Bharat Rakshak

Theo_Fidel wrote: I'm always baffled that the same people who condemn the UPA and its corruption and rail against PSU's find the AEC pure as the driven snow..

Theo_Fidel wrote: I'm always baffled that the same people who condemn the UPA and its corruption and rail against PSU's find the AEC pure as the driven snow..

The present composition of the Atomic Energy Commission for the year 2011 is given below:

Dr. Srikumar Banerjee,
Secretary to Govt. of India,
Department of Atomic Energy
Chairman

Shri V. Narayanasamy,
Minister of State, Prime Minister's Office
Member

Shri T.K.A. Nair,
Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister
Member

Shri Shivshankar Menon,
National Security Advisor
Member

Shri Ajit Kumar Seth,
Cabinet Secretary
Member

Shri Ranjan Mathai
Foreign Secretary
Member

Shri Sumit Bose,
Secretary Dept of Expenditure
Member

Shri V.V. Bhat,
Secretary to Government of India
Member
Finance

Prof. C.N.R. Rao, Honorary
President, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bengaluru
Member

Dr. M.R. Srinivasan,
Former Member(Energy) Planning Commission & ex-Chairman AEC
Member

Prof. P. Rama Rao,
ISRO Dr. Brahm Prakash Distinguished Professor, Chairman BRNS & Former Chairman Atomic Energy Regulatory Board
Member

Dr Anil Kakodkar
Former Chairman, AEC and Homi Bhabha Professor
Member

Dr R.K.Sinha
Director, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre
Member

Dr R.B. Grover
Principal Adviser, DAE
Member

Shri Arun Srivastava,
Member, Strategic Planning Group, Scientific Officer-H, DAE
Secretary

"Would this reactor design qualify to be built in Japan?" The answer is No

hey are of earlier designs

Theo_Fidel wrote:

chetak wrote: Ask and ye shall always find the fine hand of motivated, foreign funded and poisonous NGOs in all nuclear related "protests".

Kindly request you not make such wild allegations without proof. Don't go down that path based on religious labeling, this way lies madness....

Sanku,

I'm always baffled that the same people who condemn the UPA and its corruption and rail against PSU's find the AEC pure as the driven snow. Despite long evidence of incompetence and failure to perform. Cognitive dissonance if ever there was one. In Japan too despite the numerous warnings issued the failure of Government agency after Government agency the assumption was that the Nuclear establishment was incorruptible and flaw free. Tragically in an emergency the Nuclear authority collapsed.

I have absolutely no doubt that in a true emergency our Nuclear authority will collapse as well. To try and start Koodankulam, which is larger than a dozen of our other plants put together in such an environment is arrogance and overconfidence.

Chennai, Sep 21 (PTI) The 11-day hunger strike against Kudankulam Nuclear Plant ended today after the Tamil Nadu government promised to pass a resolution at the Cabinet for halting of the project even as the Centre sought to allay fears over safety.The end to the agitation came during a meeting between a delegation of the core group of protesters and Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa here."The Cabinet will be convened on September 22 and it will adopt a resolution (urging the Centre) to not to go ahead with the works on the plant site till the people's fears are removed," a state government statement said.Assuring the delegation that she would talk to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on his return from the US on September 27, she said a delegation headed by Finance Minister O Panneerselvam will also submit a memorandum to him, it said. "The Chief Minister has requested us to call off the fast and we are doing it," S P Udhaya Kumar, Convener of People's Movement against Atomic Power, spearheading the stir, told reporters while announcing end to the hunger strike.Kumar said despite withdrawal of their fast, "we will continue to keep up the pressure on the Central Government" to scrap the project, set to be commissioned in December, a decade after the work on it began.The stir ended after Prime Minister's emissary, Minister of State in the PMO V Narayanasamy, met protestors in Tirunelveli District yesterday. He briefed Jayalalithaa this morning besides conveying Singh's message on the issue to her.Narayanasamy assured her on behalf of the Centre that there would be no compromise on the safety aspects of the project, an official release said in New Delhi.He briefed the Prime Minister about his talks before Singh left for New York, it said.

Philip wrote:I concur with Chetak and SS.What needs to be done at KKM is to educate the public in a transparent effective PR campaign that this N-plant is a new modern design not of the Fuku type,etc.There seems to be an insidious attempt to derail the nation's N-plans at work as well in this case.

Debate on Times Now.

One lady said, there is no environmental report submitted.

A gentleman replied, it is on the net. Dr. Swamy said, who has asked for the report?

The lady from BJP said New Delhi Govt is not interfacing well to alley fears and thus creates issue.

