NEED OF NUCLEAR POWER
In the last three decades, consumption of electricity has been increasing in India at the rate of around 10% per annum. Starting with a meager 2300 MW in 1950, the installed capacity by March 2001 has risen to around 102 GW. Of this 25% is met by hydro, 72% by thermal power, based on coal and about 3 % by nuclear energy. India is a country occupying 2% of the world's landmass and currently generating about 3% of the global electricity. However India has a share of 16% in the world's population. To achieve a moderately high level of economic growth, the domestic electricity generation capacity needs to be increased manifold.
Through coal reserves in India are estimated to be nearly 13,000 crore tonnes, most of them are confined to a limited region in eastern and Central India. Nearly 35% of the country by area and 30% by population are more than 800 km away from coalfields. Hence, there are practical limits in transporting coal to thermal power stations located in the Western, Southern and Northern parts of India (apart from limitations on production). The total hydroelectric potential that can be economically exploited has been estimated to be about 41000 MW. Of this 25400 MW capacity is under operation. The non-conventional energy resources like solar, wind and tidal are all diffused sources of energy suitable for decentralized application. However, these sources are unlikely to meet more than a small fraction of our energy needs for many years.
Nuclear power is one source, if given impetus, can generate electricity at costs competitive with coal-fired power stations in certain location. A tonne of uranium fed into the nuclear power station produces as much heat as about 25,000 tonnes of coal taken over the life times of the stations, the low fuelling cost of nuclear stations out weights the higher cost of building them.
One important advantage of nuclear power is that it avoids a wide variety of environmental problems arising from burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas. The problems that have received the most publicity have been 'global warming', which is changing the earth's climate, acid rain, which is destroying forests and killing fish; air pollution, which is killing tens of thousands of people every year; the destructive effects of massive mining for coal and oil spills which do great harm to ecological systems.
