Why is India bent on bailing out the French nuclear industry at the cost of its own citizens’ lives?

Even as the French nuclear regulator ASN has put the nuclear power company EDF on a safety watch after repeated warning in recent years about vulnerabilities in the EPR design, the Modi government in India continues to push for the purchase of 6 EPRs for setting up in Jaitapur. This open letter written by the former Union Power Secretary Dr. EAS Sarma to the Secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India deserves wider circulation. 

E A S Sarma
14-40-4/1 Gokhale Road
Maharanipeta
Visakhapatnam 530002

To: Shri Kamlesh Nilkanth Vyas

Secretary, Dept of Atomic Energy (DEA) &
Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission (AEC)
Govt of India

Dear Shri Vyas,

I have written numerous letters to your Department cautioning on the safety concerns arising in the case of EPR reactors to be supplied by EDF/ Areva for the proposed Jaitapur nuclear power project in Maharashtra. A copy of my last letter dated 8-7-2019 addressed to the Prime Minister, who heads DEA, and copies of my earlier letters are forwarded here for your reference. I find that DEA has not cared to respond to any of my letters nor it appears that the officers of DEA have cared to brief the Prime Minister on the safety concerns that plague EDF/ Areva.

During his recent visit to France, the Prime Minister signed a joint agreement with his French counterpart on August 22, 2019. From a reading of that agreement, it appears that there was no discussion whatsoever between the two leaders on the safety aspects of the EPR reactors being manufactured by EDF. The agreement also failed to refer to any possible exchange of information between the nuclear regulators of the two countries on the subject.

I have enclosed copies of the technical notices issued by ASN (here, here, and here), the French nuclear regulator to EDF on the numerous faults and deviations in the manufacture of EPR reactors supplied for the Flamanville nuclear power project in Finland. Extracted below is a para that highlights the multiple failures on the part of EDF.

“In the case of Flamanville 3, failures occurred at various steps in the production of these welds: in the specification of the requirements for the subcontractor in charge of producing the welds, during qualification of the weld procedures, in the choice of filler materials and during the acceptance tests, during production of the control assemblies and during the non-destructive inspections. These failures led to deviations not only from the break preclusion requirements, but also from the manufacturing code used by yourselves”

The problems faced by EDF in the manufacture of the reactors seem to be of a generic nature that could extend to the EPR reactors being supplied to China and other countries including India.

In the Indian context, the concern about safety has two dimensions... read more:

https://www.dianuke.org/why-is-india-bent-on-bailing-out-the-french-nuclear-industry-at-the-cost-of-its-own-citizens-lives/