Theo_Fidel wrote:This particular power plant was originally proposed for Kerala way way back when to help with the crippling power shortages there. Staunch opposition there forced the Government to cast about for a 'pliable' area nearby to stick this project into and still be close to Kerala. The Koorkai coast is easily the poorest and most neglected area of TN. Other than education, colleges and schools there is very little other organized industry in the area. It is a fallacy that there was no opposition. There was tremendous opposition in the beginning, but many community elders sided with the government and believing their promises convinced the locals early on to support the project. These community elders have turned against the project in recent days, esp. due to Fukushima and the AERB's stance that everything is still normal.

- Too many people live in the danger zone. About 2.5 Million people. There is no long term evacuation plan for these people.

- Most of the agitation funding is coming from the Western side of the Ghats, which is still shaken to find out that a nuclear evacuation zone would almost certainly put them at risk as well. All the way upto & including Thiruvananthapuram. High level winds blow from East to West around here.

Theo_Fidel wrote:http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfeed/n ... 31307.html

Kudankulam impasse ends
PTI | 06:09 PM,Sep 21,2011

Chennai, Sep 21 (PTI) The 11-day hunger strike against Kudankulam Nuclear Plant ended today after the Tamil Nadu government promised to pass a resolution at the Cabinet for halting of the project even as the Centre sought to allay fears over safety.The end to the agitation came during a meeting between a delegation of the core group of protesters and Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa here."The Cabinet will be convened on September 22 and it will adopt a resolution (urging the Centre) to not to go ahead with the works on the plant site till the people's fears are removed," a state government statement said.Assuring the delegation that she would talk to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on his return from the US on September 27, she said a delegation headed by Finance Minister O Panneerselvam will also submit a memorandum to him, it said. "The Chief Minister has requested us to call off the fast and we are doing it," S P Udhaya Kumar, Convener of People's Movement against Atomic Power, spearheading the stir, told reporters while announcing end to the hunger strike.Kumar said despite withdrawal of their fast, "we will continue to keep up the pressure on the Central Government" to scrap the project, set to be commissioned in December, a decade after the work on it began.The stir ended after Prime Minister's emissary, Minister of State in the PMO V Narayanasamy, met protestors in Tirunelveli District yesterday. He briefed Jayalalithaa this morning besides conveying Singh's message on the issue to her.Narayanasamy assured her on behalf of the Centre that there would be no compromise on the safety aspects of the project, an official release said in New Delhi.He briefed the Prime Minister about his talks before Singh left for New York, it said.

Chetak,

There is only sporadic protests in AP, mostly for jobs. Meghalaya is different, the main question there is what NPCIL will do with the Tailings. It has not been able to answer that question.
If that is your approach what about Baba Ramdev, who gets quite a bit of his donations from Abroad. Do we then accuse him of having ulterior motives and darkly hint at his being anti-national for taking on the Government. Or for that matter the Arya Samaj in Arunachal that is bitterly opposed to dams. As I said, this way lies madness.

Energy-hungry India's ambitious plan to raise nuclear capacity to 63,000 MW by 2032 makes sense. But meeting the target won't be easy, going by demonstrations against nuclear power projects countrywide. The latest agitation over Tamil Nadu's Kudankulam plant - agitators there have just ended an 11-day fast - shows yet again how easily passions can be whipped up. Why nuclear energy appears open to mischievous fear-mongering isn't hard to see. These mega-ventures, involving big bucks and foreign collaboration, need to be built and maintained with top-grade safety standards. However rare, when mishaps do occur as in Japan's Fukushima, they serve as fodder for anti-nuclear power lobbies besides provoking knee-jerk local protests.

Sometime ago, Fukushima was used to justify calls to scrap the Jaitapur plant in Maharashtra. Haryana, Andhra, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat have had their share of troubles while Bengal junked the Haripur project. In Tamil Nadu, NGO-backed protesters now want Kudankulam's atomic power plant closed, citing misgivings over safety and displacement. The chief minister's detailed statement about safety measures in place fell on deaf ears and the Centre - reportedly ready to 'reconsider' the project - seems on the verge of caving in. When people adopt agitation for agitation's sake, goaded by myopic activists with ideological axes to grind, the first casualty is reasoned debate. Yet public awareness can hardly be raised without cool-headed discussion on both the benefits and risks of nuclear energy use.

It is no one's case that public concerns over safety needn't be addressed. If anything, Fukushima torpedoed complacency about nuclear power, driving home that disaster preparedness must plan for even freak accidents. Mishaps, however, can happen as much in a chemical plant, a coalmine or an oilrig as in a nuclear power plant. Managing concerns demands open debate about our nuclear edifice, whose decision-making processes must be more transparent. Periodic reviews of existing plants are in order, along with public education about security assessments and contingency plans. Reinforcing the structural integrity of sites must be top priority. This mandates upgrade in installation design - reactors, control rooms, containment areas, cooling systems, power backups - to help plants better withstand calamities.

