India Nuclear News And Discussion

abhischekcc · Post by **abhischekcc** » 18 Mar 2011 14:38

amit, I am not saying that measures are inadequate. I am saying that the debate is about that.

amit · Post by **amit** » 18 Mar 2011 14:56

abhischekcc wrote: I am saying that the debate is about that.

Well boss in that case my apologies, I misunderstood. To the above I agree 400 per cent and it's good that such a debate occurs. Hopefully more safety would be built in due to this debate, because at the end of the day the world (including India) cannot afford to ignore nuclear power generation.

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 18 Mar 2011 19:10

abhischekcc wrote:There is no cacophony of views - all amount to saying the same thing - that adequate safety measures have not been taken the world over regarding nuclear reactors/material.

Thanks for compactifying the debate. This is the nature of safety measures. They evolve over time as new failure modes are discovered. The Japanese situation will result in more robust safety standards. Such evolution is true for all industrial sectors. However, as others have pointed out, nuke power industry stands out as having the cleanest record in terms of deaths caused by accidents. And, as has been repeated many times over, the remarkable thing here is that these reactors did not go belly up in a situation that was well beyond their designed safety margins. Regardless of how the press hypes it up, the reactors will be brought under control and there will be no long term effects from these accidents.

In India, the problem has been compounded by a political system compromised by corruption.

This is also true of *all* sectors in India.

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 18 Mar 2011 19:22

somnath wrote:Given the really small capacity of PHWR/AHWR (still a paper reactor), LWRs are the only model with capacities of 1000 MW and more, and hence scalable...

This is absolutely true today. The EPR 1600 model provides the best economy of scale when apples are compared with apples. However, if the price of an imported reactor is compared to an indigenous PHWR, it is not a fair comparison. NPCIL/BARC are not corporations, so they don't have to recover cost of development, unlike Areva. All the manpower that went into developing the PHWR series, including the 700 MW model, is for *free* if viewed in corporate terms. Not only free, it is also *cheap* by world standards.

The real answer is that India has catching up to do. Some number of LWRs will be imported, they will be studied by Indian experts and experience will be gained in operating them. After a decade or so, I would not surprised if BARC comes up with a 2000 MW LWR of its own. This jugaad system is how India operates.

For folks who want to argue that, please go back and check on the history of development of the PHWRs - it all started with importing a CANDU reactor.

Bottomline, India needs to pay up front for reactors so that the future is secured. Buying reactors from each of the 3 sources (France, Russia and US/Japan) will allow BARC to study 3 technologies/designs and take the best features f all of them would be incorporated into an Indian design.

Note that I did not even bring up the need for LWRs in terms of sustaining the 3-phase nuke cycle, which is also a valid point on its own.

Finally, it is one thing to be critical of GOI in terms of corruption, but please keep in mind that the technical discussions find resonance within BARC and NPCIL. Calling the scientists/engineers also corrupt would be hard to swallow. Finding isolated nay-sayers like Brahma Chellany does not tilt the balance at all -- the support for these decisions of GOI is enormous, in places where it matters.

vic · Post by **vic** » 18 Mar 2011 20:08

is India planning bigger PHWR? We have reached arouind 740MW capacity, so anything bigger in design pipeline?

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 18 Mar 2011 20:13

The main hurdle is the fabrication of the vessel. Secondary issues like robotic fuel loaders, turbines etc will have to be enlarged.

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 18 Mar 2011 20:52

Somnathji:

This might be out of thread: agreed that there was no evidence of production being ramped up under the NDA...but there was no evidence of a rapid TSP buildup surpassing ours either...the situation has changed now: hence the need for a ramped up production and deployment on our side as well. Just like "nuclear restraint/ahimsa" was a slogan we clinged to for many decades from 1947, (the straightjacket was broken in 1998 - though it could have been done in 1974 itself), the word "minimum" in "minimum credible deterrent" should not become a slogan that is used as an excuse to avoid building up the necessary force levels.

