Malaysiakini: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 1.... by Dr Ronald S McCoy

Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 1

Dr Ronald S McCoy
Apr 19, 2011, 11:37am

 

 

Introduction

Since March 11, Japan has been reeling from an unprecedented natural disaster of awesome proportions, followed by a man-made nuclear crisis. First, a record-breaking earthquake, 8.9 on the Richter scale, off the north-eastern coast of the Japanese island of Honshu. Then, a towering 10-metre tsunami which killed tens of thousands of people and destroyed almost everything in its path.

Finally, the release of radioactivity into the environment from a nuclear power plant, damaged by overheating and explosions.

The earthquake had automatically shut down the six nuclear reactors of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant, owned by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco). But it also knocked out the power grid, forcing operators to fall back on diesel generators to keep coolant flowing into hot reactor cores of radioactive uranium and plutonium fuel rods.

Then the tsunami swept in, knocked out the generators and cut off power to the plant's cooling systems. All at once, four out of its six nuclear reactors were in dire trouble from overheating. Explosions then damaged fuel rods and the integrity of the primary containment structure, and radioactivity was released into the environment.

There are few environmental dangers more lasting or more fearsome than radiation from a nuclear accident. We saw this in the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl disasters, and now in Fukushima. The truth of Murphy's Law is inescapable: “If something can go wrong, sooner or later it will go wrong.”

Public health

The public health implications of nuclear power should not be subordinate to the economic considerations of the nuclear industry and government energy policies. There is a need to review the scientific evidence for public health impacts of nuclear power, to assess occupational hazards faced by nuclear industry workers, and to assess evidence that challenges the legitimacy of the underlying assumptions of nuclear safety.

A common thread running through these health concerns is the risk posed by ionising radiation. There is no safe threshold. Over the past 50 years, the claims of the nuclear industry, that nuclear power is both safe and vital for our future, have proven false and contentious.

Ionising radiation can damage DNA, causing cancer and inherited mutations. However, whether an individual develops cancer following exposure to ionising radiation depends on whether the DNA is damaged, what part of the DNA is damaged, whether the cell line can reproduce, whether the damage is completely repaired, and whether the cell completes transformations that lead to malignancy.

The most important evidence regarding risks from exposure to radiation comes from epidemiologic studies that examine incidence of cancer in exposed populations, such as children exposed to radiation in utero, people exposed to background radiation, nuclear plant workers, patients exposed to diagnostic or therapeutic radiation, and people exposed to radiation from nuclear explosions.

The risk of mutation-related damage, including cancer, is proportional to the radiation dose. There is no threshold below which ionising radiation produces no damage. This means that background radiation from any source causes cancer and genetic mutations among exposed populations.

What happens in a nuclear accident

When a reactor is operating, fuel rods containing uranium and plutonium pellets produce heat through nuclear fission and get very hot. The fuel is immersed in water and the heat produces steam, which is used to drive a turbine to produce electricity.

The water also serves to keep the fuel from overheating and is continuously circulated to carry away excess heat. Even if the reactor shuts down, the fuel will remain hot for a long time and so must still be cooled.

If the pumps that circulate the cooling water are not operating, the water will heat up and evaporate, and the fuel can be exposed to the environment. At this point, the zirconium cladding on the fuel rods will start to heat up, blister, and then rupture.

If the fuel is not covered by water and is exposed for a few hours, it will start to melt. The molten fuel will collect at the bottom of the steel reactor vessel, and it will be a matter of hours before the fuel melts through the steel and settles on the concrete floor of the primary containment vessel.

In an accident, the amount of radioactivity released into the environment will depend on the integrity of the primary and secondary containments. The radioactive isotopes of greatest concern in a nuclear accident are iodine-131 and caesium-137.

Uncertain geological knowledge

Nuclear power requires stability - political stability and geological stability. Countries considering the option of nuclear power need to soberly assess their plans, particularly if they are located in active volcanic regions.

But geological knowledge is incomplete and imperfect. And we rely on such knowledge too heavily when making policy decisions about locating hazardous technologies.

Designed and built to withstand what is termed “design basis accidents,” nuclear power plants are usually sited in geologically stable and physically secure environments, determined by geologists. The possibility of a “design basis accident” is based on “credible events,” which are determined by an analysis of probabilities.

