Govt sets target to triple nuclear power generation by 2024

Govt sets target to triple nuclear power generation by 2024

"When we came to power in 2014, we had set a target of generating nuclear power by three time in 10 years and we hope to reach that target."

Nuclear power generation capacity in the country is expected to reach nearly 15,000 MW by 2024 as the government has expedited the process of setting up new plants, Lok Sabha was informed today. In 2014, India’s nuclear power generation capacity was 4,780 MW.

Minister of State for PMO Jitendra Singh said a number of steps have been taken by the Narendra Modi government to fast-track all ongoing nuclear projects and setting up of new plants in different parts of the country.

“When we came to power in 2014, we had set a target of generating nuclear power by three time in 10 years and we hope to reach that target,” he said during Question Hour.

The Minister, however, said for generating targeted nuclear power, there has to be enough uranium available – both from domestic as well as foreign sources.

Singh said the government was actively pursuing the process of acquiring uranium from different sources, including exploration in new places like Bihar and Meghalaya.

He said for the first time, the Nuclear Power Corporation of India has been allowed to go for setting up of joint venture nuclear plants along with Public Sector Undertakings.

The Minister said the third stage of India’s nuclear power programme contemplates using thorium along with uranium-233 as fuel in thorium-based reactors.

With sustained efforts of years, India has gained experience over the entire thorium fuel cycle on a semi-industrial scale, he said.

“The developmental activities include studies in thorium extraction, fuel fabrication and irradiation, reprocessing studies including construction of an engineering-scale power reactor, thorium reprocessing facility and setting up of uranium-233 fuelled Purnima and KAMINI research reactors,” he said.

Singh said the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and research organisations attached with DAE are engaged in various R&D activities to address the utilisation of thorium in different types of reactors, including efforts aimed at enlarging the existing thorium cycle experience to a bigger scale.

Be scientific: on taking a call on GM mustard's usage

Be scientific: on taking a call on GM mustard's usage

On GM mustard for farms, the Centre must privilege reason over politics in taking the call

With the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee, an Environment Ministry body that evaluates genetically modified crops, approving transgenic mustard for environmental release, a key hurdle remains before farmers can cultivate it: Environment Minister Anil Dave’s approval, under a procedure set down by the UPA government. In 2009 the GEAC approved Bt brinjal, developed by Mahyco and the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, for commercial release. As Environment Minister, Jairam Ramesh overruled the GEAC clearance in 2010 and changed its status from an approval committee to an ‘appraisal’ committee. The issue before Mr. Dave is this: go by the expert findings of the GEAC and decide the issue on scientific merits, or opt for a replay of the Bt brinjal case. Broadly, the then government’s exceptionalism on Bt brinjal was framed along these lines: it was an edible substance unlike Bt cotton; long-term studies may be required to check its safety and environmental impact; it involved technology developed by the multinational Monsanto (which had an indirect stake in Mahyco). On the other hand, GM mustard (DMH-11) was developed by a team of scientists at Delhi University led by former vice-chancellor Deepak Pental under a government-funded project.

In essence, it uses three genes from soil bacterium that makes self-pollinating plants such as mustard amenable to hybridisation. This means local crop developers have the equivalent of a platform technology to more easily develop versions of mustard with custom traits such as higher oil content and pest resistance. It has also gone through safety and toxicity tests (on mice) prescribed by the regulator, but this is unlikely to convince opponents of GM technology. Many of them are opposed to the commercial release of any form of transgenic plants; they fear that introducing genes from soil bacterium or other forms of animal life into plants will amount to playing with the natural order of plant life. Proponents of GM crops say plants and animals are constantly swapping bacterial genes with air, soil and water, and also that the only way of determining if a gene can produce proteins toxic to humans is to subject it to a systematic testing process. Years of field tests on transgenic corn, soyabean and brinjal in other countries have shown no health risks that vary with their non-GM versions. The concern that DMH-11 employs a gene that will compel farmers to use specific herbicides and be dependent on one or two companies deserves serious attention. However, these are matters for the government, regulators, labour markets and the courts to decide. Farmers need technology, new knowledge and governmental support to get the best out of their seeds. Successive governments have failed to move on the draft National Biotechnology Regulatory Bill, 2008 that would enable a biotechnology regulator to take shape. Sans such legislation, issues to be decided on the basis of science will be at the mercy of political expediency.

