Alternate, not nuclear, energy should be government’s focus: experts

Karachi
Instead of investing in expensive nuclear power plants, the government should be working to develop sources of renewable energy, advised a panel of experts at a consultation held on Sunday in preparation for a public hearing over the environmental impact of the nuclear plants proposed for the city’s coast.
The panel comprised physicists, engineers, architects and economists who refuted the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission’s (PAEC) claims that the proposed nuclear plants would prove to be an economical source of electricity.
They suggested that the government would be better off asking China to invest in solar and wind power generation.
The event titled ‘Proposed Karachi Nuclear Power Plants: Preparing for the Environmental Impact Assessment and Public Hearing’ was organised jointly by the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research and the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum.
Physicist Dr AH Nayyar urged residents to attend the public hearing to be held by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on the Sindh High Court’s orders.
He pointed out that it was the first time the EPA was conducting a public hearing on the feasibility of nuclear power plants and highlighted the need to sensitise local communities, especially fishermen, about the dangers of radiation.
Nayyar said the government was setting up K2 and K3 along Karachi’s coast without carrying out the mandatory environmental impact assessment.
He said that though the high court had asked the government to arrange a public hearing in this regard, the EPA document should also be made available for the general public before the hearing.
He claimed that the government had recently outsourced the task of conducting an environmental impact assessment and stressed the need for upgrading the EPA to international standards.
According to Nayyar, the chief concerns regarding the power plants were about storage and disposal of nuclear fuel and demanded that the process be clearly defined in the upcoming environmental assessment report.
“Moreover, decommissioning a nuclear power plant is also quite difficult,” he said. “The cost is almost equal to that of building one.”
Earlier, said Nayyar, when some other concerned citizens had approached the court against the establishment of these nuclear power plants, the PAEC had confessed that the environmental impact assessment of the project had been compromised and was not performed in accordance with law.
The EPA had prepared the feasibility report without conducting a public hearing over the subject.
Roland de Souza of Shehri-CBE shared his experience of raising public awareness regarding development projects.
He said most people were not interested in participating in public hearings for the environmental impact assessment even when they are the ones affected in consequence.
Citing a World Bank report of 2006, he said that ecological degradation was occurring in Pakistan at a rate of six percent per annum, the same as its economic growth rate.
“Today Pakistan is actually walking backwards because GDP growth is less than four percent, but environmental degradation is much higher.”
He added that the costs of environmental risks were also not being included in the cost of power production.
Architect Arif Belgaumi explained the history of earthquakes in Karachi. According to him, the 1945 earthquake which measured 8.1 on the Richter scale was centred around 250 to 350 kilometres west of the city.
Khurram Hussain, an economist, spoke about the short and long term financial impact in case of a nuclear disaster in Karachi.