"Pakistan has been, and will always remain, a strong exponent of promotion of nuclear technology. Some fifty years ago, we all began with the slogan "Atoms for peace". Let us now strive for exploiting this technology not only for peace, but for progress and prosperity of all".
This was stated by leader of Pakistan delegation and Chairman Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) Parvez Butt while addressing the 49th International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) General Conference on September 28, 2005 in Vienna, Austria.
It is now fifty years since Pakistan realised the enormous potential of nuclear energy for sustainable socio-economic development. Starting then, with a modest programme of research and development, we now have numerous nuclear facilities for exploiting its beneficial aspects in the diverse areas of power generation, health, agriculture, hydrology, geology, industry, environment and basic sciences, he added.
Butt said "PAEC's four nuclear agriculture centres are engaged in helping farmers to grow and harvest more crops. The country's first commercial food irradiation plant is now under construction and should be operational by the end of next year. It is located next to the existing irradiation facility for medical products".
The 13 nuclear medicine and oncology centres operated by Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission continue to provide facilities to over one third of a million patients per year, he remarked. Recognising the need to provide this assistance to more patients, work on as many as five more nuclear medical centres is under way.
"In Pakistan, the overall implementation rate of IAEA's Technical Co-operation activities during 2004 achieved a record high of 75.7%. We are now amongst the top beneficiaries of IAEA's technical assistance," Butt informed the IAEA general conference.
He said, "We have derived great benefits from the IAEA's Technical Co-operation programme. We have also made some modest contribution to this programme by providing experts, lecturers, and training facilities at our establishments".
"Safeguards and non-proliferation were important pillars of the Agency's activities. Of equal importance are the promotional activities to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity throughout the world". The Agency, he said, has to be careful with regard to maintaining a balance between the two areas of its work. The public perception of IAEA as just a 'nuclear watchdog' agency, needs to be corrected and its increasing role in the promotion of peaceful uses of nuclear science and technology, needs to be re-emphasised.
"We live in an era of" "climate change", of ever increasing intensity of "most powerful" hurricanes, of increasing devastation, desertification having incipient but increasing effects on economies world-wide. We must all agree, sooner or later, that the escalating generation of carbon dioxide and the resultant global warming is the basic cause.
To reverse and contain this trend, nuclear power is a promising option. We have been talking of a resurgence of nuclear power, and as the Director General said in his opening statement, it has now "re-emerged". We hope that the supplier countries will have the vision not to confine the flow of nuclear power technology to only selected countries, bearing well in mind that "CO2 avoided anywhere is CO2 avoided everywhere", he told.
Pakistan's economy is showing a remarkable growth rate. It was 8.4% last year, possibly, the highest in our part of the world. He added that in order to meet the resultant and ever-increasing demand of electricity, Government of Pakistan has launched an "Energy Security Plan".
This plan envisages the increase of nuclear electricity generation from the present 425 MWe to 8800 MWe by the year 2030. This would increase the share of nuclear energy from the present 0.8% to only 4.2% by the year 2030. At the same time, the energy consumed by burning coal alone will increase from the current 6.5% to 19%. The share of carbon based fuels will be as high as 82.5%, and will increase from the present 44 MTOE to about 300 MTOE in 2030, our per capita consumption of electricity will increase to only 3920 KWhr/year as compared to the present 13,800 KWhr/year in the developed world.
Butt said "Pakistan is not a novice to nuclear power generation. Our first nuclear power plant, KANUPP, was in operation as far back as 1972. We are now in the process of carrying out modifications and replacements under a well planned, IAEA assisted, re-lifing programme. Recently, we very successfully replaced the plant's computer controls system", he added.
Because of embargoes, we had to wait for nearly three decades for the second nuclear power plant, CHASNUPP Unit-1. This plant is operating very well due to the good design, good workmanship and high professional skills of our operating staff. In the last one and a half years, and since its previous refuelling outage, it has achieved an availability factor of 96.3% and capacity factor of 93.3%. Its twin, the CHASNUPP Unit-2 is now under construction and making good progress.
Because of our past nuclear power experience, our future energy plan envisages 8800 MWe of nuclear electricity generation by the year 2030. To meet this target, we need to import nuclear power plants. We hope that the recent liberal trend of export and exchange of nuclear technology will help. In order to address proliferation concerns, we have been proposing the establishment of "Nuclear Power Parks".
Nuclear power plants could be constructed in these specified areas, by suppliers as contractors, or even as equity partners. Necessary IAEA safeguards and other security controls could be made applicable to these specified areas. In the meantime, we do note with interest, the Agency's efforts to promote proliferation resistant nuclear power plants. We are, therefore, participating in the INPRO activities.
"We foresee a much expanded role of nuclear energy. I am happy to report that our IAEA assisted programme to set up a nuclear desalination plant at our Karachi Nuclear Power Plant is making good progress. This plant, which will have a capacity of 1600 cubic meters per day, should be operational by the year 2007", Butt told.
Pakistan attaches, great importance to the objectives of achieving and maintaining a high level of safety and security of radioactive sources. Pakistan put in place fully functional mechanisms for effective and continuous regulatory controls over radioactive sources with a view of ensuring their safety and security.
Pakistan did not wait for long, and was among the first, to ratify the Convention on Nuclear Safety and has subjected itself to review by its peers at all the three meetings of the Contracting Parties held since its inception. Pakistan's independent Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) is now well established and is in its fifth year of existence.
Courtesy: PakAtom