Dictators love nuclear power

December 19, 2010
Malaysian Insider

I am not at all surprised that the Barisan Nasional government has decided to build a nuclear power plant. After all, despite what environmentalists might like to think, the primary case against nuclear power has always been its economics.

When you take into account the lifecycle cost of nuclear power — from feasibility to construction to operation and, finally, decommissioning — it is the most expensive conventional method of producing electricity.

Add to that the inherent risks of nuclear reactors, plus the still unresolved question of what to do with spent fuel, and it is no surprise that the nuclear power industry has seen some very tough times in the past three decades.

Over the past few years, however, high prices of oil, gas and coal, coupled with concerns with carbon dioxide and global warming, have given nuclear advocates a new lease of life. Under current conditions, provided we are prepared to ignore the safety and environmental contamination issues, it is possible to make a conceivable economic argument for nuclear power.

Nuclear power requires tremendous up-front investment followed by relatively low operating costs. Thus all you have to do is assume an unrealistically low interest rate and continually high prices for fossil fuels. Project these assumptions over decades and you can show that nuclear energy is less expensive than using fossil fuels. However, you must carefully avoid all comparisons of nuclear with renewable energy — hydro, wind, solar and biomass — which are undoubtedly superior in terms of economics, safety and environmental protection.

Paradoxically, the characteristics of nuclear power so feared by its critics — enormous capital cost, open-ended escalation clauses and the oligopolistic nature of the industry — makes it a very attractive proposition for corrupt practices, provided you can ride roughshod over the opposition. This is exactly what happened in the Philippines, more than three decades ago.

Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP)

The story of BNPP, Southeast Asia’s first and only nuclear power plant, illustrates some of the points above perfectly. In 1971, Ferdinand Marcos decided to build a nuclear power plant for the Philippines. However, at that time he was still the democratically-elected president and was unable to convince his people of the need to go nuclear.

By 1973, conditions were in place for him to push through his choice. The opposition had been eliminated by his declaration of martial law in 1972 and the quadrupling of oil prices because of the Arab oil embargo during the Yom Kippur war of 1973, made nuclear easier to sell to the public.

The tragic tale of BNPP has been carefully and comprehensively documented by the conservative business magazine, Fortune, in a remarkable 1986 article entitled “The $2.2 billion Nuclear Fiasco”. Initially Marcos delegated the responsibility for the plant to the National Power Co, the government-owned electric utility, which began negotiating for the supply of two 600MW nuclear plants from General Electric. By 1974 negotiations were more or less complete, with GE offering to supply two 620 megawatt reactors for US$650 million (RM2 billion at prevailing rates).

Westinghouse was late to the game and decided to leapfrog GE by dealing personally with Marcos. Westinghouse appointed Herminio Disini, a golfing buddy of Marcos whose wife was a cousin of Imelda Marcos, as its agent and he was able to arrange for the latecomer to present its pitch directly to Marcos and his cabinet at Malacanang Palace. After the meeting Marcos directed National Power to stop negotiating with GE and deal only with Westinghouse.

In 1976, after many rounds of fruitless negotiations and interference from Marcos, National Power announced that Westinghouse would build the BNPP, with one 626MW reactor, for US$722 million. The intervention of Marcos meant that the Philippine people had to pay a higher price for half the power! In addition, Disini, although he had no prior experience in construction, formed a new company which was awarded major BNPP subcontracts by Westinghouse.


Volcano and earthquake zone

Although the site was contentious, work began quickly, even before seismic and other on-site tests by the government regulator, the Philippines Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), were completed. Just 100km from Manila, BNPP sits on Mount Natib, a dormant volcano and within 40km of three geologic faults.

Alarmed by these facts PAEC called the International Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA) for help. In 1978, two years after construction had commenced, the IAEA concluded that the volcanic and earthquake risks were “improperly addressed” and recommended that construction be stopped until more tests were done.

The PAEC chairman, Librado Ibe, was under tremendous pressure to ignore the IAEA report and issue a construction permit for work on the reactor itself to commence. Unable to resist any further, Ibe signed the permit in April 1979 and, four days later, emigrated with his family to the United States. Ibe explained to Fortune Magazine that he felt it was unsafe to resist Marcos’s lieutenants any longer.