Somanthji and Amitji:

When you say we have "adequate to more than adequate Pu stocks": it is true only if WGPu as well as RGPu are taken into account (though RGPu may have its disadvantages in terms of more maintanence, etc that an RGPu based weapon may require as well as some loss in yield reliability).

This is unless you believe that a mere 100 or fewer warheads constitutes a minimum credible deterrent. The statement about numbers not mattering is true once the numbers cross such a threshold. They however do if they are below the necessary threshold. This is why the US at 23000 nukes had no fear of the USSR at 45000 nukes in 1986 and the USSR at 6000 nukes had no reason to fear the US at 32000 nukes in 1965. Numbers do not matter when this threshold is crossed: this threshold would be the number required to devastate beyond any possiblity of recovery TSP as well as devastate PRC to the extent of derailing its superpower ambitions for overa century (after absorbing a first strike). The arsenal required for this would approximate in size and yields the arsenal of France at its peak: several hundred medium yield (upto 200kt) warheads. Note that this is far far smaller than 23000 weapons of x00 kt yield and 6000 odd weapons of y MT yield...Of course, there should be flexibility to ramp up to a larger arsenal if our adversaries do so...

Achieving the above level of deterrence is what is important. Till then, a ramp up in production/deployment will be necessary...there should also be open evidence to the outside world of a buildup towards a medium capacity arsenal as above,though the precise details should be kept opaque. Further, qualitative improvement would be a necessity: not necessarily in terms of passing to megaton yield warheads ; but increasing deployability, reducing maintanence requirements, etc. Ideally, one would like to phase out dependence on RGPu , i,e have enough WGPu for this....

The CTBT as well as the FMCT come in the way of realizing these goals: so long as others oppose these (republicans in the case of CTBT and TSP in the case of FMCT), we have no worries. Once other opposition ends, we must take a stand against these limitations like we did in 1996. Does the nuclear deal allow that ? Is the current establishment moving towards a minimum credible deterrent of the type mentioned above or is it blindly following a "no buildup at all costs" policy ? Is the latter somehow part of an unwritten understanding that comes with our "strategic partnership" with the U.S ?

A remark about the threshold of minimum deterrence: this threshold depends on the capabilities of the adversary as well as the nature of the adversary. The first factor is obvious. The second one needs an illustration: suppose, hypothetically, that we need to deter a that values its peoples' lives (like a western country). All other factors being constant, the requirement for deterrence will be much lower than that for deterring a mad entity like TSP.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Mar 2011 21:14

Most likely in future nukes will be confined to weapons only.

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 18 Mar 2011 21:33

Ramdas-ji,

The concept of "minimum credible deterrent" is not fixed in time...I think I mentioned before, Jaswant Singh said - "its not a fixity, it is not even an enunciation of fixity"

a couple of points are moot...One, the numbers of warheads, or weapons we actually have...No one, absolutely no one in the establishment doubts the "credibility" of India's deterrent...These are people who would know a thing and two and a bit more about both the quality as well as the quantity aspects of deterrence...Two, the numbers drawn out by NPAs have a pattern - in the '90s, it was about India having a large stockpile...Now that India is somewhat "out of scope" thanks to the nuke deal, it is Pak that is ramping up stockpiles...coincidence?

Now does it mean that Pak does not have a large, maybe even a larger arsenal than India? Not necessarily..As the "weaker" power with a richer targte list, one would expect Pak to have more weapons...Just as the Soviet union had many times more number of weapons than the US...Does it mean that 4 or 5 bombs wont take Pak back to stone age? As a matter of fact, take out Lahore, Karachi and Pindi - Pak will cease to exist in the form we know...Is that deterrence enough for Pak? Or more importantly, the Paki elite that controls its own nukes?

Also, mark a shift in our deterrence postures...It started off with a sort of clear, unambiguous NFU - and we said that we would use nukes only if someone used the same on us....When the nuclear doctrine finally became official, that had already morphed into "we would use nukes against anyone using non-conventional weapons against us, ie, chemical and biological weapons as well...And now, Shiv MEnon recently went ahead and said that our NFU is only for non-nuclear weapon states

...As you can see, not only is our weapons number a "variable" rather than a constant, our doctrine too is dynamic...Maybe Jaswant Singh was just making a rhetorical point the other day, else he wouldnt have missed this when he argued that we should "revisit" NFU...Fact is we have already done so!

