Bangladesh has turned to nuclear to deal with power shortages that often stir public anger and are

widely cited as a barrier to foreign investment in the impoverished country. Gas reserves are fast depleting and most coalfields remain untapped. Barely 45 percent of Bangladesh's more than 150 million people have access to power. The country faces a shortfall of 2,000 mw of electricity, resulting in frequent power cuts and economic losses estimated at nearly $1 billion a year.
The overall view of power generation and demand are as follows: Total installed capacity Present generation capacity Current demand Average generation Maximum generation in history Load shedding 5453 MW (105 Unit) 4931 MW 5500 MW 3700-3800 MW 4146.9 MW 1000-1500 MW

Energy-hungry Bangladesh has signed a deal with Russia to set up the country's first nuclear power plant to generate 2,000 megawatts of electricity, officials said on Friday. Two reactors, each with a capacity of 1,000 mw, will be built at Rooppur in the northwest at a cost of around $2 billion, with completion expected by 2017/18. Russian state company Rosatom will supply fuel for the reactors, process spent fuel and subsequently help decommission the plant, the officials said.

DHAKA - Russia and Bangladesh, which suffers acute shortages of electricity generation, have signed an agreement to install the South Asian country's first nuclear power plant, at Rooppur in Pabna. Russia's state-owned Rosatom will supply fuel for reactors, take back the spent fuel, and help in the decommissioning of the nuclear power plant. The construction cost is initially being put at between US$1.5 billion and $2 billion. The final agreement, to be signed some time this year, will include details of the funding mechanism to be offered by Russia. The Rooppur nuclear power plant (RNPP) will eventually generate around 2,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity, with each of two

Last year in March, I wrote in The Daily Starquestioning the feasibility of the billion-dollar Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant project in technologically backward and poverty-stricken Bangladesh. Since then some new developments have taken place. In October 2000, Bangladesh and America signed an agreement in Washington for cooperation on the peaceful use of nuclear power under which the former will receive financial and technical assistance for its Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant. Earlier Dhaka had planned to include the issue in the Hasina-Clinton talks during Clinton's visit in March 2000. Bangladesh, to gain Washington's confidence about the peaceful use of the nuclear power plant, had also signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and also ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) just the visit. But Washington had requested that the issue be dropped from the agenda, citing the nuclear tests conducted by India and Pakistan in May 1998. A report published in an English daily last week quoted Prime Minister Hasina that the government has finalised preparations to start installation of the proposed nuclear power plant. The report also stated that the Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission (BAEC) has already completed the pre-implementation phase activities for the project and the site-report has also been updated. There were also reports on a high-powered team from the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) visiting the project site a few days back. Earlier in December 1997, another IAEA team came to Dhaka to discuss with experts and government officials details of the power plant and to determine a time-bound action plan. That team visited the site of the plant and conducted a 10-week pre-implementation training programme joined by 32 participants in 1998 in Dhaka. The concept of the Rooppur project, about 180 kilometres from Dhaka in the district of Iswardi, was developed in 1961 by the then Pakistani government and was approved initially for 70 Megawatt (MW) of electricity generation. But it was virtually stalled due to lack of interest by previous Bangladeshi governments as well as a shortage of funds and technical assistance. The current plan is to have a much larger plant of 600 MW capacity, which is estimated to cost about $1 billion.

Nuclear power plants are justified to the naive general public on the grounds of attractive cost-efficiency, safety and environment-friendly aspects, whereas, the underneath complex web of issues burdened with potential risk factors remains undetected. Now, is nuclear power plant safe for Bangladesh? Operating a nuclear power plant is quite different from the operation of any other kind of power-generating plant. This is because of the devastating consequences the population may face if an accident occurs during the operation of a plant. Before I proceed further, some historical facts can be cited. 1952 - December 12, Chalk River, near Ottawa, Canada: a partial meltdown of the reactor's uranium fuel core resulted after the accidental removal of four control rods. Although millions of gallons of radioactive water accumulated inside the reactor, there were no injuries. 1957 -October 7, Windscale Pile No. 1, north of Liverpool, England: fire in a graphite-cooled reactor spewed radiation over the countryside, contaminating a 200-sq-mi area. South Ural Mountains: explosion of radioactive wastes at Soviet nuclear weapons factory 12 miles from city of Kyshtym forced the evacuation of over 10,000 people from a contaminated area. The Soviet officials reported no casualties. 1976 - near Greifswald, East Germany: radioactive core of reactor in the Lubmin nuclear power plant nearly melted down due to the failure of safety systems during a fire. 1979 - March 28, Three Mile Island, near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, USA: one of two reactors lost its coolant, which caused the radioactive fuel to overheat and caused a partial meltdown. Some radioactive material was released. 1986 - April 26, Chernobyl, near Kiev, former USSR: explosion and fire in the graphite core of one of four reactors released radioactive material that spread over part of the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, and later Western Europe. 31 claimed dead. Total casualties are unknown and estimates run into the thousands. Worst such accident to date. 1999 - September 30, Tokyo, Japan: workers added seven times the required amount. Radiation was released to the surrounding areas. The three workers

