Negotiations with French company Areva on the nuclear plant at Jaitapur could restart soon, a senior official of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) said on Monday.
The talks were stalled owing to a safety review of all the nuclear plants by the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN). The review has since been completed. It included the Evolutionary Pressurised Reactors (EPRs), the type of reactors that are proposed to be installed at Jaitapur.
NPCIL's Director (Technical) S.A. Bhardwaj told reporters that a report of the ASN was being studied and the exercise could take about a week. “A quick scan of the report shows that there are no comments on any additional system that has been added to the EPRs.”
Hope on Kudankulam
Asked about the nuclear plant at Kudankulam, whose commissioning has been stalled following protests from the local community, he hoped that the agitation would be called off soon, and noted that a number of contract employees had taken jobs elsewhere as the protesters were not letting them inside the plant.
Mr. Bhardwaj denied that the nuclear establishment was “secretive” about the health impact of nuclear power. Studies both within and outside the country showed that such plants were highly safe. “We are not secretive. It was just that earlier we had been focussing more on the role of nuclear power in meeting the energy needs of the country. We have made changes now and we talk more on nuclear safety also.”
Keywords: NPCIL, Jaitapur protests, Areva, Kudankulam nuclear plant
It is not that other reactors in the world are not being grieviously damaged forever or are in the process of being so irreparably shattered or melted and that only Fukushima 1 has been targeted by the world’s dams! See in July 2007 Kashiwasaki Kariwa was attacked by the dams! And did I not warn the people! And in the process of the Sikkim quake last year many constructions in Northeast India where huge dams are being constructed were damaged. And in the Kosi fan the dam was hit and the side gate of the canal gave way and the river burst into its natural course. Only that attention of a great many people were focussed on the Fukushima ongoing catastrophe and what an intense gaze it is proving to be! When you look for something you will find it. I have been warning against the depredations of modern civilization seeing the great Bhuj catastrophe and my attention became focussed on the dam! Please people get together and change course! Say no to nukes! DNA defects remain for generations!
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