Last bit about WGPu and RGPu - way back in 1998 Perkovich spoke about Indian capability to fashion warheads out of RGPu..13 years hence, we should be much better at it, no?

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 18 Mar 2011 21:38

GuruPrabhu wrote:For folks who want to argue that, please go back and check on the history of development of the PHWRs - it all started with importing a CANDU reactor.

Spot on...Unfortunately people uneducated about history (and science) blabber inanities like "one off" etc...People forget that our power programme was initially very much planned with the GE BWR design in mind...It was only when the follow-on reactors to Tarapur had more stringent "safeguards" conditions that Homi Bhabha demurred...It was the exigencies of the "strategic" programme rather than any great presience about incremental safety of CANDU (over BWR) that drove the enterprise...

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 18 Mar 2011 22:02

Good amount of technical details:

Greater Danger Lies in Spent Fuel Than in Reactors

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 18 Mar 2011 22:48

Somnathji,

4-5 nukes are insufficient to take out Lahore,Karachi and Pindi even though they would cause severe damage. Many more will be required: more like 25-30 fission weapons. Just for this task. Further, the threat that TSP wont exist in current form after a nuke attack perpetrated by it is insufficient: after all, hardliners do not mind a TSP in stone age following pure ROP. The threat should be of TSP not existing in any organized form (current or jihadi : stone age is not a consideration here). This requires many more nukes (unless the yields are far higher than basic fission weapons, like 200kt or thereabouts).

Further, regarding PRC, we are the weaker power with a larger list of economically valuable targets. Therefore, dose'nt deterrence vis a vis PRC require a larger/ higher quality arsenal than even PRC? The answer could be yes, going by your logic. But a few tens of fission nukes could destroy, say, 5-10% of PRCs industrial capacity.

Hence the need for a far, far more potent arsenal than what the NPAs credit us for currently. Of course, NPAs could have their agenda, so their figures may not be absolute truth. The precise quantity required decreases as assured quality increases (for example, 300 200kt warheads is better than a 1000 20-30 kt warheads). However, till the TN logjam is broken by future testing, the least that needs to be done would be weaponization of the bulk of the RGPu holdings. That by itself will lead to a quantitative superiority over TSP and some deterrence vis a vis PRC. Over time, RGPu based warheads should be retired in favor of WGPu ones as more WGPu is produced. The RGPu that is freed in this process may then be transferred to the civilian side.

Sanatanan · Post by **Sanatanan** » 19 Mar 2011 07:54

Amber G. wrote: http://www.etec.energy.gov/History/Majo ... ident.html
or
http://www.etec.energy.gov/library/SRE_ ... /sre-C.pdf

Amber-ji,
I am unable to connect to those two links. I get the error message "Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage" (for about 2 days now). I suspect the problem might be with the server at http://www.wtwc.energy.gov. Could you please reconfirm that the URLs given are correct? Is there any other way by which I can access those articles?

Thank you.

Amber G. · Post by **Amber G.** » 19 Mar 2011 08:11

^^^ I just tried it and can reach both the links. (By just clicking the above)
(I don't know why you are mentioning "http://www.wtwc.energy.gov" the www.etec...)
Hth

Amber G. · Post by **Amber G.** » 19 Mar 2011 08:15

Nuclear power: Why the panic?

Suppose that a giant hydro dam had crumbled under the impact of the biggest earthquake in a century and sent a wave of water racing down some valley in northern Japan. Imagine that whole villages and towns had been swept away, and that ten thousand people were killed — an even worse death toll than that caused by the tsunami that hit the coastal towns.