A few months later Marcos himself halted construction because Filipino opposition to BNPP has grown substantially after the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, US. Marcos appointed a new ad hoc commission to study the plant and they concluded that it was unsafe and would have to be modified to meet new US safety standards.

After two further years of haggling, Westinghouse agreed to upgrade the design, at an additional cost of US$700 million. By then the total cost of BNPP had risen to USD$1.8 billion.

Westinghouse rushed to complete BNPP amid growing opposition from Filipino activists. Construction was completed in January 1985 and BNPP was handed over to National Power. Westinghouse collected its money and the last construction worker left in May 1985.


Not a single watt

However, the plant was in no state to be fuelled. Inspections found more than 4,000 faults arising from poor quality control by the main sub-contractors, Disini’s company, and another controlled by a brother of Imelda Marcos. The main problems were attributed to poor welding, faulty pipe support brackets, substandard valve installations and leaking underground conduits and vaults.

In 1986, Marcos was overthrown in the People Power Revolution. Marcos and his family fled to Hawaii while Disini bolted to his villa in Vienna, where he apparently still stays.

Subsequent investigations by Corazon Aquino’s government found evidence of massive commissions paid by Westinghouse to Disini, which he shared with Marcos. The new government attempted to sue Westinghouse for corruption and restitution for faulty construction. In 1996 Westinghouse agreed to pay the Philippines government US$100 million in an out-of-court settlement.

Further studies have indicated it would cost an additional US$1 billion to correct all the defects in design and construction. Rather than throw good money after bad, the Philippines government decided to mothball the plant.

BNPP has been scrupulously maintained for more than 25 years, costing millions of dollars per year. It has not produced a single watt of electricity. The final price rose to US$2.2 billion, three times higher than the original estimate, and the final instalment was paid by the Filipino people in 2007, thirty-two years after construction commenced.

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December 19, 2010
Malaysia to rollout two nuclear power plants by 2012

KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysia plans to build two nuclear power plants that will generate 1,000MW each with the first plant ready for operation in 2021 and the second plant a year later, as part of the overall long-term plan to balance energy supply.

Energy, Green Technology and Water Minister Datuk Seri Peter Chin said the government would engage an international consultant to evaluate the location and requirement for such plants to be built.

Meanwhile, more awareness and education programmes will be carried out to inform people on such a need.

“Hopefully, by 2013 or 2014, we will able to finish evaluating this. As for calling of tenders, we hope it will be done by 2016,” he told Bernama in an interview.

He said Malaysia was heavily reliant on gas and coal for its electricity supply and it was government policy to reduce reliance on fossil fuel. Gas accounted for 64 per cent of the country’s energy generation while the remainder came from coal.

“We must get away from this. (It is) very much imbalance. Most countries have a good balance. We want hydro to assume a prominent role as it is clean but this can only be achieved in Sabah and Sarawak where there is much potential but not in Peninsular Malaysia,” he said.

Besides, Chin said, other sources of energy such as biomass and wind were too minimal while solar was a good potential but the technology was still very expensive.

“Biomass and wind, there is nothing to shout about. Unless and until solar renewable becomes big enough, this type of energy just compliments (what you already have) as you can’t generate much due to its high cost,” he added.

Chin also said the government needed a balanced approach when it comes to renewal energy as it would not want tariffs to go up due to higher cost.

“Everyone wants to say that we want renewables but what about cost? Can we force the people to accept high tariffs? We have to look at a balanced way, that’s why we can’t depend on fossil fuel only,” he said.

Chin added nuclear has become a more prominent choice in balancing the energy source due to lower maintenance cost and lower tariffs in the long-run.

“For example, in Abu Dhabi, they are building huge solar energy plants but [were] at the same time balancing it up with a nuclear plant. They are not just concentrating on fossil fuel,” he said.

Malaysia began operating a 1MW Triga research reactor since 1982 and has an international nuclear safeguards agreement in place since 1972.

Recently, Malaysia also tightened export control laws to thwart the possibility of nuclear technology smuggling. — Bernama

Blast from the future

Evil comes from humans, never from nature. Unless human beings, especially those in power, wake up to this reality, the future of planet Earth and its inhabitants will remain balanced on the sharp edge of the knife - Stanley Koh

Thu, 03 Jun 2010
By Stanley Koh

“A gleaming explosion will transform the Earth into a glowing white cloud of gas in less that five one-hundredths of a second, while the chain reaction will run into free space with the speed of light to transform everything into gas and destroy it through exploding and burning up.