performing the operation were exposed to high levels of radiation and were treated. Thirty-nine workers were exposed in total. The alarming point of the above incidents is that all the major accidents in nuclear power plants have taken place in technologically advanced countries. The highly sophisticated technical knowhow or the specialised expertise failed to prevent accidents in those plants. For a country like Bangladesh where the typically installed gas or coal-based power plants are tripping down regularly only due to faulty installation and lack of proper maintenance, how safe will be a sophisticated nuclear power plant is certainly questionable. Besides, Bangladesh lacks in the economic strength to compensate or to recover from the liabilities arising from any such accident that may happen in any nuclear power plant. The economic cost of cleanup, evacuation and medical treatment from the Chernobyl accident is estimated to be more than $100 billion so far. The cost of merely closing down the plant itself is estimated to be $4 billion. The so-called cost efficiency It is argued that although the initial cost of a nuclear plant is double that of a conventional gas-burned plant, the fuel cost is much lower than that of a coal or oil-burned plant. Newly designed power plants of current times promise cost efficiency. But still the initial cost is exorbitantly high International Energy Agency (IEA) produced analysis on "Nuclear Power in OECD", published in 2001, showed that the capital cost for today's nuclear designs runs at about $2,000 per kilowatt, against about $1,200 per kilowatt for coal and just $500 per kilowatt for a combined-cycle gas plant. When considering the full life-cycle costs of a new project in today's money, some 60-75% of a nuclear plant's costs may be front-loaded; for a gas plant, about a quarter. History also suggests that not everything goes as planned when turning clever paper designs into real-life nuclear plants. The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant in the USA designed to generate 2200 MW, was planned in the early '70s and was estimated to cost around $500 million. The final cost ballooned to about $8 billion before the plant started producing electricity 10 years behind schedule due to errors in design and construction process, improper quality control, inadequate documentation, etc. With the continuous pressure on the foreign currency reserves, Bangladesh cannot ignore such a huge capital cost to install a nuclear power plant even if it finishes without any technical fault and within the scheduled timeframe (which is most unlikely). Bangladesh will have to approach to the donor countries to arrange the

fund. In case of foreign debts, we need to consider the interest accrued during construction, which, over many years it takes to build nuclear plants. We have to bear in mind that it took 40 long years for us to come to the implementation phase from the planning phase. Besides, Bangladesh will largely depend on foreign consultants to ensure safety of the plant as well as design and supply of plant parts and equipment. Environmental disasters True that nuclear energy does not produce carbon dioxide, the chief accused behind man-made global warming, but the other potential risk factors prevent nuclear power from emerging as a clear winter. Radiation is a threat to human health at every stage of the process, from uranium mining to plant operation (even in those new ultra-safe plants) to waste disposal. In operating a nuclear plant, a major problem is the disposal and storage of the radioactive waste material produced by the plant. No country has yet built a 'permanent' waste-disposal site. Disposal of nuclear waste will be an addition to the existing environmental hazards like high level of lead particle in the atmosphere or contamination of arsenic in ground water. The distance from a nuclear power plant also has a direct affect on things such as breast cancer. In an extensive study it was found that, women living near a nuclear reactor had an average of 26-28 deaths from breast cancer per 100,000 women. Women living far from one averaged 22-23 deaths per 100,000. It was observed that the breast cancer mortality rate in the localities where the seven oldest US Department of Energy nuclear reactors were situated rose by 37% during the period 1950-54 to 1985-89 period, whereas a corresponding rate for the entire US population rose by only 1%. In addition to this, there are numerous examples of evasive actions and cover-ups by both commercial and government owned nuclear plant authorities regarding the extent of malfunctions, accidents and consequent release of radioactive materials. It is always easy to hide behind "national security" and "sensitive information" to withhold information from the public Since the accident in the Three Mile Islands, USA in 1979, no new plants have been built in the United States. A referendum in Sweden in 1980, demanding an end of nuclear power was initiated by the Three Mile Islands incident. The 1986 Chernobyl incident seemed to put the nail in the coffin of nuclear power in Europe. Following Sweden, a number of countries campaigned for a ban. Germany and Belgium have decided to ban new nuclear plants. Even pro-nuclear France seemed to lose its enthusiasm for new

