Excelsior Correspondent
NEW DELHI, Mar 16: Allaying fears arising out of media reports about the leakage from Kakrapar Nuclear power reactor in Gujarat, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh has said that the leakage was very minor and that, it is not justified to describe it as an accident because it was simply an incident and that too not of unusual nature. Such incidents have occurred in the past, even in reactors abroad including the Canadian reactors, he said.
In reply to a query in the Lok Sabha today, Dr Jitendra Singh produced evidence to prove that this event was of very minor nature. He said, akin to the Richter scale used to quantify severity of earthquake, the “International Nuclear and Radiological Event” (INES) scale developed by “International Atomic Energy Authority” (IAEA) has rated the Kakrapara leakage at Level -1, which is the lowest on the scale from Level -1 to 7 and means that this incident was nothing more than “an anomaly in the plant”.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, what we need to feel proud of and also compliment our scientists for, is that within no time, this leakage was detected and inbuilt mechanisms to overcome the heat due to loss of coolant also got into process. He said, what happened was that one of the pipes carrying heavy water coolant suffered from leakage but immediately this was detected. The present situation is that Kakrapar unit is stable and there are no major safety concerns, he added.
As far as the issue of radiation hazard is concerned, Dr Jitendra Singh reassured the members of the House that there has been no significant detection of radioactivity inside or outside the plant after carrying inspection through sophisticated devices and therefore, there is no possibility of any of the workers receiving any radioactivity exposure.
Meanwhile, Dr Jitendra Singh also informed the House that ever since the taking over of the Narendra Modi government, the quantum of nuclear energy generation has been progressively on the rise and in the year 2014-15, highest quantum of nuclear energy to the extent of 37,835 MW was produced which is more than any other previous year. The Government has laid before itself the target of tripling its nuclear generation capacity to three times by 2024, he said.
In the years to come, Dr Jitendra Singh said, nuclear power will be a major source of electricity and energy in this country and it will not only fulfill the increasing requirements of India but would also live up to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s dictum of “zero effect” which means, minimal adverse effect on environment because nuclear energy does not produce green-house gases like Carbon-dioxide.
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