and radioactive substances and appropriate curriculum must be included in NCERT/ CBSE syllabi for enhanced sensitisation of impressionable young minds about the lurking dangers of radiation and over-exposure as also potential application with adequate safeguards.
WE also need to strengthen the regulatory aspect of emergency preparedness in the area of other radiation facilities— prescribe mandatory safety codes/ procedures and emergency preparedness plans based on strict assessment of risk factors; and put in place effective control mechanisms for securing compliance to the prescribed safety codes in accordance with the Nuclear Safety Convention. An effective legislative framework also needs to be provided for decommissioning of NPPs. Any NPP or nuclear fuel cycle facility, after its life is over, needs to be decommissioned, decontaminated and demolished. The role of AERB with reference to decommissioning, therefore, needs to be strengthened and subjected to international peer review and appraisal to derive assurance of its effectiveness. The PAC was assured that this would be done once the Nuclear Safety Regulatory Authority Bill was enacted in the form recommended by the Standing Committee of Parliament on Science and Technology. One hopes that once the law is enacted, the AERB will take care of all these concerns and emerge as an independent and credible nuclear regulatory authority.
No First Use Nuclear Policy
That India's No First Use policy is under threat of the axe in any future review of the nuclear doctrine is apparent from the election time controversy over the mention of a nuclear doctrinal review in the manifesto of the Bharatiya Janata Party. The reference - subsequently toned down - was possibly an attempt by the conservative party to live up to its image as a strategically assertive replacement of the Congress Party.
No First Use Nuclear Policy.pdf
No First Use (NFU) is taken as among the cardinal principles of India’s nuclear doctrine; the others being “credible” and “minimum”.1 Even as developments in India’s deterrent posture, specifically, in the number of warheads, its variegated missile capability and operationalisation of the deterrent, have led to the “credible” potentially superseding the “minimum”, the NFU is also seemingly under threat of eclipse. This is best evidenced by the recent controversy that attended the release of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) manifesto promising to “revise and update” India’s nuclear doctrine. While the manifesto did not anticipate which pillars of the doctrine would face the axe, the very mention led alert nuclear commentators to pre-emptively pitch for continuation of India’s NFU.2
The reaction was prompted by BJP functionaries initially alluding to the NFU as a prospective area of change.3 The BJP probably was reacting to the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s call at a Pugwash-Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) conference in New Delhi for adoption of NFU as a new “global no-first-use norm”.4 Since the speech was the government’s swan song on nuclear matters, it is possible that the BJP was reluctant to have its strategic space tied down by the Congress-led administration’s last minute initiative. In the event, the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, seemingly in response to the criticism in strategic circles,5 put a lid on the topic by maintaining that he would give NFU credence since it had the imprint of the BJP stalwart, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, whose moderate image he, Modi, was emulating during the electoral campaign under way.6
1998 Playback?
While a review by itself is unexceptionable, the concerns voiced in wake of the manifesto owed in part to the precedence of the reference in the BJP manifesto of March 1998 to a strategic review including India’s nuclear path. Then, the nuclear tests of May 1998 took the world by surprise by short-circuiting the promised strategic defence review.7 Therefore, the BJP’s utterance set off a small storm in strategic circles. Consequently, the BJP, having gained mileage as a party attuned to national security, but wanting to project a sober image on that score, has stepped back.
Nevertheless, the contretemps indicates the shadow over NFU. While NFU in the declaratory doctrine is useful, it is more important that the posture must itself be evident in the operationalisation of the deterrent. There are apprehensions that developments in nuclear technology and direction of operationalisation make NFU less than credible. The problem this gives rise to is that it would make nuclear trigger fingers itchy in case the recurrent “push” of subcontinental crises comes to a conventional war “shove”.
NFU was first broached in the strategic context of thinking in the 1960s on whether India should go nuclear. Writing anonymously in the late 1960s the writer, possibly K Subrahmanyam, then director of programmes at IDSA, advocated a push for delegitimising nuclear weapons use.8 The measure to this end was to be an NFU treaty for all nuclear powers, requiring their combined response to any breach of the treaty by any nuclear power. It is notable that four decades on the prime minister’s Pugwash-IDSA speech reiterates this idea of a multilateral framework by all nuclear weapons possessing states.