The aim, ultimately, is to have our nuclear power programme take off. Fast-developing India can't rest content with Luddite responses to technology, as frequently manifested in misguided activism be it against transgenic crops or nuclear energy. Our power consumption is set to increase by leaps and bounds. Environment-friendly energy use being critical to our high growth path, we require alternatives to polluting fossil fuels. Renewables - coming with their own set of headaches concerning use of land and other resources - can't do the trick alone. We need a diversified energy basket, which includes an emissions-free source like nuclear power generated to benefit people on a mass scale.

The Tamil Nadu Cabinet on Thursday passed a resolution urging the Centre to halt the work on the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) until the fears of local population over the safety of the plants are allayed.

The Cabinet resolution was in line with the assurance given by Chief Minister Jayalalithaa to the anti-Kudankulam protesters on Wednesday, when their representatives called on her.

Though the 12-day fast by the protesters came to an end on Thursday following assurances by Ms. Jayalalithaa, they have vowed to intensify their struggle against the Union government in the days to come.

Bishop of Tuticorin Roman Catholic Diocese Rt. Rev. Yvon Ambroise, who came to the protest venue at 10.30 a.m., explained in detail the demands put forth during their meeting with Ms. Jayalalithaa in Chennai on Wednesday.

“We urged the Chief Minister that the State Cabinet pass a resolution demanding the permanent closure of the KKNPP and appealed to her to withdraw cases against some of the protesters during the agitation. We also appealed to her to draw a comprehensive alternative energy policy, which should ensure tapping of non-conventional energy sources at the optimum level so that the environment and people living near such power generation units do not get affected. Since the Chief Minister's replies satisfied us to the maximum possible extent, we agreed to withdraw the ongoing indefinite fast,” In his address, coordinator of the agitation, S.P. Udhayakumar said representatives of non-governmental organisations, social activists, anti-nuke groups and community leaders would participate in a meeting to be held in Madurai on September 25 to decide on the future course of action against nuclear programmes in the country.

He informed that a protest against the KKNPP would be held at Samithoppu in Kanyakumari district on October 2 under the leadership of Swamy Balaprajapathi. “We'll even lay siege to the KKNPP in the near future to ensure its permanent closure,” he said.

The protesters left the venue only after after the Cabinet passed the resolution. However, the sprawling pandal erected for the protest is yet to be dismantled.

“It will be there till the Union government gives a satisfying reply to our demands. If not, the pandal will come in handy for us again,” said S.V. Antony, president, Uvari panchayat.

Nothing evokes a nuclear reaction quite as much as the nuclear issue in India. So it is no surprise that highly emotionally-charged responses have surrounded the setting up of the Kudankulam nuclear plant in Tamil Nadu. While the minister of state in the prime minister's office, at the behest of Manmohan Singh, has assured that nothing would be done which would compromise the safety of the people, Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa has made this a political issue and sought the suspension of work on the plant. The protest against the plant has now been called off. However, the fears of those living around the plant are legitimate.

Nuclear power is still an unknown quantity in India and the recent Japan Fukushima fiasco has heightened fears. While it's indisputable that India can't meet all its growing energy needs through hydel, thermal and non-conventional sources, pushing nuclear energy is always fraught both with risk and resistance from those living in the vicinity of the plants. India's track record in nuclear safety has been patchy, with leakages and reactors working below capacity as have been the case at both Rawatbhata and Kalpakkam. Assurances from politicians that all safety measures are in place have little meaning, they are not experts and will go in whichever direction the favourable winds are blowing. But, the question that must be asked is whether such secrecy is required when it comes to matters nuclear. Today people have access to various sources of information and this can fuel fears. The political class cannot expect to commission nuclear reactors in populated areas and be ensured of an easy ride. The only way these tensions over commissioned plants can be avoided is for the scientific community to be more transparent and take people into confidence on issues like this which could have far reaching consequences on their lives.

A positive step has been the effort by senior officers of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India and the Department of Atomic Energy to assess the situation and allay the fears of the local community in Kudankulam. It's no one's contention that the blueprints of nuclear plants be made public. It is imperative that people know about the possible drawbacks of such plants as well as the benefits. The issue of rehabilitation and compensation for land is another issue which should be addressed comprehensively before construction begins. Nuclear energy is a costly proposition to begin with. But if interminable delays take place after a plant is commissioned as is happening in both Jaitapur and Kudankulam, the cost overruns become prohibitive and the benefits diminished. As of now, the protests over Kudankulam and Jaitapur have been by the locals, politicians and NGOs. The fact that the scientific community has stepped in this time could prevent the debate from getting radioactive as usual.

svenkat wrote:Regarding 'we'-saar,are you from the fishing community in the immediate vicinity.

Or is your land in the area which can be affected.Can you indicate the distance of your place from KKNP.Because everyone is concerned about the safety and well being of OUR people.So that there can be an informed debate.