The Fukushima disaster was a “beyond design basis accident” because the analysis was wrong. It was calculated that the probable “credible event” expected to occur in Fukushima would be an earthquake no greater than a magnitude of 7.9 and a tsunami no higher than 6.7 metres.

It was not in the analysis of probabilities that Fukushima would be struck by an 8.9 magnitude earthquake or a 10-metre high tsunami. But geologists and the nuclear industry, like all human beings, sometimes get it wrong.

It is noteworthy that there are a number of unknown geological faults and processes which make it more difficult to accurately predict a “credible event.” In other words, it is very much an intelligent guessing game, but guessing it is nevertheless.

Incidentally, the recent earthquake in Christchurch occurred on an unknown and unexposed geological fault, and was therefore unpredictable. In fact, damaging earthquakes have been known to originate from unknown faults.

Malaysia has so far not been traumatised by a severe earthquake or tsunami, although located on the western margins of the Pacific Rim of Fire and close to earthquake-prone Indonesia and the Philippines. But with such incomplete and imperfect geological knowledge, we cannot rule out the possibility of a damaging earthquake in the future.

Human error

But earthquakes and tsunamis are not the only causes of a nuclear accident. Human error alone can lead to a nuclear accident. It happened in Windscale (later renamed Sellafield), Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. So, it could happen in Malaysia. Building two nuclear reactors in error-inclined Malaysia would carry the potential for an incalculable catastrophe. The chances of a nuclear accident in Malaysia are not negligible.

I have heard the facetious argument that plane crashes are not sufficient reason to abandon air travel. But the scale of a nuclear accident is incomparable. Radiation could kill and injure thousands, cause cancers, and contaminate and render uninhabitable a large part of Malaysia.

Nightmare at Fukushima

Japan, the only country to have experienced nuclear warfare, now faces another nuclear nightmare. Months may pass before we can fully understand what went wrong and learn from Fukushima. It is a high price to pay for using potentially dangerous and replaceable technology. It has rekindled fading memories of Chernobyl and shifted the balance in the debate on climate change and the risks and benefits of nuclear energy.

It is forcing many countries to review the safety of their nuclear facilities and their energy policies. Germany has responded to strong public anti-nuclear sentiment by reinstating and accelerating its nuclear phase-out policy, and temporarily shutting down the oldest seven of its 17 reactors.

Both India and China, with their expanding economies and energy needs, are reviewing nuclear safety measures, but have not shelved plans to build more reactors in the next ten years.

A number of studies conclude that nuclear power cannot meet energy needs; that it is excessively expensive; that it is not carbon neutral; that it creates additional environmental and security risks. Most importantly, new evidence indicates that environmentally safe and sustainable energy technologies can be developed to meet growing energy needs.

There is a growing conviction worldwide that nuclear power should be phased out and a serious commitment made to invest in renewable energy, energy efficiency and energy conservation.

Malaysia's nuclear energy plans

Apparently, the Malaysian government is continuing its plans to build two 1,000 megawatt nuclear reactors, in spite of a 40 percent energy reserve.

In responding to the Fukushima nuclear crisis, the Energy, Green Technology and Water Minister covered his back politically when he said that the decision to build the reactors will only be made after his colleagues in cabinet have evaluated a paper to be submitted by the new Malaysian Nuclear Power Corporation, a creature of the Economic Transformation Programme.

Serious questions are in order:

• Does the green minister believe that nuclear energy is green
• Does the government realise that nuclear energy is dirty, dangerous and expensive?
• What is the urgency in embarking on a nuclear energy project when Malaysia enjoys a 40 percent energy reserve and does not need to rush into nuclear power?
• Has the government really considered the realities of nuclear power economics?
• How much of taxpayers' money will be required as subsidies to make nuclear power economically feasible?
• Is it wise to invest billions in expensive nuclear energy when investments should be made in alternative renewable energy and energy efficient technologies?
• Is it not time for the government to join with other governments in a holistic approach to climate change by implementing ecologically sustainable economic development?
• Has the government considered the health, environmental and human security dangers of a reactor meltdown or a terrorist attack on nuclear facilities?
• Will it be possible in the long term to prevent diversion of nuclear materials to nuclear weapons proliferation or to a terrorist group?
• Where and how does the government plan to dispose of nuclear waste, that will remain radioactive for thousands of years, when the nuclear industry and advanced countries have not found a solution?
• Does the government not think that such a crucial issue as nuclear energy deserves a national debate and a referendum?
• Does the government really think that it can make a unilateral decision and then justify it by claiming that it has studied and accepted a report from the very company that will benefit from it?
• Does the government realise that the billions of ringgit invested in nuclear energy will divert scarce resources away from the imperative of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies?
• Is the government beginning to believe its own propaganda and misinformation about nuclear energy?