Today, Shyam Saran, currently head of the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB), in his “Subbu lecture” in April 2013 in honour of late K Subrahmanyam, describes India’s NFU thus: “…India will not be the first to use nuclear weapons, but that if it is attacked with such weapons, it would engage in nuclear retaliation which will be massive and designed to inflict unacceptable damage on the adversary.”9 This formulation echoes the Draft Nuclear Doctrine put out by the 1998-99 edition of the NSAB that had been chaired by Subrahmanyam which stated NFU as: “India will not be the first to initiate a nuclear strike, but will respond with punitive retaliation should deterrence fail” (para 2.4).10
While seemingly straightforward, ambiguity crept in with the Draft adding a caveat: “India will not resort to the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons against States which do not possess nuclear weapons, or are not aligned withnuclear weapon power” (emphasis added to its para 2.5).11 The intrusion of the caveat referring to nuclear use against a non-nuclear state aligned to the hostile nuclear power also contradicted India’s “unqualified” negative security assurance further down in the Draft (para 8.2). In effect the caveat qualifies both the NFU and the negative security guarantee.
Past Caveats
The NFU in the 2003 official nuclear doctrine is phrased as: “A posture of ‘No First Use’: nuclear weapons will only be used in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian territory or on Indian forces anywhere” (para 2 ii). However, NFU was yet again with a caveat, specifically: “…in the event of a major attack against India, or Indian forces anywhere, by biological or chemical weapons, India will retain the option of retaliating with nuclear weapons” (para 2 vi). This can be attributed to the influence of global strategic culture with India emulating the US which had stated something similar in the run up to the Iraq War II.12 It bears noting that a decade on, Shyam Saran in his lecture retains this caveat, stating that nuclear retaliation would be against use of “such” weapons, meaning weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and biological weapons.
These caveats suggest a discomfort with NFU. This is best evidenced by psychological slips such as the national security advisor’s gaffe in his 2010 address to the National Defence College (NDC) fraternity at its golden jubilee. He worded NFU as: “No first use against non-nuclear weapons states”.13 Vipin Narang, a knowledgeable nuclear watcher, dismissed this as insignificant, stating, “the most plausible explanation is that the NDC formulation was simply the product of an innocent typographical or lexical error in the text of the speech”.14 The point is telling slips like this are one way to gain a measure of India’s nuclear policy.15
Adversaries are surely alert to these. They also no doubt listen in on the debates within the strategic community where there are strong voices for jettisoning NFU altogether.16 Karnad argues that attempting to fashion a counter strike after receiving a debilitating first strike may be too much to expect from an India that even faces problems from the monsoons. This would be inevitably so for any country on the receiving end of a first strike attempt. However, first strike – the attempt to degrade enemy counter strike ability – is not the only manner of first use. Therefore, a counter strike is very much possible. Recognising this enables preserving the utility of NFU.
Currently, NFU suits India strategically since there is little incentive for India to use nuclear weapons. The Draft of 1999 had required India to maintain “highly effective conventional military capabilities” in order to raise “the threshold of outbreak both of conventional military conflict as well as that of threat or use of nuclear weapons” (para 2.7). There is an internal contradiction in this requirement. India’s conventional strength when leveraged by its limited war doctrine has led to Pakistan’s lowering of the nuclear threshold.
Pakistan’s Approach
For Pakistan, nuclear weapons are also meant to deter conventional war, in the fashion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in the cold war era. This is distinct from India’s concept that these deter not war but nuclear weapons, as was articulated most recently by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at his IDSA address, thus: “that the sole function of nuclear weapons, while they exist, should be to deter a nuclear attack.” Being at variance conceptually, Pakistan has emulated the NATO in its induction of the Nasr,17 a tactical nuclear weapon (TNW) to attempt checkmate India’s “Cold Start”.
