(Published in the Manila Standard Today under the Greenlight column, June 23, 2008)
The Philippine government has recently expressed to seriously study the option of opening the mothballed Bataan Nuclear Power Plant to bolster the country's energy supply. And why not? In this age of US$135 a barrel of petroleum, many economic planners in countries across the globe are prodded to consider nuclear energy as a more economical and efficient energy source.
In a recent article by Sam Knight in the Financial Times, he describes this transformation of the nuclear industry in the next 20 years as “renaissance” or rebirth. This is an apt description for a once dead industry.
Revival
So it was once dead. No new reactor has been built in the US since 1979, when an accident at the Three Mile Island power plant caused the reactor core to melt. The construction of nuclear power plants in the last 22 years since the Chernobyl incident was on a standstill, with the exception of Japan, South Korea, and France. No new nuclear reactor has been built in the US since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, wherein the reactor core melted. In 1971, the ASEAN endorsed a nuclear-free zone concept with the creation of a “regional nuclear safety regime”. In the 1990’s, Italy and Germany which are the early developers of nuclear power assured that they will phase out their nuclear energy completely.
Now, in this era of nuclear rebirth, many nations have declared to initiate and scale up their nuclear programs to reduce their dependence on oil. Only recently, the Italian government declared its intention to restart construction of nuclear power plants by 2013, In 1987, after more than 20 years of being a nuclear-free country. The UK government expects the new generation of nuclear power to supply significantly more of the country's electricity than the 19 per cent the existing ones deliver, and in fact planned to maximize the contribution from nuclear sources in the next 10 to 15 years. Across Europe, politicians are reassessing nuclear policy, opting to extend the life of existing reactors like in Germany and Sweden, or built new reactor altogether like Russia.
Growth of nuclear power in Asia
East and Southeast Asia are the only regions in the world where nuclear power generation is growing significantly. According to the Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper published in 2007, the region boasts 109 operational nuclear power plants, with 18 more under construction and around 110 in the planning stage. Moreover, much of the startling growth is in China (10 units), Taiwan (6 units), India (15 units), Pakistan (2 units), Japan (55 units) and South Korea (20 units). Additionally, regional leaders at the 13th ASEAN Summit in Singapore in November 2007 issued a statement promoting civilian nuclear power, alongside renewable and alternative energy sources.
This nuclear renaissance, though controversial and politically incorrect to many, is an uncomfortable way to mitigate the energy crisis, apart from reducing the dependence on fossil fuels and therefore reduce greenhouse gases and global warming. It is one of the most efficient and cleanest alternatives to coal and gas-based electricity production, and it's responsible for only less than 20% of electricity production.
Continuing fear
But despite these, many fear and reject nuclear power due to possible safety breaches and accidents, such as Chernobyl and the Three Mile Island accidents, and the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant leakage in Japan in 2007 due to an earthquake. But is our fear of nuclear power well-grounded?
A nuclear accident, such as those mentioned above, is a “black swan” or an outlier, an event that lies beyond the realm of normal expectations, as Nassim Taleb puts it in his self-same book. Key to reducing, if not, eliminating the fear of nuclear power is understanding the risk associated with it Why are we willing to risk our health, the environment, and our very existence with the use of fossil fuels over an improbable catastrophic nuclear meltdown of a reactor?
Taleb, in his book, says the focus of the investigation should not be on how to avoid any specific black swan, for we don't know where the next one is coming from. The focus should be on what general lessons can be learned from them.
Lessons learned
And indeed we learned. It is estimated that the probability for a plant to have a serious flaw has decreased from 0.1 to 0.01 during the developmental phase of the nuclear industry. At the same time the equivalent frequency of accidents has decreased from 0.04 per reactor year to 0.0004 per reactor year, and this is according to a study by Jussi vaurio in 1984!
Another positive development is through a player in this nuclear industry, Thorium Power based in Russia which currently qualifying its proprietary thorium (a silvery metal which is thought to be between three and four times more abundant) fuel designs for use in existing and future commercial nuclear reactors. These designs have three major benefits: no production of nuclear weapons-usable materials in spent fuel, reduced nuclear waste, and improved industry operating economics. The technology will be commercially available in 2013.
Operating the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant will definitely provide a huge breather to the oil crisis; and there are available technologies and best practices now to prevent nuclear accidents and make nuclear energy more efficient. But a potential flaw is execution. Our society is rife with examples of infrastructures fraught with corruption-laden contracts and sub-standard materials that undermine its very purpose. Political will would play a huge part.
-------------------------------
Reynaldo C. Lugtu, Jr. teaches management and marketing courses in the MBA Program of De La Salle Uiniversity, Graduate School of Business. He may be e-mailed at rlugtu2002@yahoo.com or visit his blog at http://rlugtu.blogspot.com..