“Everything that will be pulled into the gleaming mass will fall into destruction with the speed of light and vaporize without the possibility of stopping.”

Thus writes Eduard Meier in his book Existing Life in the Universe (1978). It is his hypothetical description of a nuclear-triggered holocaust, a grotesque scenario of unimaginable devastation in which millions of human beings perish within seconds.

The threat of a global nuclear war hangs like the sword of Damocles over mankind.

“It is important to remember that while the world is concerned over the impact of global warming, starvation in too many countries, worldwide pandemics and threats of terrorism or biological weapon attacks, only nuclear weapons have the capacity to obliterate entire cities with one bomb and entire countries in massive nuclear exchanges, and perhaps destroy most life on earth,” said John D Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World a paper he presented recently at an international conference on US foreign policy held in Kuala Lumpur.

Albert Einstein was one of the most brilliant and wisest men who ever lived. After the invention of the atomic bomb, he said, “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything, save our modes of thinking. And we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophes.”

Isaacs said that before the election of Barack Obama, hawkish president George Bush was promoting a policy that made nuclear weapons a central tenet of American national security and acted not only to preserve thousands of nuclear warheads, but would have built a new generation of nuclear weapons.

“Fortunately Congress denied funding this,” he said.

“Sixty-five years after the dawn of the atomic age and despite many international negotiations to deal with the problem of nuclear weapons, there remain an estimated 23,000 nuclear weapons held by nine nuclear powers.”

The United States and Russia own more than ninety per cent of the 23,000 atomic bombs, most much larger than those that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

Isaacs, who has devoted most of his life to stopping the nuclear arms race, said our planet still faced the threat of nuclear destruction although the Cold War ended 20 years ago.

The risks and fear of a nuclear attack by warring nations or by terrorists are a global problem.

No escape for anyone

Isaacs said a Malaysian journalist recently asked him why Malaysia should care about this issue. “Isn’t the nuclear threat a problem for the United States and not here?”

Many Malaysians would probably harbour the same sentiment.

In answer, Isaacs quoted former US Senator Sam Nunn, who said:

“If you were trying to draw a circle to mark the overall impact of the blast—in social, economic and security terms—the circle would be the equator itself.

“No part of the planet would escape the impact.”

Even if a relatively minor nuclear explosion occurs, life would change drastically because people everywhere would fear another, perhaps stronger, blast. Travel, international trade, capital flows, commerce would initially stop, and many freedoms we come to take for granted would quickly be eroded in the name of security.

According to Isaacs’ paper, Malaysia had played a positive role in trying to prevent such a disaster. It has passed a law aimed at blocking illicit nuclear trade by countries such as Iran, Pakistan and North Korea.

There were indications of danger in 2003 and 2004 when it was reported that smugglers had used Malaysia as a transhipment point to ferry parts useful in making nuclear bombs.

The offending shipping container bore the label of a Malaysian company, but Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak has said the government was not involved.

“Malaysia is committed towards ensuring that nuclear materials and technologies do not fall into the wrong hands,” Najib said recently in address at the Nuclear Security Summit held in April and attended by the leaders of 47 countries.

On the part of the US, Obama has been forthright about the dangers of nuclear weapons.

“I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.

“As the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United States has a moral responsibility to act. We cannot succeed in this endeavour alone, but we can lead it, we can start it,” Obama said in April last year.

Evil comes from humans

However, the going will not be easy for the Obama administration.

“The North Korean nuclear challenge, along with the Iranian nuclear issue, is going to be a litmus test for the Obama administration’s determination and capacity in realizing the objectives of non-proliferation (of nuclear weapons),” said Professor Choi Kang, director general for American Studies of the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security (IFANS) in Seoul.

Nevertheless, a nuclear holocaust is not the only threat against a world that is already overpopulated.

The likelihood of a runaway global warning getting worse and the probability of regular “super” storms, human exploitative activities inclining toward desertification, massive floods, more frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and the melting of glaciers are just some of the threats brought on by human stupidity and the selfish use of the earth’s resources.