plants. In recent months the new government in Taiwan, once a big fan of nuclear power, has tried to reverse the course. The Japanese government has quietly scaled back its plans for 20 new plants. When the enthusiasm for nuclear power plants is on he reverse gear for some genuine reasons, why we shall choose to swim against the stream ignoring all the exposed menaces of nuclear power plants. Due to economical, geographical and demographical facts existing in Bangladesh, any accident in the Rooppur power plant has the potential to adversely impact the lives of every citizen of Bangladesh and of future generations. Hence, the viability of a nuclear power plant in Bangladesh needs to be rethought and recalculated. It is true that nuclear power has far lower routine emissions than energy from burning fossil fuels and Bangladesh is in a crying need of electricity. But whether nuclear power plant is the perfect solution is arguable. It has been reported many a times that the existing power plants in Bangladesh, if in production with its full capacity, can supply the required amount of electricity. But due to technical faults, lack of maintenance and notably, dishonesty from some part of the concerned officials, have given the country's power sector a gloomy look. Besides proper maintenance of the existing power plants and vigilance against misuse and 'system loss' of electricity, the huge amount of natural gas reserves can be a more suitable source of electricity than nuclear power considering the grave risk factors associated with nuclear power plants. Natural gas can be complemented by renewable energy sources such as solar energy, biomass fuels (renewably produced and used), and wind energy.

Our over-confident nuclear energy advocates should discard their blinkers and start seriously rethinking the nuclear energy option. The reasons are clear and compelling. When a country like Japan, so advanced in spiritual wisdom and material science, is virtually reeling under the impact of a crippled nuclear power plant ---- no matter what the reasons are ---- how can we, with our low-tech orientation and essentially myopic outlook, handle the situation, in the event of a big or small accident ? The advocates probably don't really care as long as their immediate interests are served. In any case, the descendents of most of our decision-makers live outside the country and would not have to suffer from any fallout ---- hidden or apparent. As for the innocent public, they haven't the foggiest notion that radioactive fallout ---- something they cannot smell, see or feel ----- can do terrible and tangible harm to their health, the environment, and all life for generations to come. How little the 'authorities' cared was proved many years ago when a rare

newshound reported that leaked water from the cooling system of the nuclear research reactor at Savar was simply being collected in jars to be disposed of later ! 'What the public doesn't know doesn't hurt them,' seems to be the unwritten policy! Civil society groups who do care ought to take up the case against nuclear energy. Consider the problems emerging out of Japan's badly battered Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The troubles have been proving far more intractable than what its operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has been imagining. The company president could not take the strain of the crisis and criticism and had to be hospitalized. Under the impact of the March 11 quake-tsunami, the cooling systems of four of the six nuclear reactors at Fukushima collapsed, and at least one of the units seemed to be approaching a meltdown, if not already melted by last Wednesday. TEPCO has been struggling with a 'cooling dilemma' --- how to continue spraying enough water to keep the troubled units from over-heating, and how to drain the highly contaminated water without releasing it into the environment. But that radioactive water did leak out from the underground maintenance tanks was evident in the fact that radioactive iodine in the seawater near the plant was found to be 3,355 (up from 1,850 ) times the legal limit, according to last Wednesday's reports. And then plutonium was also detected in the soil, proof enough of at least a partial meltdown. TEPCO has been faulted with lacking transparency and giving contradictory and confusing information as well. Radioactivity in the troubled plant was said to be 'ten million times the normal level' by one official. Then it was revised as '100,000 times', claiming the temperature was just too hot to re-check! The Japanese cabinet secretary was unforgiving, 'Considering the fact that monitoring of radioactivity is a major condition to ensure safety, this kind of mistake is absolutely unacceptable,'he said. Radioactive contamination had soared to 1,000 millisieverts per hour, rendering it extremely hazardous for the struggling workers to remain exposed as long as the job needed. Experts tell us, a single dose of 1000 millisieverts, can cause temporary radiation sickness, including nausea and vomiting, and 100 millisieverts a year is considered the lowest level at which an increase in cancer is evident. Three workers, two of whom did not even have rubber boots on, stepped into the 2000 to 6000 millisieverts radioactive water, rising just below their ankles. They were released from medical care as they had 'no signs of injuries' but the National Institute of Radiological Sciences facility, where the three were sent, said they would be monitored by local clinics. Time will tell what the injuries will be for apart from the directly observable physical injury, 'ionising' radiation can wreck life at the molecular level, leading to cancers, birth defects and other health problems. At Bangladesh's socio-economic stage the above 'nicieties' are unheard of. Consider what a survey by the Nuclear Safety and Radiation Control Division of the Bangladesh Atomic Energy commission some years ago found. Most of the 38 industries that used radiological elements and equipment were extremely careless about maintaining the mandatory safety and radiation protection protocols. There is little to suggest that the industries in question had rectified themselves by now. Government departments and even autonomous organizations in the country are not exactly famous for enforcing rules and regulations and laws.