Raising the threshold entails getting Pakistan to accede to NFU. It is possible that India’s efforts since the early 1990s in this direction are prompted by this need. Since Pakistan has studiously avoided such commitment, India may be using the threat of abandonment of NFU as last ditch pressure to get Pakistan to sign on. In a hark back to the 1994 non-papers by J N Dixit, then foreign secretary, one of which was on NFU,18 most recently India reiterated the NFU in Saran’s offer that stated, “An agreement on no first use of nuclear weapons would be a notable measure….” His warning alongside of “inexorable” escalation, yet another hangover from the Subrahmanyam era, is to use India’s doctrine of “massive” nuclear retaliation to bring to bear on Pakistan the dangers stemming from introduction of nuclear weapons into a conflict. Since the threat held out first in the 2003 official nuclear doctrine has not worked, perhaps India is using NFU abandonment as a pressure tactic.
Pakistan, by not adhering to NFU rules in “first use”, thereby, worries India. This brings to the fore the option of “first use” for India since Pakistani first use preparations may prompt pre-emptive nuclear strike thinking on India’s part. Among the implications is a jettisoning of the NFU policy. Arguably this is when NFU would be most needed, so as not to be stampeded into nuclear decisions by possibly false or misleading intelligence of Pakistani preparations. Also, a display of nuclear preparation will form part of nuclear signalling during conflicts. An NFU can tide India through, with the risk being worth bearing.
For India that “credible” supersedes “minimum” is already apparent.19 It is in the middle of demonstrating technological capability in all dimensions: missile defence, nuclear submarines, submarine launched ballistic missiles, multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles, ballistic missiles, command and control measures such as the national command post, warheads ranging from 200Kt to sub kiloton levels, cold tests, silo based and mobile delivery systems, miniaturisation, military surveillance and communication satellites, etc. Though a step behind in numbers, it has the capacity for a warhead surge, given that it has over eight tonnes of reactor grade plutonium that can also be used to fashion warheads.20 The surveillance capability and the number of warheads it could reach when combined with the missile defences and an invulnerable nuclear submarine-based second strike capability enable a potential first strike capability. This by definition has a negative implication for NFU.
Assertion of Strategic Culture
The impending review is seen politically as an expression of India’s strategic culture that has been overly restrained. This is taken as emboldening India’s adversaries. Fashioning of a new strategic culture has been underway over the past quarter century involving a move towards an assertive India that is not averse to proactive and offensive deployment of military power. The NFU has faced attacks from the segment of strategic community so inclined.
Though the NFU is important to retain so as to prevent the aggressive subculture in India’s strategic culture from gaining an upper hand, this subculture is likely to be energised with the possible advent of the BJP in government. The last time it was at the helm it moved India’s strategic culture further towards assertion, best exemplified by its banging its way into the nuclear club. This time round it would likely want to make similar waves since its leader, Narendra Modi, may wish to project his “56 inch” chest. The NFU policy is a readily available issue that also provides an opportunity for adherents of the assertive subculture to take over the reins of strategic policy and the dominant position in the strategic community. Declaring NFU void will be a consequential signal to Pakistan that India means nuclear business.
India’s NFU pledge is therefore in an existential crisis. While the BJP may not abandon NFU since escalation dominance capability is not quite in place yet, a review is certain since India’s nuclear doctrine saw two iterations in the party’s last tenure as against none during the Congress reign and the changed circumstance since its adoption entail review. Since there are two potential areas of changeover – a distancing from “massive” nuclear retaliation and the NFU – it is possible that both may be done simultaneously. In order to keep deterrence on an even keel, a step back from “massive” nuclear retaliation can be compensated by abandoning NFU. What needs doing alongside is reminding the nuclear establishment that even if NFU does not figure in the declaratory doctrine, it could continue to inform the operational doctrine. This will preserve the one element that could preserve south Asia from a nuclear fate brought on by Nobel laureate Thomas Schelling’s conceptualisation famously put as: “He thinks we think he thinks…he thinks we think he will attack; so he thinks we shall; so he will; so we must.”
Reset Nuclear Power Clock
R Rajaraman
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The new government should retune our ambitious N-power targets with a timeline to achieve them If the price of power from imported reactors is much higher, some of the funds should be diverted to indigenous reactors or to solar, wind and hydropower
The new government must review India's nuclear energy policy . It is also a major issue in financial terms.Building a nuclear capacity of about 50,000 MW in the next 15 years will cost $150-200 billion. But the momentum generated on the nuclear front during UPA-I rule has been steadily dissipating since then.
