hit Fukushima Daiichi complex has fuelled anew an impassioned debate about nuclear energy. The world wasn't completely sold on nuclear power to begin with. Now, proponents of this technology find themselves having to start over, defending their position against powerful lobby groups like Greenpeace who have pledged to continue the fight against nuclear energy. Sri Lanka has no nuclear reactors. Sri Lanka has been talking of harnessing nuclear energy but it will be a while yet. Nevertheless, ongoing discussion about the pros and cons of the technology is today more relevant to Sri Lanka than ever. Why? Because, across the narrow Palk Strait, neighbouring India possesses one of the fastest growing nuclear reactor populations in the world. India has 20 operational nuclear reactors in six nuclear power plants. Two sites of concern to Sri Lanka should be Kalpakkam , where the Madras Atomic Power Station is based, and Koodankulam, where the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Project is based. While Kalpakkam at 300 kilometers north is less of a danger, the Koodankulam atomic power plant in Tirunelveli is only 232 kilometers west of Kalpitiy, Sri Lanka. To put this in perspective, Tokyo is located about 225 kilometers southwest of the Fukushima plant. The anti-nuclear energy lobby in India is fired up. Authorities that support nuclear power are being called upon to reassure a jittery public and to canvass for a continuation of their program. They have had to justify their claims that Indian reactors are safe; that a catastrophe of the type Japan faced would not befall India. Public anxiety seems to be magnified by the perception that the Indian atomic energy establishment is cagey and secretive. In an interview with India's NDTV, the hairman of that country's Atomic Energy Commission was asked some revealing questions. “Can you keep your hand on your heart and say Indian public need not fear Indian reactors?” the reporter insisted. “Most people think that the Department of Atomic Energy is secretive about what it does,” he pointed out. “It is not transparent. It does not give out data.” Many Indians, it would seem, are nervous and hungry for information. Given the country's proximity to some of India's nuclear sites, is Colombo too asking the right questions asked of New Delhi? What is Sri Lanka doing to protect national interest should an accident happen? In an editorial in the Hindustan Times last week, physicist M. V. Ramana and Suvrat Raju, a fellow at Harvard University's Department of Physics, called for India to closely examine the events at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility and understand that no nuclear plant is immune to the possibility of major accidents. In April 2010, this writer interviewed Ramana who is an expert on India's nuclear program and safety issues. He said that information in the public domain shows that scientists are taking every measure possible to ensure safety — particularly because it is in New Delhi's best interests to protect its own citizens before it worries about the populations of neighboring nations. “The nuclear reactors are safe,” he agreed. “But there is no guarantee that an accident will not occur.” Ramana is an associate research scholar at the Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Responding to questions via email, he pointed out that Kalpakkam is quite far from Sri Lanka so it would only be in the event of a massive accident that any fallout could reach the country. However, he said, Koodankulam is closer. Asked when Sri Lanka should start getting concerned, Ramana responded: “It should have been concerned long ago, when the construction of the reactor at Koodankulam commenced.” In a paper for the July 2009 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Ramana and Ashwin Kumar, another expert of India's nuclear program, wrote about the safety inadequacies of India's fast breeder reactor. Only one fast breeder reactor operates in India and that is in Kalpakkam. There is no doubt that the expansion of the nuclear energy industry in India could be beneficial to Sri Lanka. If India produces excess, it could meet part of our energy needs. But accidents do happen. Authoritative diplomatic sources said last year that Sri Lanka has bilaterally raised “some concerns from time to time” about safety issues related to India's nuclear program. Nothing was made public, however, to avoid any embarrassment. In the past, Sri Lanka was predominantly worried about non-state actors getting access to nuclear material. “Not nuclear bombs,” said a retired diplomat, who did not wish to be named. “But fissile material to make, say, a dirty bomb. This was an issue especially after the LTTE acquired aircraft.” Regarding trans-frontier pollution, there seems to have been less said. Asked for a comment, a senior serving diplomat said that the development of the Kalpakkam and Koodankulam reactors must be seen in the context of Sri Lanka's relationship with India. Earlier, there was a tendency to be suspicious of events such as the building of a nuclear plant in close proximity to Sri Lanka. “But now, over the years, we have more trust in the Indian scientific community.” Sri Lanka also has to accept, he said, that, globally, nuclear power is becoming increasingly respectable. There is no valid substitute for clean power than nuclear energy. Even Sri Lanka is now discussing the possibility of producing nuclear energy. Meanwhile, India is increasingly demonstrating its prowess in nuclear energy. “We have more confidence in the capacity of the India system to minimize the sphere for mishaps and to evolve a structure that best serves the interests of its country and of its neighbors,” the diplomat stressed. But confidence alone doesn't cut it. Others are sceptical, pointing to nuclear accidents of past and asserting that mishaps are inevitable. For them, it's not a question of “if” but “when”. “We saw how a technology giant, an economic colossus, was humbled in a totally unexpected manner by nature's fury,” said another retired senior diplomat, requesting anonymity. “Radiation damage is something one cannot handle once it occurs. Chernobyl proved it. Three Mile Island nearly proved it. Fukushima proved it. Kalpakkam and associate monsters will prove it when it happens.” He pointed out that South Asia has the largest reactor population in the developing world. “All of those reactors are disasters waiting to happen,” he maintained. “Fukushima also showed us something else. One does not have to engineer an earthquake; all you have to do is to disable diesel pumps sending coolants to reactor and hold the reactor hostage for a relatively brief period until it is super-heated and blows up!” Even if Colombo does take all this up with New Delhi, its options for redress might be limited. “Sri Lanka's problem here – the risk from facilities in a neighboring state – is actually a global problem,” said Arjun Makhijani, president of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, in comments to this writer. “It is a big gap in international law that was illustrated by the Chernobyl accident which caused considerable economic and environmental damage in several neighboring countries like Germany and Norway.” “Today, there are high-level liquid radioactive wastes from commercial plutonium separation in Britain and France that could cause similar damage in case of a severe accident for instance in Norway (according to the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority),” he observed. “Also international shipments of plutonium from Britain and France also pose some risks on the high seas and in the economic zone waters of countries along the route.” “In general, I know of no international liability arrangements that would cover a severe nuclear accident,” Makhijani asserted. “There is no provision for an international environmental impact assessment and no opportunity for people of neighboring countries to have any formal input, directly or via their governments, into projects and activities that could cause significant harm in the event of a severe accident.” It really is a story of damned if you do... and damned if you don't. The writer is a senior jounalist based in Colombo __