Nuclear devices are used by foreign construction contractors in the gas and oil exploration sector, for irradiator and gas mantle production, for the measurement of moisture, laying gas pipe networks, installing chemical and power industries, building bridges and hundreds of other sectors. The said survey revealed that radiation safety measures were absent in almost 60 per cent cases of industrial radiography practices. Findings with regard to handling equipment and isotopes, monitoring radiation warning systems and the like were also not up to the mark. In some cases over 80 per cent of the workers handling nuclear equipment were found to be totally untrained. And there is no provision yet for employing a health physicist to take charge of the radiology or other departments that use nuclear isotopes. The survey did not seem to have anything to say regarding the utterly callous manner in which X-ray machines ( and other high-tech medical equipment that use various radioactive isotopes ) are installed and used throughout the country, with no regulation whatsoever as to how much is zapped into people and the environment, or whether it is at all necessary for diagnosis. The irresponsible manner in which they are generally handled should be of concern to decisionmakers in the sector. Consider the case of a pipeline worker at the Bakhrabad Gas Systems Ltd, over two decades ago which illustrates how criminally negligent employers can be ---- in this case, an international construction company. The worker had been exposed to heavy radiation during his welding job in 1985. He had no idea his long bouts of sickness while on the job was due to severe radiation from the nuclear-tipped welding equipment. He worked without any protection and collapsed several times while at work. When environmental reporters brought his plight to public notice his fingers had already started getting 'eaten up' by radiation and had to be amputated. The long-term effects of radioactive contamination were crippling, giving him recurring headaches and drying up his blood vessels, among other health problems. This is just one example of gross negligence and it is quite likely that the careless practices of the majority of the industrial enterprises in the country are leaving many seriously ill and impaired by ionizing radiation. The BAEC has the authority to regulate and control all nuclear practices in the country as per the Nuclear Safety and Radiation Control Act 1993 and the Nuclear Safety and Radiation Control Rules 1997. Can these legal instruments at all protect people against radioactive hazards --either from medical equipment or a nuclear power plant ? The public must be made fully aware of the dangers that ionizing radiation can pose, even when taking a 'few X-rays', for experts are now sanguine that there is no such thing as a 'safe' dose, even though it is sometimes necessary to diagnose or cure diseases. Nobody must be allowed to treat the mind-boggling powers of nuclear science with the complacency and carelessness observed in Bangladesh. As Japan works to contain the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986, an official with the nuclear agency was heard saying that it was time to think outside the box. Let us educate ourselves, please.

Foreign Minister Dipu Moni and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held talks in Moscow Wednesday on Prime Minister (PM) Sheikh Hasina's proposed visit to the Russian Federation seeking cooperation in the construction of a Nuclear Power Plant in Bangladesh, reports UNB. They also reviewed the entire range of bilateral relations including economic, energy and power, trade, cultural, educational and defence cooperation and status of a number of proposed agreements and MoUs, duty free and quota free access of Bangladeshi products to Russia, exchange of diplomatic properties, etc. The two Foreign Ministers also discussed different regional and international issues of common concern. Dipu Moni expressed her satisfaction over developments in the preliminary steps for the establishment of nuclear power plant, assistance of Gazprom in the oil and gas exploration sector, modernization of old electricity generation units and also in the status of draft agreements some of which were ready to be signed during the forthcoming visit of the PM. Lavrov said Bangladesh enjoyed duty free and quota free access as an LDC under the framework of Council of Euro-Asian Economic Community (Supreme Body of Customs Union) members of which are Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