UPA-I saw the successful negotiation of the hard-fought Indo-US nuclear deal and consequent lifting of nuclear sanctions against India. The deal opened the door for importing uranium and commissioning large foreign-built reactors. Buoyed, the government announced ambitious plans for expanding nuclear power, targeting 20,000 MW by 2020 and a whopping 50,000 MW by 2030.
There was a rapid movement towards this goal soon after the deal was signed. Significant quantities of uranium were imported and initial understanding was reached with reactor builders in Russia, the US and France to build six reactors each.
However, subsequently , plans for buying foreign-built reactors started running into obstacles and, now, progress has slowed to a crawl.
There were three major causes behind this. The first, no fault of our government, was the disaster at Fukushima, whose reactor explosions triggered universal public concern over reactor safety and energised an ti-nuclear activists. While the government managed to overcome the protests against the first Kudankulam reactor, its commissioning got delayed and future reactors are likely to generate similar protests.
The second impediment has been the nuclear liability Act, discussed by Parliament under the shadow of the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal chemical tragedy . The Act allowed reactor operators, who must first pay damages to victims, to subsequently sue reactor suppliers.
Deals Remain Unsigned That sounds fair enough, but this being not an international practice, led to consternation among potential reactor builders. Our government then tried to allay their concerns by introducing more supplier-friendly working rules for implementation of the Act. Nevertheless, final agreements to build the reactors are still to be completed, let alone construction.
The third factor is the steep rise in the cost of reactor construction.
This is a global problem. Areva is building an EPR reactor in Finland, similar to what it is offering us, whose cost has gone up from ¤3 billion to a staggering ¤8 billion. In the US too, permits are no longer sought for new domestic reactors because of financial, safety and spent fuel concerns.
So we must undertake a comprehensive review of our own plans.
France, the US and Russia had all been showed keen interest in building reactors for us even before the deal was complete. Today , five years after the deal was signed and sealed, none of them has finalised a commercial agreement. Some estimate is needed on when actual construction is likely to start on any foreign-built reactor. We are not referring to the Kudankulam reactors, which were drawn up long before the deal.
Second are our energy targets. Certainly , construction won't start on any of them within the next year.
That implies six or more years of lag before any power flows out of any of them, taking us up to 2020. By then, we were supposed to have achieved 20,000 MW of nuclear capacity .
As things stand, we will not reach even 10,000 MW by then, including Kudankulam 2 and additional indigenous reactors. That would only be 3-4% of the total generation capacity at that time. We must face this fact.
Extra-Long-Term Target Similarly , the bigger target of 50,000 MW is much farther away than 2050.
The new government must announce updated, realistic targets. Otherwise, the old targets remain unretracted, misleading planners and undercutting the credibility of the nuclear establishment.
What will be the price of electricity from these projects? Estimates differ widely between supporters and opponents of nuclear energy . The government should commission an independent estimate by neutral experts of the provisional price per me gawatt of electricity from these bilateral reactor projects. If the price is much higher than from other sources, some of the funds envisaged for imported reactors should be diverted to indigenous reactors or to solar, wind and hydropower.
Safety First With uranium easily available through imports, further investments in a parallel closed-cycle thorium route must be reassessed.
Finally, we need to address safety concerns. Fukushima and Chernobyl notwithstanding, no objective comparison has shown that reactors are more unsafe than many other forms of modern technology . But this has to be explained to people living near reactors.
We do not want current nuclear plans to be abandoned, only that they be reviewed. The nuclear deal opened up many options but these must be exercised judiciously . If some strategies are not quite working out, we must be willing to modify them rather than throw good money after bad.
The writer is co-chair, International Panel on Fissile Materials
UPA-I saw the successful negotiation of the hard-fought Indo-US nuclear deal and consequent lifting of nuclear sanctions against India. The deal opened the door for importing uranium and commissioning large foreign-built reactors. Buoyed, the government announced ambitious plans for expanding nuclear power, targeting 20,000 MW by 2020 and a whopping 50,000 MW by 2030.
There was a rapid movement towards this goal soon after the deal was signed. Significant quantities of uranium were imported and initial understanding was reached with reactor builders in Russia, the US and France to build six reactors each.