The Philippine government has recently expressed to seriously study the option of opening the mothballed Bataan Nuclear Power Plant to bolster the country's energy supply. And why not? In this age of US$135 a barrel of petroleum, many economic planners in countries across the globe are prodded to consider nuclear energy as a more economical and efficient energy source.
In a recent article by Sam Knight in the Financial Times, he describes this transformation of the nuclear industry in the next 20 years as “renaissance” or rebirth. This is an apt description for a once dead industry.
Revival
So it was once dead. No new reactor has been built in the US since 1979, when an accident at the Three Mile Island power plant caused the reactor core to melt. The construction of nuclear power plants in the last 22 years since the Chernobyl incident was on a standstill, with the exception of Japan, South Korea, and France. No new nuclear reactor has been built in the US since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, wherein the reactor core melted. In 1971, the ASEAN endorsed a nuclear-free zone concept with the creation of a “regional nuclear safety regime”. In the 1990’s, Italy and Germany which are the early developers of nuclear power assured that they will phase out their nuclear energy completely.
Now, in this era of nuclear rebirth, many nations have declared to initiate and scale up their nuclear programs to reduce their dependence on oil. Only recently, the Italian government declared its intention to restart construction of nuclear power plants by 2013, In 1987, after more than 20 years of being a nuclear-free country. The UK government expects the new generation of nuclear power to supply significantly more of the country's electricity than the 19 per cent the existing ones deliver, and in fact planned to maximize the contribution from nuclear sources in the next 10 to 15 years. Across Europe, politicians are reassessing nuclear policy, opting to extend the life of existing reactors like in Germany and Sweden, or built new reactor altogether like Russia.
Growth of nuclear power in Asia
East and Southeast Asia are the only regions in the world where nuclear power generation is growing significantly. According to the Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper published in 2007, the region boasts 109 operational nuclear power plants, with 18 more under construction and around 110 in the planning stage. Moreover, much of the startling growth is in China (10 units), Taiwan (6 units), India (15 units), Pakistan (2 units), Japan (55 units) and South Korea (20 units). Additionally, regional leaders at the 13th ASEAN Summit in Singapore in November 2007 issued a statement promoting civilian nuclear power, alongside renewable and alternative energy sources.
This nuclear renaissance, though controversial and politically incorrect to many, is an uncomfortable way to mitigate the energy crisis, apart from reducing the dependence on fossil fuels and therefore reduce greenhouse gases and global warming. It is one of the most efficient and cleanest alternatives to coal and gas-based electricity production, and it's responsible for only less than 20% of electricity production.
Continuing fear
But despite these, many fear and reject nuclear power due to possible safety breaches and accidents, such as Chernobyl and the Three Mile Island accidents, and the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant leakage in Japan in 2007 due to an earthquake. But is our fear of nuclear power well-grounded?
A nuclear accident, such as those mentioned above, is a “black swan” or an outlier, an event that lies beyond the realm of normal expectations, as Nassim Taleb puts it in his self-same book. Key to reducing, if not, eliminating the fear of nuclear power is understanding the risk associated with it Why are we willing to risk our health, the environment, and our very existence with the use of fossil fuels over an improbable catastrophic nuclear meltdown of a reactor?
Taleb, in his book, says the focus of the investigation should not be on how to avoid any specific black swan, for we don't know where the next one is coming from. The focus should be on what general lessons can be learned from them.
Lessons learned
And indeed we learned. It is estimated that the probability for a plant to have a serious flaw has decreased from 0.1 to 0.01 during the developmental phase of the nuclear industry. At the same time the equivalent frequency of accidents has decreased from 0.04 per reactor year to 0.0004 per reactor year, and this is according to a study by Jussi vaurio in 1984!
Another positive development is through a player in this nuclear industry, Thorium Power based in Russia which currently qualifying its proprietary thorium (a silvery metal which is thought to be between three and four times more abundant) fuel designs for use in existing and future commercial nuclear reactors. These designs have three major benefits: no production of nuclear weapons-usable materials in spent fuel, reduced nuclear waste, and improved industry operating economics. The technology will be commercially available in 2013.
Operating the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant will definitely provide a huge breather to the oil crisis; and there are available technologies and best practices now to prevent nuclear accidents and make nuclear energy more efficient. But a potential flaw is execution. Our society is rife with examples of infrastructures fraught with corruption-laden contracts and sub-standard materials that undermine its very purpose. Political will would play a huge part.
-------------------------------
Reynaldo C. Lugtu, Jr. teaches management and marketing courses in the MBA Program of De La Salle Uiniversity, Graduate School of Business. He may be e-mailed at rlugtu2002@yahoo.com or visit his blog at http://rlugtu.blogspot.com..
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