Would there be a great outcry worldwide, demanding that reservoirs be drained and hydro dams shut down? Of course not. ..
<snip>
Okay, another thought experiment. Suppose that three big nuclear power reactors were damaged in that same monster earthquake, leading to concerns about a meltdown and a massive release of radiation — a new Chernobyl. Everybody within a 20-kilometre radius of the plant was evacuated, but in the end there were only minor leakages of radiation, and nobody was killed....
<snip>

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Mar 2011 08:57

The nuclear takeaway

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/The-n ... ay/764523/

Amber G. · Post by **Amber G.** » 19 Mar 2011 08:58

WSJ roundup ..
What They Said: Nuclear Lessons India Can Learn From Japan

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Mar 2011 09:02

The Future of Nuclear Power (Video)

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11551

'Our N-reactors have many safety features'

http://www.hindustantimes.com/Our-N-rea ... 75172.aspx

Amber G. · Post by **Amber G.** » 19 Mar 2011 09:10

abhishek_sharma wrote:The nuclear takeaway

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/The-n ... ay/764523/

Seems there may be few errors;
eg

there has been only one incident of level 5 in the INES scale, the Three-Mile island case, ..... What’s more, there had been no other nuclear accident above level 2 so far... with the exception of the current Japanese case. The IAEA terms events at levels 1-3 “incidents”

This is not correct, apart from Chernobyl (level 7) , there have been level 6 (Kyshtym disaster at Mayak) and quite other 5 (othan TMI) (one each In Canada, UK and Brazil in addition to Japan) and many level 4 and 3 etc,,,

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Mar 2011 10:07

Backgrounder: Nuclear Power Expansion Challenges

http://www.cfr.org/united-states/nuclea ... ges/p16886

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 19 Mar 2011 10:11

^^^

Amber G. wrote:This is not correct, apart from Chernobyl (level 7) , there have been level 6 (Kyshtym disaster at Mayak) and quite other 5 (othan TMI) (one each In Canada, UK and Brazil in addition to Japan) and many level 4 and 3 etc

I think he was referring to nuclear power plants...A lot of the "incidents"/accidents, Kyshtym included were on military sites, not power plants...

But a consensus that is emerging out of the whole Fukushima incident till now is that even a 40 year old design was robust enough to withstand an earthquake 2-3 times its design capacity...The issue was only with the Tsunami which knocked out of the active cooling systems....Even then, there was enough slack in the design to allow workers to keep addressing the problem at the plant site and even work out alternative measures (like flooding the reactor with sea water)...

All-in-al,, if anything it is a good advert for nuke designs in general...Latest designs are likely to be even more robust...

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 19 Mar 2011 10:22

ramdas wrote:Further, regarding PRC, we are the weaker power with a larger list of economically valuable targets. Therefore, dose'nt deterrence vis a vis PRC require a larger/ higher quality arsenal than even PRC? The answer could be yes, going by your logic. But a few tens of fission nukes could destroy, say, 5-10% of PRCs industrial capacity.

Ramdas-ji, thats a very fair point, and I was wrong in ignoring that in my previous post...

The essential feature about the Indo-Pak-China equation is that it isnt linear, unlike the US-USSR equation...In the latter, there were two adversaries, and they pretty much made up the "game"....Currently, the game is too "multi-linear", if I may use that term...India needs a certain deterrence agaist Pak, and also a certain level against China...China needs a certain deterrence against India, but it also needs to maintain a certain level against Russia and a little more against the US....From a Chinese perspective, their target list therefore is a LOT more richer than India's....

The question ultimately boils down to what is the psychological threshold level of the adversary...there are tons of Cold War books on this, mostly by NPAs

...Is taking our Shanghai and Beijing enough deterrence for China? Given China's over-riding ambitions and the way econom,ies are heavily clustered around megapolises, I would tend to think so...A bomb over the Bund in Shanghai will destroy pretty much the entire financial infrastructure of China, and one over Tianenmen Square will take out the political leadership...China can of course "live on" after that, but will this be acceptable damage? I dont know for sure, no one does, but I think it would...Ditto for India as well...

This is not to argue for a circumscribed deterrence, but we need to put a perspective to the philosophy of deterrence we want to follow..