Public distrust

The nuclear industry has carried the stamp of secrecy like a birthmark. From its very beginning, the nuclear industry has had a long history of cover-ups and downright deception, with the occasional lapse into silence - the silence of guilt. Public trust in the promoters of nuclear power is almost non-existent.

In Britain, America, Germany, Russia, Japan and other countries, people have not been told the truth about the real economic cost of nuclear energy and the health and environmental consequences of nuclear mishaps and near-misses.

The stricken Japanese population is well aware of the culture of nuclear cover-ups. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) owns and operates the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant.

In 2002, Tepco's chairman and senior executives had to resign when the Japanese government discovered that they had covered up the existence of structural damage to reactors. In 2006, Tepco admitted that it had been falsifying data about reactor coolant materials.

Tomorrow: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 2

DR RONALD S McCOY is the founding president of Physicians for Peace and Social Responsibility and the co-president of International Physicians for the Preventive of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Alternate Viewpoint: We should stop running away from radiation... By Wade Allison,

Alternate Viewpoint: We should stop running away from radiation  

By Wade Allison, University of Oxford, 

BBC, 26 March 2011 Last updated at 12:50 GMT 

More than 10,000 people have died in the Japanese tsunami and the survivors are cold and hungry. But the media concentrate on nuclear radiation from which no-one has died - and is unlikely to.

 

Modern reactors are better designed than those at Fukushima - tomorrow's may be better still

Nuclear radiation at very high levels is dangerous, but the scale of concern that it evokes is misplaced. Nuclear technology cures countless cancer patients every day - and a radiation dose given for radiotherapy in hospital is no different in principle to a similar dose received in the environment.

What of Three Mile Island? There were no known deaths there.

And Chernobyl? The latest UN report published on 28 February confirms the known death toll - 28 fatalities among emergency workers, plus 15 fatal cases of child thyroid cancer - which would have been avoided if iodine tablets had been taken (as they have now in Japan). And in each case the numbers are minute compared with the 3,800 at Bhopal in 1984, who died as a result of a leak of chemicals from the Union Carbide pesticide plant.

Becquerels and Sieverts

• A becquerel (Bq), named after French physicist Henri Becquerel, is a measure of radioactivity
• A quantity of radioactive material has an activity of 1Bq if one nucleus decays per second - and 1kBq if 1,000 nuclei decay per second
• A sievert (Sv) is a measure of radiation absorbed by a person, named after Swedish medical physicist Rolf Sievert
• A milli-sievert (mSv) is a 1,000th of a Sievert

 

So what of the radioactivity released at Fukushima? How does it compare with that at Chernobyl? Let's look at the measured count rates. The highest rate reported, at 1900 on 22 March, for any Japanese prefecture was 12 kBq per sq m (for the radioactive isotope of caesium, caesium-137).

A map of Chernobyl in the UN report shows regions shaded according to rate, up to 3,700 kBq per sq m - areas with less than 37 kBq per sq m are not shaded at all. In round terms, this suggests that the radioactive fallout at Fukushima is less than 1% of that at Chernobyl.

The other important radioisotope in fallout is iodine, which can cause child thyroid cancer.

This is only produced when the reactor is on and quickly decays once the reactor shuts down (it has a half life of eight days). The old fuel rods in storage at Fukushima, though radioactive, contain no iodine.

But at Chernobyl the full inventory of iodine and caesium was released in the initial explosion, so that at Fukushima any release of iodine should be much less than 1% of that at Chernobyl - with an effect reduced still further by iodine tablets.

Unfortunately, public authorities react by providing over-cautious guidance - and this simply escalates public concern.
 