(Reuters) - Bangladesh will press ahead with its nuclear power programme and has already signed a framework agreement with Russia to set up a 1,000 megawatt (MW) nuclear plant, the country's prime minister said on Sunday. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said the plants which were damaged by the earthquake and tsunami in Japan were old and security systems had improved significantly since. She said that after completing the final agreement, a nuclear power plant at Ruppur would start operating by 2017. "We have a plan to construct another 1000 MW nuclear based power plant at Ruppur by 2018," she said. Hasina had earlier opened up a furnace oil-based quick rental power plant that has been set up by leading Bangladesh company Summit Power SMPL.DH SMPL.DH.

Summit Power, along with multilateral lending agencies, will invest $1 billion to produce 1,450 megawatts of electricity by 2013, Muhammad Aziz Khan, chairman of Summit Group, said. "We are happy to be able to complete a 102 MW power plant within the stipulated time frame," he told Reuters on Sunday. "I am also happy that Summit Power is being able to support Bangladesh to overcome power shortages," Aziz added. Summit, a conglomerate whose business ranges from power to shipping. has so far invested more than $500 million and is producing about 500 MW of electricity. The prime minister said when the present government assumed office in January 2009, power generation was only 3200 MW and had now increased to about 4700 MW. So far the government has signed agreements to produce 3317 MW. The country faces up to 2500 MW power shortages a day. (Reporting by Serajul Islam Quadir; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Cross posted from Climate Central. As the world continues to watch the crisis at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant unfold, many are asking what the repercussions will be for the future of nuclear power. First, though, we must understand the current state of the nuclear industry: Where are the worlds nuclear power plants located? How much electricity do these plants produce? How much more nuclear generating capacity is planned, and for where? The International Energy Agency (IEA) reports that about 16 percent of the worlds electricity comes from nuclear power, and that given pre-Fukushima plans, this percentage would stay roughly constant over the next two decades, barring any major changes in policy. The maps below, which come courtesy of Katherine Marvel, a post-doctoral fellow at Stanfords Center for International Security and Cooperation, show where the worlds nuclear reactors are presently located and how many more are planned. (Visit Climate Central to see the maps with full interactive capabilities.).

Number of Nuclear Reactors

Percent of Electricity from Nuclear Power

Before Fukushima, there were 443 functioning nuclear power plants in the world. About 62 were under construction, and another 324 were in various stages of planning. (This data comes from the World Nuclear Association, a nuclear power advocacy organization). The worlds nuclear power is concentrated in a handful of countries: Of the worlds 192 countries, only 30 have nuclear power plants, and 75 percent of global nuclear generation is concentrated in just eight countries: The United States, France, Japan, Russia, South Korea, India, the U.K., and Canada. Membership in the "nuclear power club," though, is set to expand considerably if current proposals come to fruition.

The following eleven countries lack nuclear power today, but are planning to build or are building power plants: United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, Turkey, Poland, Belarus, Bangladesh, Iran, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, and Kazakhastan. Another eight countries: Israel, Italy, North Korea, Thailand, Lithuania, Chile, Italy, and Malaysia, have proposed to build power plants. Number of Nuclear Reactors Under Construction

Number of Nuclear Reactors Planned

Number of Nuclear Reactors Proposed

Operating = Connected to the grid. Under Construction = first concrete for reactor poured, or major refurbishment under way. Planned = Approvals, funding or major commitment in place, mostly expected in operation within 8-10 years. Proposed = Specific program or site proposals, expected operation mostly within 15 years.

Another fact shown by the graphics is that although many countries have proposed or are planning to construct nuclear power plants, only China is aggressively building them they have proposed 110 and are building 27. By comparison, the United States has 23 proposed reactors, but only one is under construction. And that single reactor, which is located in southern Tennessee, was begun in the 1980s, put on hold for 20 years, and is only now being completed. The disparity between planned power plants and plants under construction raises the question of how many of these proposed plants will actually be built. Also, the expansion of nuclear power to new countries raises issues related to nuclear proliferation the technology to build certain nuclear power plants could be used to make nuclear weapons with relative ease. And what these maps do not show is what would be built instead of these nuclear plants, should they not move forward. In place of nuclear power, will these countries invest in coal, natural gas, hydropower, solar, or wind energy? Answering these questions will require continued work to balance the benefits and risks of nuclear energy against the growing energy demands of society.