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 19 Mar 2011 12:40

Somnathji,

Vis a vis PRC the basic premise is correct: capability for a second strike causing enough damage to rule out their emergence as a superpower for the next couple of centuries will ensure deterrence.

However, you seriously underestimate the requirement for this: a couple in Shanghai + a couple in Beijing (even in Tiananmen) will be grossly insufficient. For one, the leadership will probably be in well protected bunkers. More importantly, PRC's development and infrastructure have now spread out: B. Raman reports that Gujarat (being one of our best deveoped/industrialized states) more or less matches Sichuan (one of their poorer provinces) in infrastructure, etc. So, PRC's industry is not concentrated in a few mega-cities. The same would soon be true of their financial centres, etc.

if a few weapons in key centers meant deterrence, PRC should also think the same and be satisfied with an arsenal numbering <100 ! Especially given that their warheads are TN warheads between 300kt and 5MT in yield. However, they have way more than that. What does that tell us about our requirements ? Something like 100 or fewer Hiroshima yield weapons is grossly insufficient. Only deliberate negligence on this front can lead to the decision to maintain such a puny deterrent.

P.S: Jaswant Singh has said on record that our arsenal is only 50-60 warheads. How much should this number quoted in parliament be trusted ? If true, this is criminal negligence on the part of GOI, corresponding to a philosophy of "naam ke vaaste" deterrence. The most minimal credible deterrence against TSP requires several times this quantity. That should be the primary focus of the nuclear program (more so than energy production, which can become the focus after the minimum deterrent is attained).

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 19 Mar 2011 15:07

http://stinet.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc ... tTRDoc.pdf

Do read this link. This gives estimates of 133 nuke.wpn. equiv. from Cirus+Dhruva as of 2000...growing at 6 per year. Even with a cirus shutdown from 2003-2008, this should imply 189 NWE by now from dedicated facilities. Not to speak of what they may have gotten from PHWRs.

Is this closer to the picture than Jaswant Singh's or other NPA estimates ?

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 19 Mar 2011 15:21

Ramdas, I think our basic position on the number of nukes India has should be "we don't know". Other than that we can simply record the claims and categorise them from the ridiculous to the sublime

... It could in fact be anything from <50 to >500...

Jaswant Singh will be the last person to disclose how many nukes we have, even if he knows exactly which I doubt he does. On the other hand, he probably knows what we are capable of doing - likely more than any of us on BR knows. What I do remember is the comment made (unwittingly?) to the media by a former COAS - IIRC Gen. Padmanabhan - after he retired that he was astounded when certain capabilities were revealed to him in the final days before his retirement or just after ... That story was in the media for only a day or two before it "disappeared"... I didn't have the foresight to save a snapshot. Don't know if anyone did.

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 19 Mar 2011 16:06

ramdas wrote:Do read this link. This gives estimates of 133 nuke.wpn. equiv. from Cirus+Dhruva as of 2000...growing at 6 per year. Even with a cirus shutdown from 2003-2008, this should imply 189 NWE by now from dedicated facilities.

Ramdas-ji, the broad numbers (on the basis of WGPu) tie-in with what George Perkovich spculated about in his book, which pre-dated this study by a couple of years...And the total numbers tie-in well enough with the other, later-dated link I had posted earlier of a certain NPA-sponsored study

...given the uncanny similarity of numbers, the essential sources may be the same

I am a little puzzled by Jaswant singh's articulation of "50-60" in Parliament...and JEM-ji, I think he does indeed have a very good idea of the number - he was part of the absolute inner circle not so long back! Was he simply "quoting" a study, specifically the recent one talking of Pak nukes being more than India's? the number doesnt sound correct by any means - and comforingly though, no one in the establishment has come out sounding worried - and there are a few whistleblowers as we know well!

Fundamentally though, I wont be surprised, or disturbed if china has more numbers of bombs than India...If they aim to achieve a minimum deterrence against the US AND Russia, their requirements go up manifold automatically...Question is whether we have enough to breach China's psychological barrier...With respect to B Raman, he isnt a great analyser of economics...Today, all economic activity centres around main urban centres...Look at Japan, Tokyo is but one major city in the country right? But the Fukushima incident with its "potential" impact on Tokyo has scared the wits out of everyone...Taking out a Beijing or Shanghai is ging to send China right back by half a century at least, even if the political leadership physically survive..