Over-reaction On the 16th anniversary of Chernobyl, the Swedish radiation authorities, writing in the Stockholm daily Dagens Nyheter, admitted over-reacting by setting the safety level too low and condemning 78% of all reindeer meat unnecessarily, and at great cost.

 

Bottled water was handed out in Tokyo this week to mothers of young babies

Unfortunately, the Japanese seem to be repeating the mistake. On 23 March they advised that children should not drink tap water in Tokyo, where an activity of 200 Bq per litre had been measured the day before. Let's put this in perspective. The natural radioactivity in every human body is 50 Bq per litre - 200 Bq per litre is really not going to do much harm.

In the Cold War era most people were led to believe that nuclear radiation presents a quite exceptional danger understood only by "eggheads" working in secret military establishments.

To cope with the friendly fire of such nuclear propaganda on the home front, ever tighter radiation regulations were enacted in order to keep all contact with radiation As Low As Reasonably Achievable (ALARA), as the principle became known.

This attempt at reassurance is the basis of international radiation safety regulations today, which suggest an upper limit for the general public of 1 mSv per year above natural levels.

This very low figure is not a danger level, rather it's a small addition to the levels found in nature - a British person is exposed to 2.7 mSv per year, on average. My book Radiation and Reason argues that a responsible danger level based on current science would be 100 mSv per month, with a lifelong limit of 5,000 mSv, not 1 mSv per year.
 

New attitude People worry about radiation because they cannot feel it. However, nature has a solution - in recent years it has been found that living cells replace and mend themselves in various ways to recover from a dose of radiation.

These clever mechanisms kick in within hours and rarely fail, except when they are overloaded - as at Chernobyl, where most of the emergency workers who received a dose greater than 4,000 mSv over a few hours died within weeks.

"Some might ask whether I would accept radioactive waste buried 100 metres under my own house?”

  

However, patients receiving a course of radiotherapy usually get a dose of more than 20,000 mSv to vital healthy tissue close to the treated tumour. This tissue survives only because the treatment is spread over many days giving healthy cells time for repair or replacement.

In this way, many patients get to enjoy further rewarding years of life, even after many vital organs have received the equivalent of more than 20,000 years' dose at the above internationally recommended annual limit - which makes this limit unreasonable.

A sea-change is needed in our attitude to radiation, starting with education and public information.

Then fresh safety standards should be drawn up, based not on how radiation can be excluded from our lives, but on how much we can receive without harm - mindful of the other dangers that beset us, such as climate change and loss of electric power. Perhaps a new acronym is needed to guide radiation safety - how about As High As Relatively Safe (AHARS)?

Modern reactors are better designed than those at Fukushima - tomorrow's may be better still, but we should not wait. Radioactive waste is nasty but the quantity is small, especially if re-processed. Anyway, it is not the intractable problem that many suppose.

Some might ask whether I would accept it if it were buried 100 metres under my own house? My answer would be: "Yes, why not?" More generally, we should stop running away from radiation.

Wade Allison is a nuclear and medical physicist at the University of Oxford, the author of Radiation and Reason (2009) and Fundamental Physics for Probing and Imaging (2006).

Viewpoint: Fukushima makes case for renewable energy.... By Antony Froggatt

Viewpoint: Fukushima makes case for renewable energy

By Antony Froggatt, Senior Research Fellow, Chatham House BBC, 4 April 2011 Last updated at 12:16 GMT
 

The Fukushima accident has highlighted one of the most important issues concerning nuclear power - that of safety and risk.

 

The risk of containment damage at Fukushima was put at one in a million, per reactor per year

The accepted wisdom has been that the consequences of a catastrophic nuclear accident may be large, but that the frequency is low.

The industry and nuclear regulators calculate this on the basis of the likelihood of an accident for any one operating year. In the case of the design of the first four reactors at Fukushima, the Japanese Nuclear Energy Safety Organization estimated in 2002:

"The frequency of occurrence of a core damage accident is 1/100,000 or less per one year for one reactor and the frequency of occurrence of an accident leading to containment damage is 1/1,000,000 or less per one year for one reactor."

"Whereas nuclear costs have tended to go up, renewables have gone down”

Given that only a few decades, rather than millennia separate the accidents at Fukushima, Chernobyl and Three Mile Island (which were also thought to be at minimal risk of core damage) it is clear that nuclear operators and/or regulators are significantly underestimating the inherent risks associated with nuclear technology.

