Vitas Gerulaitis once dropped his racquet in utter surprise when he heard a usually well-mannered Bjorn Borg letting out an expression of disgust. The nation feels that way at the Prime Minister's recent remarks against some sections of the civil society (read NGOs). He was feeling quite anguished over the continued agitation to stall efforts to commission the Kudankulam atomic power plant. For a gentleman like him, it must have needed great provocation to accuse foreign NGOs of funding the agitation. His exasperation is, perhaps, all the more, that the agitation is continuing despite the best efforts of the central government to convince the local people that the plant would present no health-related risks.

SAFETY ASPECTS

True, that serious accidents had occurred in nuclear power plants in the US (the Three Mile Island), in the former Soviet Russia (Chernobyl) or, in recent times, in Japan (Fukushima), but the Indian government and independent experts have assured the public repeatedly of the safety aspects of India's nuclear plants and their impeccable record. The Government's insistence on nuclear power is an integral part of its policy to add additional electricity generating capacity to feed the country's rapidly growing power needs, keeping in mind India's commitment to the global community to reduce, progressively, the energy intensity of its GDP growth, and in turn, the carbon intensity as a part of its “common but differentiated responsibility” to combat global warming under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

India is a party to the Convention. Promoting nuclear power generation is, thus, a part of power planning, as well as of environmentally sustainable economic development. It is for this reason that more than 60 nuclear reactors are being constructed around the globe, and according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the share of nuclear energy in electricity generation is only set to grow.

But not long ago, we witnessed an agitation against the Jaitapur atomic power plant to be set up in Maharashtra. Earlier, the Jaduguda Uranium mines in Jharkhand had been the target of local public anger and opposition smouldered on prospecting operations to assess the extent of the relatively-rich nuclear mineral deposits in Andhra Pradesh. All these instances have gone to weaken India's efforts to attain a modicum of self-sufficiency in fissile material, and embark upon additions to its electricity-generating capacity through nuclear power. In the process, they have also gone to undermine India's strategy to reduce its carbon footprint.

If nuclear power is a valuable component of the package of clean and safe energy sources, then opposition to it by the so-called environmentalists is difficult to understand. They claim to be knowledgeable of the possible risks of the operation of a nuclear power plant but wouldn't let any contrary view, however much based on science and technology, to be expressed. Their reluctance or total negation to lend an ear to others' views passes one's comprehension. The sad part is that the lay public, fed with half truths, falls victim to the NIMBY (Not in my backyard) syndrome.

TRADE WAR

Ever since the beginning of the global environmental movement in 1972, the potential of environmental concerns being used as an economic, trade or commercial weapon has been recognised. Despite repeated assurances to the contrary, developed countries have employed such concerns in the form of trade barriers to prevent or restrict imports into their territories of goods from developing countries, in maintaining their technological superiority and global market share of their exports, by hindering transfer of technologies even of the green variety by invoking intellectual property rights and resorting to concerted campaigns to delay or abort developmental initiatives in the developing realm.

In the 1990s, India's shrimp exports were made to carry certificates of the catch having been landed using turtle excluding devices to save turtles from being caught in the fishing nets, a trade protection measure introduced in the garb of conservation. The recently-introduced carbon tax on aircraft emissions in the EU is an example of climate change concerns being used as a commercial weapon. More than 20 nations, including the US and India, have protested against the measure.

ENVIRONMENT CONCERNS

Copying examples from abroad without assessing their relevance to local conditions also can distort a developing country's environmental priorities. In India, DDT was used mainly in the Malaria Eradication programme with much success. It isn't denied that organochlorine compounds, a family of chemicals to which DDT belongs, are harmful to humans, birds and some other animals alike, if used indiscriminately. But discontinuance of its use in public health operations in India, without an equally-effective and cheap substitute, has only led to the recrudescence of the disease, that lays down millions morbid and leads to the mortality of lakhs of poor, not only in India, but in many developing countries.

In India, whenever environmental concerns are piled up against any project, the “Precautionary Principle” is invoked to err on the safe side and abandon the project. This principle, which forms part of Agenda 21 of the Rio Declaration (1992), states that, “In order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied by states according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, want of full scientific certainty shall not be used for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”

The precautionary principle needs to be used judiciously, and not indiscriminately. Environmental problems that may possibly arise should be anticipated on the basis of experience with similar projects elsewhere, and suitable safeguards built into the projects from the very beginning, and monitored strictly once the projects get underway. A cost-benefit analysis of the gains of a project and the environmental losses that may result can be carried out, and wherever the gains are less or only marginally higher than the losses, it would be prudent to abandon the proposal.

Displacement of large populations, diversion of vast acres of forests or areas rich in wild life, irreversible damage to aquifers, and damage to monuments of archaeological, historic or religious importance could be sited as examples of instances where one needs to tread with caution before embarking upon any development. Where it is difficult to put a price tag on the environmental loss, then a value judgement will have to be made to allow the project or not. But jettisoning every project on the specious ground of precautionary approach is unacceptable in a developing country.

One hopes the agitators in Kudankulam would see reason and allow the project to be commissioned.

(The author is former Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India.)

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