One more point..The Cold warriors in the US/USSR are used to a certain level of "transparency" in questions of strategic deterrence...Its been one of the conerstones of MAD...India, on the other hand ha run its strategic programme with an enormous amount of obfuscation and secrecy...Its part of the strategic culture, which is what gives various people not in the "know" to make speculations that conform to certain agenda...

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 19 Mar 2011 17:11

ramdas wrote:P.S: Jaswant Singh has said on record that our arsenal is only 50-60 warheads. How much should this number quoted in parliament be trusted ?

You have no data, so not much you can do. Estimating WGPu a la halfbright still does not help guesstimate what fraction of the maal has been weaponized.

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 19 Mar 2011 17:55

Guruprabhuji,

If the upper bound on the arsenal is itself puny, the deterrent is clearly inadequate. However, these estimates dont account for the possibility of RGPu being weaponized. Hence, the ambiguity.

Somnathji,

Beijing+Shanghai <10% of PRCs GDP. Their destruction will be very painful, but will certainly not set PRC back by 50 years. Further, they are large cities, whose destruction requires much more than a handful of warheads. Fukushima,while tragic, is more about hype than actual large scale damage if one views things from an overall national perspective.

All in all, if the NPA estimates are true and no further buildup is occurring, the deterrent has some credibility against TSP (but a level of credibility that diminishes as TSP's arsenal increases) and virtually no credibility against PRC. In short, the reluctance to build national power that has plagued us since 1947 still plagues us.......given how we tend to imagine that miniscule retaliatory damage to TSP's or PRC's aggression is sufficient.

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 19 Mar 2011 18:06

A point on the nuke deal with the US...During the debate,a lot of people said that BJP's opposition was hypocritical and they were as much on board as the congress...Wikileaks seems to confirm that..

http://news.outlookindia.com/item.aspx?715635

I dont take it negatively at all...It was a deal that was good for India...And the fierce debate within India enabled the govt get a better bargain using the "national consensus public opinion" levers....But maybe BJP overplayed its hand towards the end - it would have been even better for India's democracy if finally at the end the two major parties got toegther and said - this format is good, and we are in it together....

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 19 Mar 2011 18:40

ramdas wrote:If the upper bound on the arsenal is itself puny, the deterrent is clearly inadequate.

you have no data, so you have no meaningful upper bound. your worries don't make it "puny"

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 19 Mar 2011 20:42

Guruprabhu,

I certainly used the qualifier "if"....

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 19 Mar 2011 22:19

ramdas wrote:Guruprabhu,

I certainly used the qualifier "if"....

Boss, the usage of "if" seemed rhetorical. But, if you say that you meant it to be conditional/speculative, then fine. I suggest that we read the remainder of your post as speculative as well, especially sentences starting with "If the NPA ..." etc. We should not, even unwittingly, convey the impression on BRF that any of us has a rat's ass idea of the size of the nuke arsenal.

ramdas · Post by **ramdas** » 19 Mar 2011 22:34

None of us would have a clear idea about the size of the arsenal (in terms of warheads/ delivery systems produced). It should however , be pointed out that total opacity has its disadvantages: what I am saying is that the possibility that the arsenal is smaller than or equal to the numbers the NPA quote should be clearly ruled out.

Going by what someone like APJ Abdul Kalam himself has foreseen for the 2020+ timeframe, the deterrent is likely to be quite robust by then: provided we do not succumb to any form of arms control (CTBT/FMCT) or any written or unwritten policy of restraint in developing the deterrent in the mean time. Other steps like regular operational testing of long range ballistic missiles (beyond the basic development testing) also go a long way in adding to the credibility of the deterrent.