However, subsequently , plans for buying foreign-built reactors started running into obstacles and, now, progress has slowed to a crawl.
There were three major causes behind this. The first, no fault of our government, was the disaster at Fukushima, whose reactor explosions triggered universal public concern over reactor safety and energised an ti-nuclear activists. While the government managed to overcome the protests against the first Kudankulam reactor, its commissioning got delayed and future reactors are likely to generate similar protests.
The second impediment has been the nuclear liability Act, discussed by Parliament under the shadow of the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal chemical tragedy . The Act allowed reactor operators, who must first pay damages to victims, to subsequently sue reactor suppliers.
Deals Remain Unsigned That sounds fair enough, but this being not an international practice, led to consternation among potential reactor builders. Our government then tried to allay their concerns by introducing more supplier-friendly working rules for implementation of the Act. Nevertheless, final agreements to build the reactors are still to be completed, let alone construction.
The third factor is the steep rise in the cost of reactor construction.
This is a global problem. Areva is building an EPR reactor in Finland, similar to what it is offering us, whose cost has gone up from ¤3 billion to a staggering ¤8 billion. In the US too, permits are no longer sought for new domestic reactors because of financial, safety and spent fuel concerns.
So we must undertake a comprehensive review of our own plans.
France, the US and Russia had all been showed keen interest in building reactors for us even before the deal was complete. Today , five years after the deal was signed and sealed, none of them has finalised a commercial agreement. Some estimate is needed on when actual construction is likely to start on any foreign-built reactor. We are not referring to the Kudankulam reactors, which were drawn up long before the deal.
Second are our energy targets. Certainly , construction won't start on any of them within the next year.
That implies six or more years of lag before any power flows out of any of them, taking us up to 2020. By then, we were supposed to have achieved 20,000 MW of nuclear capacity .
As things stand, we will not reach even 10,000 MW by then, including Kudankulam 2 and additional indigenous reactors. That would only be 3-4% of the total generation capacity at that time. We must face this fact.
Extra-Long-Term Target Similarly , the bigger target of 50,000 MW is much farther away than 2050.
The new government must announce updated, realistic targets. Otherwise, the old targets remain unretracted, misleading planners and undercutting the credibility of the nuclear establishment.
What will be the price of electricity from these projects? Estimates differ widely between supporters and opponents of nuclear energy . The government should commission an independent estimate by neutral experts of the provisional price per me gawatt of electricity from these bilateral reactor projects. If the price is much higher than from other sources, some of the funds envisaged for imported reactors should be diverted to indigenous reactors or to solar, wind and hydropower.
Safety First With uranium easily available through imports, further investments in a parallel closed-cycle thorium route must be reassessed.
Finally, we need to address safety concerns. Fukushima and Chernobyl notwithstanding, no objective comparison has shown that reactors are more unsafe than many other forms of modern technology . But this has to be explained to people living near reactors.
We do not want current nuclear plans to be abandoned, only that they be reviewed. The nuclear deal opened up many options but these must be exercised judiciously . If some strategies are not quite working out, we must be willing to modify them rather than throw good money after bad.
The writer is co-chair, International Panel on Fissile Materials
| Establishment of New Nuclear Power Plants in the Country | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
There are six nuclear power reactors installed at Rawatbhata in Rajasthan with a total capacity of 1180 MW. The details are given below :-
Legend: RAPS : Rajasthan Atomic Power Station.
Presently, 1080 MW capacity is in operation, as Rajasthan Atomic Power Station (RAPS) Unit-1 (100 MW) is under extended shutdown for techno-economic assessment for continued operation.
There are two nuclear power reactor Rajasthan Atomic Power Project (RAPP) - Units 7 & 8 (2x700 MW), with a total capacity of 1400 MW, under construction atRawatbhata. In addition, the Government has accorded ‘In-principle’ approval for setting up four more nuclear power reactors, each of 700 MW at Mahi-Banswara in Rajasthan. These are planned in two phases, each of 2x700 MW.
The XII Five Year Plan proposals envisage start of work on 19 new nuclear power reactors with a total capacity of 17400 MW. The details are as under :-
The Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions and Prim Minister’s Office ShriV.Narayansamygave this information in reply to a written question in the Rajya Sabha today.
