The Hyde Act Indo-US
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The Hyde Act Indo-US

Posted By subhashjoshi on Wed, 22/08/2007 - 13:49 in

Everywhere the hot topic today is the Indo-US relationship based on the position to be taken with respect to India’s nuclear capabilities in the eyes of USA. Even America is divided in this aspect with the Congress pushing Bush to one side of the wall while the business houses with surplus of enriched nuclear fuel looking at India as a business opportunity.

In brief the Hyde Act puts the following conditions on India:

  1. Full Co-operation denied to India in civilian nuclear energy (the use of nuclear materials like Uranium in Power plants)
  2. India to participate and support in the international congruence on nuclear non-proliferation with a policy bending towards America's interests, especially for countries like Iraq, Cuba, Libya etc. This is a direct threat to our independence in foreign policies.
  3. The NPT (Nuclear non-proliferation treaty) will have a direct impact on our Strategic Defence Programs

In spite of the stringent conditions and objectionable clauses above our PM and other congress leaders have been going on repeating that there is no threat to our Nuclear Programs which is misleading.

There has been direct objections to the Hyde agreement from the top nuclear scientists of the country.

The signatories include, Mr. HN Sethna (former Chairman – Atomic Energy Commission), M.R Srinivasan (former Chairman – Atomic Energy Commission), PK Iyengar (former Chairman – Atomic Energy Commission), A Gopalakrishnan (former Chairman – Atomic Energy Regulatory Board), AN Prasad (former Director, Bhabha Atomic Research Center), YSR Prasad (former CMD Nuclear Power Corporation of India), Placid Rodriguez (former Director, Indira Gandhi Atomic Research Center)

The 123 agreement has come about after vested business interests within USA have pushed the Bush administration. The 123 is more like a smokescreen to the Hyde Act with a tag that “American administration is more concerned about maintaining better relations with India than with its Congress”. The 123 is more like a trade agreement which almost forces India to buy nuclear materials only from USA or their certified countries.

 

The clauses in 123 agreements include

  1. Supply Assurances
  2. Reprocessing
  3. Non-hindrance
  4. Fall back Safeguards (giving them rights to visit our nuclear sites)
  5. Nuclear trade & by-products

The important articles of the 123 agreement talk about:

Article 3: Civil nuclear cooperation with respect to reactors & life time supply of nuclear fuel.
Article 5: USA will not provide with enrichment, reprocessing or heavy water technology(which India anyway already possesses), however they say they are open to future negotiation for these items. They have included a clause to supply nuclear fuel for the lifetime of the reactors (installed capacity for power production) as fuel reserves & in case of shortfall they will allow supply from their approved countries.
Article 6: USA is agreeable to reprocessing of spent fuel(which is usually for military purpose) but under their watchful eyes only through a National Processing Facility.
Article 9: India will not be allowed to use the spent fuel for military purposes.

At present only 10% of country’s power generation is nuclear, so how big an impact this deal can have on India is debatable. The nuclear dependence for power is expected to reach to about 20% by 2020 which is a long way off. However with hostile Nuclear power capable counties surrounding us and supported by America, Americans are trying to cut our wings with these treaties and at the same time safe guarding its business interest.

With erratic monsoons the hydro projects suffer & thereby we continue to fall way behind the Power needs of our country. So alternate resources like gas, nuclear materials are part of our future plans to meet the power shortage.

USA has a surplus of enriched Uranium and India has a great shortage of enriched Uranium for our breeder reactors. The business houses in USA see this as a great opportunity to make good business with India and God knows if this deal goes through how many palms would get greased at the exchequer’s expense with a great dent to India’s long term Nuclear plan. The worst part of the deal here is the selfishness of the bureaucrats and politicians who do not have the best interests of the country in their minds.

Indian scientists have been repeatedly pushing the govt. for funding for Thorium based fast breeder reactors. India has enough thorium reserves to light-up the country for the next 1000 years and a great potential for exports. But owing to international vested interests and corrupt officials and politicians there is a go slow on thorium based research……

Read on…………….

India is power starved, 80% of population lives in rural areas and 60% depend on agriculture. These agriculturists are moving to the cities owing to poor returns in farming, poverty & a very low standard of living in villages thereby squeezing the cities infrastructure & artificially inflating prices of essentials.

The lack of power, water shortage and the potential to pull millions out of poverty within a span of a generation are the motivation of development of Thorium based fast breeder reactors. With little need for the expensive uranium that we import under severe restrictions we can improve our foreign reserves by billions of dollars.

Initial data on these reactors suggest that with Thorium it is possible to build small self-contained fast breeder reactors of 10-15 feet wide, 45-50 feet high and weighing under 200 tons. Since the technology is self-contained (unlike the current Uranium based reactors), it would be completely sealed with enough fuel to generate uninterrupted power for 3 decades. There will be no downtime as no refueling would be involved. Such a uranium based reactor is already under test in National Laboratory of North California.

One Pound of non-fissible Thorium can produce One Pound of fissible uranium and energy equivalent to 1500 tons of coal. After the life of the reactor there is no need of dismantling, it can simply be sealed and buried to avoid any future radiation scare. The concept used with these reactors will be called “Sealed for Life”.

The economic benefit of these small reactors would be
  • Reasonably small infrastructure.
  • Power output and size of reactor can be commensurate with the size of the target population which could be a group of villages.
  • Employment generation for local population and entrepreneurship opportunities for the local population since a project like this can create lots of parallel jobs and business.
  • Transmission loss will be negligible as the power generated will be consumed locally.
  • Lower cost of power production would mean lower subsidy for farmers, quality and uninterrupted supply, almost nil pilferage & surplus water for agricultural & drinking purposes.
  • If uninterrupted power is available and land is also available at a reasonable rate then lots of industries would move-in leading to distributed industrialisation across the country running parallel to agriculture. This would also move back the exploding population back to their roots therby setting a uniform economy across the country.
  • Availability of uninterrupted & cheap power will bring in better power dependent agricultural methods therby improving quality n quantity for the farmers.
  • The population in rural areas can continue to maintain their way of life, traditions, and environment and at the same time enjoy a better standard of living.
  • Even if one such installation is done successfully then within the next 2 decades India would be self sufficient in Power and indirectly have surplus water as well.
  • This will ensure that villages reach city standards in living with high returns in agriculture & no more exodus of people moving to cities thereby artificially inflating land prices.
Since land, power & water form the backbone of any countries infrastructure development including agriculture a solution to such a problem could put India right up the ladder and the think tanks in the USA precisely know this and don’t want it to happen.

Instead of arguing and debating about The Hyde Act & the 123 Agreements, if the govt. concentrates and listens to its nuclear experts with a bold, selfless and open mind there could be a solution to poverty eradication in this country……So lets hope that the first stones are laid in this direction in this 60th year of our Independent India……….