Regarding arms control, our position should be uncompromising. CTBT can be considered only after conducting a new series of tests that decisively confirm (in the eyes of our scientific establishment , current as well as retired) our ability to field reliable thermonuclear weapons. FMCT should be completely unacceptable for the next several decades, though we can make a superficial show of participating in negotiations towards an FMCT as per our commitments under the nuclear deal.

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 19 Mar 2011 22:42

ramdas wrote:It should however , be pointed out that total opacity has its disadvantages: what I am saying is that the possibility that the arsenal is smaller than or equal to the numbers the NPA quote should be clearly ruled out.

Ramdas-ji, 100% with you on this point...We have carried forward this tradition of opacity a bit too much in the strategic sphere..It is counterproductive for weapons that theoreticaly are "not for use"...There needs to be greater transparency on our arsenal, our objectives etc so that adversaries are well informed and as a result, sufficiently deterred as well..It also prevents a debilitating arms racce of the sort that happened between US and USSR...

GuruPrabhu · Post by **GuruPrabhu** » 19 Mar 2011 22:56

All this opacity stuff is causing angst to you two. However, what makes you think that it is universally opaque? What if a "dossier" of capabilities has been handed over to the 7 other nuke states? Why do we assume that deterrence happens in the full glare of media spotlight and public curiosity?

Especially in India, why would anyone sane wish to discuss strategy openly? We, after all, are known as argumentative Indians

krisna · Post by **krisna** » 20 Mar 2011 03:48

Thorium catches world's eye post Japanese nuke disaster

India is considered as the world leader in thorium. The Kakrapar-1 reactor located near Surat in Gujarat is the world's first reactor which uses thorium than depleted uranium for vital power generation. Compated to uranium, thorium has less fissile. The nuclear physicists are now looking at thorium as the safer model.
Ian Hore-Lacy from World Nuclear Association said, "India is the only country in the world that develops thorium fuel cycle. The expertise in India is world class and it is applied very rigorously to the safety of nuclear plants in India."

Pioneering Indian technology using thorium rather than uranium generated new interest around the world. Thorium is considered less efficient but certainly is much safer. In the light of what has happened in Japan, critics are less inclined to dismiss thorium than they were before.

Does a Different Nuclear Power Lie Ahead?

Might the Fukushima accident eventually create a chance for the nuclear industry to "reboot"? In recent years some have begun to argue that solid-fuel uranium reactors like the ones in Japan are an outdated technology that deserves to peter out and be replaced by an entirely different kind of nuclear energy that will be both safer and cheaper.

Thorium has lots of advantages as a nuclear fuel. There is four times as much of it as uranium; it is more easily handled and processed; it "breeds" its own fuel by creating uranium 233 continuously and can produce about 90 times as much energy from the same quantity of fuel; its reactions produce no plutonium or other bomb-making raw material; and it generates much less waste, with a much shorter half life until it becomes safe, so the waste can be stored for centuries rather than millennia.

A thorium reactor needs neutrons, and both ways of supplying these subatomic particles are relatively safe. They can be introduced with a particle accelerator, which can be turned off if danger threatens. Or they can be introduced with uranium 235, which in this process has a much lower risk of an uncontrolled reaction than it does in today's nuclear plants. The fuel cannot melt down in a thorium reactor because it is already molten, and reactions slow down as it cools. A further advantage of this design is that the gas xenon is able to bubble out of the liquid fuel rather than—as in normal reactors—staying in the fuel rods and slowly poisoning the reaction.

Nobody knows if thorium reactors can compete on price with coal and gas. India has been working on thorium for some years, but the technology is as different from today's nuclear power as gas is from coal, and very few nuclear engineers even hear about liquid fuel during their training, let alone get to work on it.

India's experimental Thorium Fuel Cycle Nuclear Reactor [NDTV Report]

Amber G. · Post by **Amber G.** » 20 Mar 2011 07:18

Could 'Chernobyl’ scaremongers cost our nuclear future?

