What waiver unlocks: N-fuel to avionics, biotech to N-reactors

Mumbai|New Delhi, September 6: Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Anil Kakodkar may have typically understated the NSG waiver as an “important breakthrough” and proponents of nuclear self-reliance treated it as inevitable but for India’s secretive nuclear establishment in Mumbai, crossing the hurdle on Saturday brought a huge sense of relief and quiet jubilation.

The NSG waiver to India marks the end of the technology denial regime that crippled the country’s nuclear power programme. Here is what can potentially change with the NSG waiver:

• Seventeen existing reactors which had an average plant load factor (PLF) of 54 per cent in 2007-08, the lowest in ages, will get access to imported uranium to overcome the shortage of indigenous fuel.

• Arrival of imported fuel will allow the firing of three new reactors—the 220 MW Kaiga-4 and the 220 MW RAPP 5 and 6 in Rawatbhata, Rajasthan, which have been stuck for want of uranium. Two 700 MW units are to come up in Kakrapar in Gujarat and two more in Rawatbhata.

• India will have access to Canada’s CANDU reactors that allow the breeding of thorium directly instead of depending on homegrown breeder reactors to realise the goal of achieving it by 2010.

“This waiver gives us a lot of freedom,” said Prof. CNR Rao, Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister. “All our plans until now were in a vacuum as we needed NSG approval even to deal with willing countries like France or Russia. Most immediately, we can buy uranium from various sources and other countries can come here and set up reactors,” he said.

The waiver also opens the doors for high technology that can be used in a wide range of scientific and industrial sectors. Here are some examples of dual-use technology and trigger list items (sensitive technology), which will be available to India now.

DUAL-USE TECHNOLOGY

• Sonar, which is used for undersea warfare, can be used for finding minuscule abnormalities in mammograms.

• Advanced computers that have weather forecasting applications such as CRAY XPM 14, which was denied to India in the 1980s.

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