Why is the christist bishop leading the agitation.what does this thug/clown know about nuclear safety.I can understand if theo saar leads the agitation,if he is in the immediate vicinity.

Why has this agitation suddenly cropped up?Why this demand of shutting down which this christist thug (the Bishop) is demanding.

Is it the local leadrs or NGOs infiltrated by outsiders.We want to be sure that there is no religious dimension given the track record of foreign christists (US and Britain) towards India and Hindoos and the stereotypes they have erected.

where is the ultimate SCM-somnath and the erudite amitji whois suspicious of hindutva.

svenkat wrote:chanakya,
I am from the deep south.The conversion took place within 200 years.You are completely wrong on that.

Tamizhnaadu has been part of the periyaarist revolution.This area has 'n' number of schools and colleges and this area is politically vibrant.I see no need for the christist thug to take the lead.

In the region around Chernobyl, more than
5 million people may have been exposed to excess radiation, mainly through contamination by
iodine-131 and cesium isotopes.
7
Although exposure to nuclear-reactor fallout does not cause
acute illness, it may elevate long-term cancer risks.
Studies of the Japanese atomic-bomb survivors
showed clearly elevated rates of leukemia and
solid cancers, even at relatively low total body
doses.
28,29
However, there are important differences between the type of radiation and dose rate
associated with atomic-bomb exposure and those
associated with a reactor accident. These differences may explain why studies evaluating leukemia and nonthyroid solid cancers have not
shown consistently elevated risks in the regions
around Chernobyl. Alternatively, small increases in
the risks of leukemia and nonthyroid solid cancers
may become more apparent with improved cancer
registries or longer follow-up. In the population
around Three Mile Island, there was a notable temporary increase in cancer diagnoses in the years
immediately after the accident, but this increase
may have been the result of intensified cancer
screening in the area. Long-term follow-up has
shown no increases in cancer mortality.
However, there is strong evidence of an increased rate of secondary thyroid cancers among
children who have ingested iodine-131.
Careful
studies of children living near the Chernobyl plant
(which included estimates of the thyroid radiation dose) suggest that the risk of thyroid cancer
increased by a factor of 2 to 5 per 1 Gy of thyroid
dose.Although this relative increase in incidence is large, the baseline incidence of thyroid
cancer in children is low (<1 case per 100,000
children). Factors that increase the carcinogenic
effect of iodine-131 include a young age and iodine deficiency at the time of exposure. Among
children in regions with endemic iodine deficiency,
the risk of thyroid cancer per 1 Gy of thyroid dose
was two to three times that among children in
regions in which iodine intake was normal.
Moreover, the risk of thyroid cancer among children who were given stable iodine after the Chernobyl accident was one third that among children
who did not receive iodine.
Studies of the effect
of thyroid exposure to radiation in utero and
in adulthood have been inconclusive.
In accidents in which iodine-131 is released,
persons in affected areas should attempt to
minimize their consumption of locally grown
produce and groundwater. However, since the
half-life of iodine-131 is only 8 days, these local
resources should not contain substantial amounts
of iodine-131 after 2 to 3 months. On the advice
of public health officials, area residents may take
potassium iodide to block the uptake of iodine-131
in the thyroid. To be most effective, prophylactic
administration of potassium iodide should occur
before or within a few hours after iodine-131 exposure. The administration of the drug more than a
day after exposure probably has limited effect,
unless additional or continuing exposure is expected.
Although potassium iodide can have toxic effects, the Polish experience with en masse
administration of the drug after Chernobyl was
reassuring. More than 10 million children and
adolescents in Poland were given a single dose of
prophylactic potassium iodide, with very limited
morbidity.
The Food and Drug Administration
has issued guidelines for the administration of
potassium iodide according to age and expected
radiation exposure

ramana wrote:The Kudankulam power plant agitation is a strange one against nuke power. Among other thing it hits at Russia also. Its almost like India doesn't want any nuke power plants.

Is it only for imported or all types?

gakakkad wrote:

ramana wrote:The Kudankulam power plant agitation is a strange one against nuke power. Among other thing it hits at Russia also. Its almost like India doesn't want any nuke power plants.

Is it only for imported or all types?

Subramanian swamy tweeted that China and France are behind the whole protest for a different reason... China does not want India to grow while the french want to sell Areva reactors so it is protesting against russian ones...

The present agitation in the area is not spontaneous but began by vested interests of countries which hope to sell reactors to India and do not want competition from Russia. The Catholic church which is surprisingly openly represented at the protest venue through large number of nuns and padres is also active which is inexplicable..

Sasikala is active in exporting Thorium laden sands off Kodankulam area..

One of our most modern Naval ports is being readied on the coast off Kodankulam near Kanyakumari and will enable us not only to protect the reactor against sea launched attack but will also monitor movements in the Indian ocean. This fact is known to some foreign countries who are not happy with the increased role of India in the Indian ocean.