Nuclear power use will rise, but safety is a must
dubai — There will be a “significant” increase in the global use of nuclear energy between now and 2030, according to Yukiya Amano, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). As of 2015, more than 30 IAEA member states were actively considering or planning nuclear power programmes, and at the moment, over 60 reactors are under construction in 15 countries, with four in the UAE.
“In the lowest scenario, there will be a two per cent increase (in the use of nuclear power worldwide). In the highest scenario, there will be a 56 per cent increase by 2030,” Amano said. “The countries that are considering the increase in nuclear power are states in which climate change is one of the strongest reasons.”
Philippe Jamet, former commissioner of the French Nuclear Safety Authority, noted that countries must remain extremely careful and maintain the highest possible safety measures as they turn to nuclear power. He noted that — in the last 40 years — there have been three major nuclear safety accidents, at Three Mile Island in the US, at Chernobyl in the Soviet Union, and at Fukushima, Japan. “This is quite a high frequency,” he said. “This calls for modesty, because in none of these accidents there was any warning. Till the day before those accidents, everybody believed that nuclear safety was achieved. We can never avoid surprises. We have to be very careful. Key players in nuclear energy have to strive a lot for continuous improvement. There are many areas where improvement should be done from an institutional point of view.”
Amano, for his part, said that in the IAEA’s point of view, the Fukushima disaster had a positive effect on worldwide nuclear energy safety. “Safety culture has strengthened a lot after Fukushima. The concept of safety (is now) widely accepted.”
Despite better precautions, Amano said public acceptance of nuclear power often holds nations back from achieving their nuclear power goals. One major misconception is that nuclear waste cannot be disposed of safely. “It is believed that there is no solution to deal with nuclear waste. That is wrong. It is difficult to deal with high-level waste and spent fuel, but even with these there is a solution, which is deep geological disposal.” On the UAE’s own nuclear ambitions, Amano said the IAEA is “very happy” at the cooperation between the organisation and Emirati authorities. “Since the beginning of the project, the UAE and IAEA have been working in close cooperation,” he said.
bernd@khaleejtimes.com