The Cancun Summit in December 2010 agreed: "Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time and that all Parties share a vision for long-term co-operative action."

To meet UN targets, emissions must be cut by about 80% by 2050, which will require decarbonising the energy sector.

At the same time, traditional energy forecasts anticipate rapid increases in energy demand, driven primarily by the need to fuel the growing economies in Asia, particularly China and India. The International Energy Agency (IEA) assumes that global energy demand will increase by 47% by 2035.

Energy efficiency
Supporters of nuclear power believe that it should play an increasingly important role in this new, highly efficient, zero-emissions energy sector.

However, nuclear power is not currently a global technology, being employed by only 30 countries with just six - USA, France, Japan, Germany, Russia and South-Korea - producing almost three-quarters of the nuclear electricity in the world.

 

 Finland's Olkiluoto nuclear plant is late, and 50% over budget

The total contribution to global commercial energy production is around 6%, compared to 25% for coal 23% for natural gas.

For nuclear power to play a significant role in meeting future energy demand a significant scaling up of its use will therefore be required, amplifying many-fold the existing problems of nuclear safety, siting and waste management, as well as causing new worries about the proliferation of nuclear materials.

Given the scale and urgency of the problem, it is essential that low-cost technologies with a proven track record of coming in on time and budget, and with global appeal, are prioritised.

The number one priority must therefore be energy efficiency, which not only addresses climate change and energy security problems simultaneously, but also brings demonstrable and rapid economic benefits.

"Renewables along with energy efficiency can deliver all or virtually all of our global energy needs”

The second area is renewable energy, which, to the surprise of many, has entered the mainstream in the last few years. For example in the EU, renewables installations provided the majority of new capacity in 2008 and 2009, while in Germany they are now bigger contributors to electricity than nuclear power.

This deployment at scale has demonstrated not only the technical capabilities and environmental advantages of wide-spread use of renewables, but also the economic benefits, with reduced dependencies on fluctuating fossil fuel prices.

Nuclear power on the other hand has, at best, had a chequered history of delivery. The most recent example in Europe is the infamous Olkiluoto reactor in Finland, whose original start-up date was May 2009 but which is now at least three-and-a-half years late, and more than 50% over budget.

So whereas nuclear costs have tended to go up, renewables have gone down, and in many conditions are now the cheaper option.

Cascading problems
As a result of Fukushima, most commentators believe that the engineering and financial costs associated with nuclear power will increase further.

 

Fukushima provided 3% of Japan's electricity

In particular it is expected that there will be a greater emphasis on protecting plants from broader environmental threats such as flooding, storms and droughts (which are expected to become more frequent as a result of climate change).

It is also likely that the cascade of problems at Fukushima, from one reactor to another, and from reactors to fuel storage pools, will also affect the design, layout and ultimately the cost of future nuclear plants.

Numerous studies have shown that renewables along with energy efficiency can deliver all or virtually all of our global energy needs, and that therefore nuclear power does not have to be part of the future.

Meanwhile, the ongoing disaster at Fukushima has highlighted the environmental, societal and economic impact that nuclear power can have in extreme conditions.

As Japan addresses the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami, too much worry, time and effort are having to be spent trying to secure and make safe one facility that provided just 3% of the country's electricity.

Antony Froggatt is a Senior Research Fellow in the Energy, Environment and Resource Governance programme at Chatham House, in London.

malaysiakini: Japan's nuclear morality tale... by Brahma Chellaney

Japan's nuclear morality tale

Brahma Chellaney
Mar 15, 2011, 11:33am

COMMENT The troubles at the Fukushima nuclear power plant and other reactors in northeast Japan have dealt a severe blow to the global nuclear industry, a powerful cartel of less than a dozen major state-owned or state-guided firms that have been trumpeting a nuclear power renaissance.

But the risks that seaside reactors like Fukushima face from natural disasters are well known.

Indeed, they became evident six years ago, when the Indian Ocean tsunami in December 2004 inundated India's second-largest nuclear complex, shutting down the Madras power station.

Many nuclear power plants are located along coastlines because they are highly water-intensive. Yet natural disasters like storms, hurricanes and tsunamis are becoming more common, owing to climate change, which will also cause a rise in ocean levels, making seaside reactors even more vulnerable.