Evil comes from humans, never from nature. Unless human beings, especially those in power, wake up to this reality, the future of planet Earth and its inhabitants will remain balanced on the sharp edge of the knife.

Stanley Koh is a Free Malaysia Today contributor

Bolehland into Nuclear Energy?

This is my biggest worry when Bolehland wanted to follow every dicks in this region to have a nuclear power plant. When government officials are half-past-six, built building that collapsed, with roof that leaks, poor maintainance cultures, corruptions, and whatnot. Answer me, can you trust them to do a good job of safe keeping the nuclear plant?


May 5, 2010 MYT 4:21:28 PM
Govt's nuclear energy plan draws flak
Star

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian environmentalists and Opposition leaders on Wednesday slammed the Government's plan to build a nuclear power plant, calling it a risky venture and saying the country has sufficient energy output to meet future needs.

Energy Minister Peter Chin announced Tuesday that the Government had approved, in principle, a nuclear plant which would start operating from 2021, as an efficient and cost-effective means to fuel economic growth.

Malaysia will join neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam, which have unveiled plans to operate their first nuclear power plants by 2020, while Indonesia plans to build its own on Java island by 2015.

The opposition DAP said there was no need for nuclear power because Malaysia has a 40% energy reserve margin, double the Government's target of 20% reserves. Malaysia's power usage now stands at 14,000 megawatts, out of a total capacity of 23,000 megawatts.

In addition, it said, several large hydroelectric dams are being built on Borneo island to cater to future demands.

"Clearly, Malaysia has more energy than it needs ... why then does Malaysia need a nuclear power plant?" DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said in a statement.

He also expressed concerns for safety and the environment, citing the 1986 Chernobyl reactor explosion that sent a cloud of radiation over much of Europe and left some two million people ill.

Malaysian officials maintain the plan is crucial for the country's long-term energy security in view of a growing population and future economic expansion, but say they will conduct feasibility studies before deciding whether to proceed.

Malaysia uses coal and natural gas to generate most of its electricity supply, and the Government has repeatedly warned the cost of relying on both commodities is expected to spiral in the decades ahead.

The Centre for Environment, Technology and Development, a local think-tank, warned that nuclear power was capital intensive and risky because it generated radioactive waste that has to be discarded.

Centre chairman Gurmit Singh said there was a lot of energy wastage in the country because gasoline, diesel and electricity were subsidised. He urged the Government to instead bolster energy efficiency and turn to other renewable sources like wind and solar power.

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, there are more than 430 nuclear power plants operating in some 30 countries worldwide, accounting for about 15% of global electricity output. - AP

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We Are Dead!
by Simon Templar
Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Wow! We are going to have a nuclear plant.

If we were still in school, this will be 'like super cool, man!'. It's 'like so futuristic'. And so advance.

But we are no longer in school. And we know the ugly truth about Malaysia. Verdict: We Are Dead!

We are talking about the very realistic Malaysia that you and me know. The Malaysia that cannot even efficiently maintain the mini Tenaga sub-stations at our housing areas. We are talking about the Malaysia who cannot provide clean water to the people even when easy and efficient technology is in use. The Malaysia who cannot even dispose off our garbage in a manner that is not harmful to the environment. The Malaysia who even with computers and technology assistance cannot get trains to arrive and depart on time.

And yet we are going to have a matha-farking nuclear plant!

I hope that the plant is built far away. Maybe Sabah or Sarawak. Sorry folks, I need the South China Sea to act as a barrier.

Hmmm... Maybe they can build it in Sabah near the coal-fired plant. If we are talking about environmental damage and loss of human life, we might as well reduce the area and bring down the headcount. Better that than everyone dying, ain't it? (I was told that it is human nature to be selfish. I was also told that I can't beat the government.)

A nuclear plant? What the...?

What the hell to we need a nuclear plant for? We are a kuchi-rat country with 28 million jokers leaving in it. How much efficient energy do we consume? How desperate is our need for such enormous amount of energy? How many energy zapping factories do we have in this country? Dude, this is no Command & Conquer. This is real life death-threatening technology we are talking about. Plus, to be managed by some dumb-wits.