Hiten · Post by **Hiten** » 20 Mar 2011 07:26

interview with Dr. Srikumar Banerjee

http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/walk-t ... jee/193840

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 20 Mar 2011 08:14

^^ watch out if you don't have active protection. The NDTV has a trojan:

Trojan.Win32.FakeAv.awrp (v)

chaanakya · Post by **chaanakya** » 20 Mar 2011 10:00

Massive uranium deposits found in Andhra Pradesh

Potentiality of the area is huge; it will be one of the top 20 of the world's reserves: Atomic Minerals Directorate

Huge deposits of natural uranium, which promise to be one of the top 20 of the world's reserves, have been found in the Tummalapalle belt in the southern part of the Kadapa basin in Andhra Pradesh.

The Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research (AMD), which explores uranium in the country, has so far discovered 44,000 tonnes of natural uranium (U3O8) in just 15 line km of the 160-km long belt.

P.B. Maithani, Director, AMD, is confident that “the potentiality of the area is huge” and that it will be “one of the top 20 of the world's deposits where more than 60,000 tonnes of uranium is available.” He is sure that the uranium deposits will occur over the entire length of 160 km of the Tummalapalle belt with a “depth consistency” of about 400 metres. The uranium resources found so far can sustain a generation of 5,000 MWe of nuclear power.

Srikumar Banerjee, Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission, described the discovery as “very large although it is not a rich ore.” He added that “there is a possibility of further extension” of the ore on either side of Tummalapalle. About 4,000 tonnes of uranium deposits have also been found at Gogi in Gulbarga district of Karnataka. “Gogi is not a large deposit but it is a rich ore,” said Dr. Banerjee.

The Uranium Corporation of India Limited (UCIL), meanwhile, is pressing ahead with the commissioning of a mine at Tummalapalle. It will have a state-of-the-art decline in a few months. A mill to process the uranium into yellow cake will start production at Tummalapalle next year. The yellow cake is converted into fuel bundles and fed into the nuclear power reactor. Both the AMD and the UCIL belong to the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE).

Mr. Maithani said: “The continuity and tonnage of the Tummalapalle deposits is very high although the grade is medium.” The AMD earlier worked in the area and found more than 14,000 tonnes of U3O8. After developing the leachability of the natural uranium ore and tackling other issues, the AMD started drilling again in the area. “We expect that the continuity will be there up to 160 km. There may be some barren sites in between. But geologically, they are the same — the same rock is above and below the ground,” he said. He was sure the belt would yield more than 60,000 tonnes of U3O8. He called Tummalapalle “a special type of occurrence and you don't get this in any other part of the world. It is strata-bound.”

“The nuclear energy programme of the country can be definitely tailored as per the availability of resources we have seen so far in just two blocks – Tummalapalle and Kanampalle. But there is a continuation at Motuntulapalle, Muthanapalle, Rachakuntapalle and so on. These are situated adjacent to Tummalapalle blocks. We are confident that sizeable resources can be added from this area,” said Mr. Maithani.

The AMD earlier found uranium deposits in Nalgonda district and it was confident that it could locate reserves in the adjoining Guntur district, where its men were working now.

About 4,000 tonnes of U3O8 deposits were discovered in the Bhima basin at Gogi in Karnataka. Gradewise, the Gogi ore was richer than the Tummalapalle ore but it did not continue over a long distance. “But we may get a number of Gogis with similar fracture/fault-controlled uranium-mineralisation setup in the nearby areas,” Mr. Maithani said.

“Fracture-controlled mineralisation of uranium has been found at Rohil in Sikar district in Rajasthan and the grade of the ore is similar to that of the Gogi ore. The Rohil belt is 130 km long and there is continuity of occurrence of uranium ore. The Rohil belt may yield between 5,000 tonnes and 10,000 tonnes of uranium,” he said.

In Meghalaya, about 10,000 tonnes (at Domiasiat) and 8,000 tonnes (Wakhyn) of deposits were discovered several years ago. But the UCIL was unable to mine them because of socio-economic problems, said S.K. Mathur, Scientific Officer, AMD.

India has 19 operating Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWRs) that use natural uranium as fuel. It is building more PHWRs of 700 MWe capacity each.

U308 is uranium oxide , requires enrichment to 3-5% U235 before being used as fuel.