*****
Agenda for nuclear diplomacy
On June 22, the Narendra Modi government announced that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Additional Protocol had been ratified. It is a welcome step marking the new government’s foray into nuclear diplomacy. However, by itself, it will not pave the way to the successful conclusion of negotiations with Westinghouse or GE or, for that matter, even AREVA. For that, more initiatives need to be taken, particularly if progress on the nuclear issue is to be registered during the Prime Minister’s visit to Washington.
Addressing proliferation
To understand the Additional Protocol, it is useful to look at its genesis. With the end of the Cold War, the prospects of a nuclear exchange between the two superpowers receded and the proliferation of nuclear weapons became the new threat that needed to be addressed at a global level. In 1993, the IAEA began to consider how it could play a role in this and began a deliberative two-year exercise, described as 93+2.
The IAEA was already implementing full-scope-safeguards in countries that were party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as non-nuclear weapon states. This meant that all nuclear activity in these countries was monitored to ensure that it was intended only for peaceful purposes. For the five nuclear weapon states recognised by the NPT (the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France and China), full-scope-safeguards were not applicable as these countries had a nuclear weapon fuel cycle that could not be subjected to international accounting and inspection by the IAEA. These five countries, therefore, worked out an understanding with the IAEA and accordingly, “voluntarily” placed some of their civilian facilities under a much looser IAEA safeguards agreement, more as a political gesture to demonstrate their good faith and provide credibility to the IAEA, which would otherwise be accused of only policing the nuclear have-nots.
The 93+2 exercise led, in 1997, to the Model Additional Protocol. The logic behind it was different — while full-scope-safeguards provided assurance that all nuclear materials were fully accounted for in exclusively peaceful activities, the Additional Protocol was intended to reassure that there was no clandestine nuclear activity being undertaken. Its purpose was to strengthen and expand the existing safeguards regime applicable to the non-nuclear weapon states. Remote monitoring and analysis, environmental sampling to detect traces of radioactivity, and inspections without notice, were introduced. In addition, the scope of declaratory activities relating to the nuclear fuel cycle was expanded, thresholds to trigger inspections were lowered, and imports (and exports) of dual-use items came under scrutiny. The prime catalysts for this were nuclear developments in Iran, North Korea and Libya, most of them easily traceable to Dr. A.Q. Khan’s freewheeling nuclear Wal-Mart. Once again, the five nuclear weapon states excluded themselves from the Model Additional Protocol citing national security considerations, but volunteered to conclude an Additional Protocol based on what could be shared with the IAEA.
Recognising Indian ambition
During the 1990s, with the tightening of export control regimes and the expansion of control lists to cover dual-use items and technologies, India’s access to these sectors was severely restricted. Therefore, after the 1998 nuclear tests and the declaration that India now possessed a nuclear arsenal, it was important for the Vajpayee government to demonstrate India’s impeccable non-proliferation record and as a responsible nuclear-weapon-state, seek its place in legitimate civilian nuclear commercial and technology exchanges. In the dialogues undertaken with major powers after 1998, France and later on, the U.S., were receptive to this ambition.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh took forward the nuclear diplomacy of the Vajpayee government. Looking beyond the Next Steps in Strategic Partnership (NSSP), which was being implemented in phases in 2004, the breakthrough came in July 2005 during Dr. Singh’s visit to Washington, when it was announced that “the U.S. would work to achieve full civil nuclear energy cooperation with India”, “seek agreement from Congress to adjust U.S. laws and policies,” and further, “work with friends and allies to adjust international regimes to enable full civil nuclear energy cooperation and trade with India.” In turn, India agreed to “take on the same responsibilities and practices and acquire the same benefits and advantages as other leading countries with advanced nuclear technology, such as the United States.” These responsibilities included “signing an Additional Protocol with IAEA for civilian facilities.”