For example, many nuclear power plants located along the British coast are just a few metres above sea level. In 1992, Hurricane Andrew caused significant damage at the Turkey Point nuclear-power plant on Biscayne Bay, Florida, but, fortunately, not to any critical systems.

All energy generators, including coal- and gas-fired plants, make major demands on water resources.

But nuclear power requires even more. Light-water reactors (LWRs) like those at Fukushima, which use water as a primary coolant, produce most of the world's nuclear power.

The huge quantities of local water that LWRs consume for their operations become hot water outflows, which are pumped back into rivers, lakes and oceans.

Because reactors located inland put serious strain on local freshwater resources, including greater damage to plant life and fish, water-stressed countries that are not landlocked try to find suitable seashore sites.

But, whether located inland or on a coast, nuclear power is vulnerable to the likely effects of climate change.

As global warming brings about a rise in average temperatures and ocean levels, inland reactors will increasingly contribute to, and be affected by, water shortages.

During the record-breaking 2003 heat wave in France, operations at 17 commercial nuclear reactors had to be scaled back or stopped because of rapidly rising temperatures in rivers and lake. Spain's reactor at Santa Mara de Garoa was shut for a week in July 2006 after high temperatures were recorded in the Ebro River.

Paradoxically, then, the very conditions that made it impossible for the nuclear industry to deliver full power in Europe in 2003 and 2006 created peak demand for electricity, owing to the increased use of air-conditioning.

Indeed, during the 2003 heat wave, Electricite de France (EDF), which operates 58 reactors - the majority on ecologically sensitive rivers like the Loire - was compelled to buy power from neighbouring countries on the European spot market. The state-owned EDF, which normally exports power, ended up paying 10 times the price of domestic power.

Similarly, although the 2006 European heat wave was less intense, water and heat problems forced Germany, Spain and France to take some nuclear power plants offline and reduce operations at others.

Central dilemma

Highlighting the vulnerability of nuclear power to environmental change or extreme weather patterns, in 2006 plant operators in western Europe also secured exemptions from regulations that would have prevented them from discharging overheated water into natural ecosystems, affecting fisheries.

France likes to showcase its nuclear power industry, which supplies 78 percent of the country's electricity. But such is the nuclear industry's water intensity that EDF withdraws up to 19 billion cubic metres of water per year from rivers and lakes, or roughly half of France's total freshwater consumption.

Freshwater scarcity is a growing international challenge, and the vast majority of countries are in no position to approve of such highly water-intensive inland-based energy systems.

Nuclear plants located by the sea do not face similar problems in hot conditions, because ocean waters do not heat up anywhere near as rapidly as rivers or lakes. And because they rely on seawater, they cause no freshwater scarcity. But, as Japan's reactors have shown, coastal nuclear power plants confront more serious dangers.

When the Indian Ocean tsunami struck, the Madras reactor's core could be kept in safe shutdown condition because the electrical systems had been ingeniously installed on higher ground than the plant itself.

And, unlike Fukushima (left), which bore a direct impact, Madras was far away from the epicentre of the earthquake that unleashed the tsunami.

The central dilemma of nuclear power in an increasingly water-stressed world is that it is a water guzzler, yet vulnerable to water.

And, decades after Lewis L Strauss, the chaiperson of the US Atomic Energy Agency, claimed that nuclear power would become “too cheap to meter”, the nuclear industry everywhere still subsists on munificent government subsidies.

While the appeal of nuclear power has declined considerably in the West, it has grown among the so-called nuclear newcomers, which brings with it new challenges, including concerns about proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Moreover, with nearly two-fifths of the world's population living within 100km of a coastline, finding suitable seaside sites for initiation or expansion of a nuclear power programme is no longer easy.

Fukushima is likely to stunt the appeal of nuclear power in a way similar to the accident at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania in 1979, not to mention the far more severe meltdown of the Chernobyl reactor in 1986.

If the fallout from those incidents is a reliable guide, however, nuclear power advocates will eventually be back.

BRAHMA CHELLANEY is Professor of Strategic Studies at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi and the author of, among others, 'Asian Juggernaut: The Rise of China, India, and Japan' (Harper Paperbacks, 2010) and 'Water: Asia's New Battlefield' (Georgetown University Press, 2011).