I tell you, this has all got to do with blardie money again. I think UMNO has gone too far this time. The thing with UMNO is they are getting extremely greedy. They are no longer satisfied with reaping money on the smaller scale by the millions and tens of millions per project. Everything nowadays has got to benefit them in terms of hundreds of millions or billions. But to put the life of every Malaysian at risk just to satisfy their lust for money?

Eh come on lah, stop fucking around with people's lives.

Even that they want to do it on a larger scale. Previously, the Malaysian government is happy killing the people (mostly Indians it would seem) on a small scale of a couple of thousand per year. Nowadays, they are talking about killing the mass population. What's with this apa nama UMNO? They got possessed by the Satan is it? Have they gone fucking nuts?

Allow me to frighten you a little with some Chernobyl stats. Did you know that the Chernobyl disaster released 400 times more radioactive material than the Hiroshima atomic bombing? Did you know that the contamination of the Chernobyl accident was felt up to more than 1,000 km away?

Let's put that to perspective. Peninsular Malaysia from the tip of Perlis to the bottom end of Johor is approximately 750 km. Simply put it, wherever this nuclear thing is built in Peninsular Malaysia, you are fried the moment a very likely Malaysian style disaster takes place at the said plant.

You may not die if you are further away. But you will quite likely die of some kind of cancer. That's if you don't already decide to kill yourself when your nervous system involuntarily makes you shout out Rosmah's name every exact 38 seconds. And of course, be assured that your newborn baby will look very adorable with her 3 eyes and a limb sticking out of her chest.

This is so brilliant. By the way, I wage 50 bucks that by the time the plant is in operation, 20,000 folks leaving nearby would have already have taugehs growing from the top of their heads. And another 1,000 may have grown a second dick. Failed tests. Drums of radioactives 'accidentally' falling into the nearby river. Accidents of trucks ferrying radioactive materials on their way to the plant. The usual stuffs. But of course you won't read these in the papers. Shhhhh...

Malaysia is so boleh! Damn I love this country.


Note to Singaporeans: Hey, you guys are pretty nearby I last checked.

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Be afraid. Be very afraid
Wed, 26 May 2010

Imagine that Umno is still in power a dozen years from now, with a nuclear power plant under its control. That’s scary even if you delete the words following the comma. We’ll still have the ISA and other satanic laws. The police, judiciary and mainstream media will still operate as Umno bureaus. Lucrative government contracts will still go to the Umno-connected. Things will remain the same because Umno is stubbornly — and sometimes militantly — resistant to change. If an Umno apologist disputes this, then he must give an alternative explanation of why Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was kicked out.

Now restore the words we deleted. And then recall that under Umno’s watch the country lost two warplane engines to thieves and bought a submarine that couldn’t dive. Especially remember that when we were choking in the haze blown in from Sumatra and Kalimantan, the government forbade the media from publishing readings from the air pollutant index for fear of scaring away potential investors in the Malaysian economy, as if any investor would be foolish enough not to make his own measurements.

Can we expect this same government to announce a radiation leak if it happens?

Perhaps Vincent Tan would like to bet his millions on this. Many of us did not know about the radioactive waste dumps in Perak until about two weeks ago, when Tan’s good buddy spoke about it — decades after the dumping. “The place is still not safe, and we have almost one square mile that is dangerous,” said Dr Mahathir Mahathir.

It would have been distressing enough if Peter Chin, the allegedly Green Minister, had said the government was merely considering the nuclear option. But he said the government had “decided” to go nuclear. With his next breath, he rubbed radioactive plutonium into our cancer wounds. He indicated that the government was not willing to debate the matter.

But let us try to be fair to the Najib administration. It has at least chosen not to keep the decision secret. Never mind that it promised to put people — and presumably not the government — first. We shall assume that it plainly and honestly forgot that promise.

Let us stretch our fairness further and thank the government for making the announcement 11 years before activating the nuclear plant. We shall assume that it did this in order to gauge public reaction before reaching a “final decision”. Indeed, Chin has written about the decision in his blog and is entertaining comments. That’s encouraging. Or maybe that’s entertainment.

Remember the contract junkies we mentioned in the intro? They are probably already scrambling for nuclear-related businesses. Even if Najib Tun Razak decides that the critics are right and the nuclear idea is dumb and should be dumped, will he have the political will to go against those who can already see a windfall coming?