Not being party to the NPT, India was not subject to full-scope-safeguards. However, nuclear reactors set up with international cooperation (e.g. Tarapur 1&2, Rajasthan 1&2, and more recently, Kudankulam 1&2) were subject to the IAEA’s facility-specific safeguards. As per the 2005 undertaking, it was tacitly understood that as a nuclear weapon state, India would keep some of its facilities out of safeguards for national security reasons and there would, therefore, be significant differences between the Model Additional Protocol (as adopted by states under full-scope-safeguards) and the customised Additional Protocol that would apply in the case of India. In fact, the Indian Additional Protocol does not contain most of the Model Additional Protocol’s provisions and basically requires that India provide information to the IAEA regarding its nuclear-related exports. So much so, that even though India only signed the Additional Protocol on March 15, 2009, President Bush had certified to the U.S. Congress in September 2008 that India and the IAEA were making substantial progress in negotiating the Additional Protocol, thus clearing the way for the India-U.S. Agreement to be signed on October 10, 2008.
Quantifying liability
Ratifying the Additional Protocol was the low-hanging fruit but significantly, the decision indicates that nuclear diplomacy will remain a priority for the Modi government. The focus should therefore now shift to resolving the ambiguities of the 2010 Nuclear Liability Law. Without this exercise, India can only import nuclear fuel for the existing power plants; it will not be able to undertake the much-needed expansion of the nuclear power sector. It is not only the foreign suppliers who would like clarity on this issue; Indian vendors are equally concerned about its ambiguities.
We know how national and international nuclear liability laws have evolved and why liability was channelled exclusively to the operator. In the 1950s, only the U.S. had a nuclear industry and the U.S. private sector needed this protection in order to establish itself at a global level. Today, the situation is different and there is a growing feeling that this exclusive channelling is no longer helpful. The Indian law of 2010, which brings in the concept of supplier liability, may not be consistent with existing practice, but it is certainly much more in consonance with the spirit of the times. The idea of some measure of supplier liability is an idea that can no longer be bypassed. However, what the Modi government needs to ensure is that supplier liability does not become “infinite” or “open-ended.” What is necessary is a genuine effort to address the concerns of the suppliers’ community so that their liability can be quantified in a manner that does not raise costs to prohibitive levels.
The NSG waiver has enabled India to import nuclear fuel from multiple sources and improve capacity utilisation in nuclear power plants, but the ambiguities of the Nuclear Liability Law created a roadblock that UPA-II could not overcome. Dialogue with the U.S. lost momentum as did the quest for India’s membership of the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Mr. Modi is well placed, both at home and abroad, to impart a new momentum to the diplomatic process, thereby ensuring India’s long-term energy security interests, giving a push to India-U.S. relations, and getting India to its rightful place at the nuclear high table.
Minimum deterrent and large arsenal
lthough the 42-page-long BJP election manifesto had only one short paragraph addressing strategic nuclear policy, that presumably does not reflect the priority that the newly elected government will attach to the subject. It is well-known that the BJP lays great importance on national security, of which nuclear policy forms an important component. Indeed, one of the first tasks undertaken by the Modi government was the appointment of a National Security Advisor.
Sooner or later the new government will undertake, perhaps quietly, a review of our nuclear doctrine. Now is an appropriate time to offer suggestions on what needs to be revised and what can be left as is.
The current official nuclear doctrine, released by the Cabinet Committee on Security on January 4, 2003, summarises our nuclear policy in eight succinct points. Of these, only a few of them really call for significant modification, because in recent years things have been relatively stable on the South Asian nuclear front.
This is despite the fact that both India and Pakistan continue to produce weapons-usable Plutonium at the Dhruva reactor and the Khushab reactors respectively. Pakistan may also be continuing to produce some weapons-grade Uranium at its centrifuge plants, despite its overall Uranium ore constraints. All this fissile material is presumably being assembled into warheads. So both arsenals have been growing, as have all the attendant dangers of maintaining a nuclear force. Nevertheless the situation has, by and large, just been “more of the same.” Therefore there is no call for any radical change of our nuclear doctrine. But a few features do need to be clarified and others underlined.
No First Use
During the election campaign, the only brief reference to nuclear issues was a statement attributed to Narendra Modi that he would retain the principle of No First Use (NFU). His statement is very welcome, particularly since simplistic expectations were that Mr. Modi would bring a more hawkish approach to nuclear issues. Maintaining a doctrine of NFU, apart from being generally in tune with India’s non-aggressive ethos, has considerable diplomatic value. After our 1998 nuclear tests elicited the anticipated international opprobrium, the inclusion of NFU thereafter in the 1999 Draft Nuclear Doctrine helped soften the criticism, especially in comparison to Pakistan, which till today retains the option of a first strike.
However, although NFU has moral and diplomatic value, there should be no illusions about its impact on hard strategic decision makers on the other side. What matters to them is not any statement of intentions (like NFU) but the actual capabilities of the adversary. Pakistani colleagues one meets in Track II invariably say they set little store in our NFU. It makes no operational difference in their nuclear plans.
What matters more for nuclear confidence building is the actual state of alert. India has been sensibly following a system of keeping its warheads de-mated from their missiles and delivery aircraft. This introduces a minimum built-in delay in launching an attack after the decision to do so has been made. It greatly reduces the risk of an accidental or hastily decided launch. The new government should continue our policy of a de-mated de-alerted posture.
One clause currently in the Doctrine merits some revision. It states that “ ....[our] nuclear weapons will only be used in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian territory or on Indian forces anywhere...retaliation to a first strike will be massive.” Now, threatening retaliation “against a nuclear attack on Indian territory” is one matter. It is the basic component of nuclear deterrence and should apply whether the attack on our territory is small or big, as long as it is nuclear.
But adding on the phrase “or on Indian forces anywhere” is a different matter. The rationale behind it was presumably to deter a nuclear attack on our forces should they enter alien territory or the high seas in combat. Such an eventuality is not implausible after Pakistan developed the Nasr — a nuclear capable battlefield missile which could be used on Indian forces if they march deep into Pakistani territory. However, threatening retaliation against that with a massive nuclear attack from our side can boomerang on our credibility. Pakistan’s battlefield nuclear attack is likely to be small (by nuclear standards). They would not want to spread much radioactivity on their own soil. It is also unclear whether they can develop a sufficiently miniaturised warhead to fit the Nasr, and how much damage such a warhead could do. It may achieve at most a few hundred fatalities. This is still a terrible loss of Indian soldiers and armoury. But it would be far from being “mass destruction.”
However, such a battlefield nuclear attack will place India in a dilemma. Having threatened in our Doctrine to inflict a “massive” nuclear retaliation, can we really go ahead and kill lakhs of their civilians in response to a much smaller attack, that too on their own soil? It would be a disproportionate response, which would go against our national sensibilities and attract widespread criticism from around the world. Surely, there are more proportionate non-nuclear ways of inflicting punitive retaliation.
Yet, if we do not counter attack after having threatened to do so, that would invite derision that we are “a soft state” incapable of hard nuclear decisions and would erode the credibility of our future deterrence, not only against Pakistan, but also against China.
It may therefore be better to limit massive nuclear retaliation only against nuclear attacks on our country and say nothing in the Doctrine, one way or the other, about attacks “on Indian forces anywhere.” Should the latter take place, we always have the option of some appropriate, measured retaliation.
What deterrence needs
Next, consider the characterisation in our Doctrine of our nuclear force as a “credible minimum deterrent (CMD)”, where the requirement of “minimum” has been spelt out as what is needed to “inflict unacceptable damage” to the adversary. These represent a very judicious choice of words selected, in fact, by the last BJP administration. It is designed in part to temper over-zealous weapon enthusiasts from going on an endless spree of building nuclear bombs. It recognises the dangers of possessing an unnecessarily large arsenal of nuclear weapons, beyond what is essential for deterrence. The new government must ensure that the agencies concerned respect CMD in spirit and substance.
Unfortunately, our arsenal of nuclear bombs has already gone way over the minimum required to “inflict unacceptable damage” on any rational government, be it Pakistan or China. (Should Pakistan someday be taken over by irrational extremists to whom death of lakhs of civilians is “acceptable”, then no arsenal, however large, will deter them anyway. With respect to China, what deterrence needs is not more bombs than what we already have, but longer range missiles capable of reaching major Chinese cities.)
As to credibility, large arsenals, beyond a point, do not enhance it. What does is a show of determination and toughness on other non-nuclear fronts, such as terrorism or border incidents.
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