Off the road: India cannot sit out B&RI

Off the road: India cannot sit out B&RI

Don’t shut the door on diplomacy over China’s Belt and Road Initiative

Three years after the plan for the Belt and Road Initiative (B&RI, formerly called the Silk Road Economic Belt or One Belt One Road) was announced, China has concluded the first Belt and Road Forum. While 130 countries participated, of which at least 68 are now part of the $900-billion infrastructure corridor project, India boycotted the event, making its concerns public hours before the forum commenced in Beijing. India's reservations, according to the carefully worded statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs, are threefold. One, the B&RI’s flagship project is the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which includes projects in the Gilgit-Baltistan region, ignoring India’s “sovereignty and territorial integrity”. Two, the B&RI infrastructure project structure smacks of Chinese neo-colonialism, and could cause an “unsustainable debt burden for communities” with an adverse impact on the environment in the partner countries. And three, there is a lack of transparency in China’s agenda, indicating that New Delhi believes the B&RI is not just an economic project but one that China is promoting for political control. These concerns are no doubt valid, and the refusal to join the B&RI till China addresses the objection over Gilgit-Baltistan is understandable. The decision to not attend even as an observer, however, effectively closes the door for diplomacy. It stands in contrast to countries such as the U.S. and Japan, which are not a part of the B&RI but sent official delegations.

Each of India’s neighbours, with the exception of Bhutan, has signed up for the B&RI, expecting to see billions of dollars in loans for projects including roads, rail, gas pipelines, oil pipelines, electricity and telecommunications connectivity. India’s anxiety about the possible debt trap may be well-founded, but it ignores the benefits these countries believe will accrue from the project. Simply put, India cannot appear to be more worried about these countries than their own governments are, or to determine their stance. As a friend and neighbour, India can at best alert them to the perils of the B&RI, and offer assistance should they choose another path. India may also face some difficult choices in the road ahead, because as a co-founder of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and as a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (from June 2017) it will be asked to support many of the projects under the B&RI. At such a point, especially given the endorsement from the UN Secretary General, who said the B&RI is rooted in a shared vision for global development, India should not simply sit out the project. It must actively engage with China to have its particular grievances addressed, articulate its concerns to other partner countries in a more productive manner, and take a position as an Asian leader, not an outlier in the quest for more connectivity.

Putting a global price on carbon

Putting a global price on carbon
A carbon tax is less likely to face political opposition while creating avenues for businesses and growth

We stand today on the brink of a long-term anthropogenic and ecological change, caused not by the forces of nature but our own exploitation of the planet’s resources. There is compelling evidence that climate change is the greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen, and there is a large chance of a global average temperature rise exceeding 2ºC by the end of this century. It has also been established in various scientific studies that any such warming of the planet will lead to increased natural calamities such as floods and cyclones, declined crop yields and ecological degradation. A large increase in global temperatures correlates with an average 5% loss in global GDP, with poor countries suffering costs in excess of 10% of GDP.

As a mitigation policy

A global and immediate policy response is urgently required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the effects of climate change. We want to reinvigorate the discourse towards adopting a multilaterally coordinated imposition of a carbon tax as a potent mitigation policy. A carbon tax aims to internalise the externality of climate change by setting a price on the carbon content of energy consumed or greenhouse gas emitted in the production or consumption of goods. Carbon tax regimes will only be effective if harmonised internationally. Different country-wise policies could lead to ‘carbon leakages’ where energy-intensive businesses will most likely move to less strict national regimes.

Harmonised carbon taxes hold advantages over quantitative limits imposed through government control and regulation. First, a carbon tax regime avoids the problems related to choosing a baseline. In a price approach, the natural baseline is a zero carbon tax. Second, a carbon tax policy will be better able to adapt to the element of uncertainty which pervades the science of climate change. Quantity limits on emissions are related to the stocks of greenhouse gas emissions, while the price limits are related to the flow of emissions. From this uncertainty arises another complication of price volatility which is the third reason why a carbon tax policy is likely to cause less volatility in the prices of carbon emissions.

Fourth, quantity limiting policies are often accompanied by administrative arbitrariness and corruption through rent-seeking. This sends off negative signals to investors. In a price-based carbon tax, the investor has an assured long-term regulation to adapt to and can weigh in the costs involved.

Addresses issue of equity

Fifth, the most contentious issue in any international negotiation on climate change mitigation either at the level of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) or at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has been the issue of equity between high-income and low-income countries. The price-based approach in the form of carbon taxes makes it easier to implement such equity-based international adjustments than the quantity-based approach. Finally, the carbon tax will essentially be a Pigovian Tax which balances the marginal social costs and benefits of additional emissions, thereby internalising the costs of environmental damage. It can act as an incentive for consumers and producers to shift to more energy-efficient sources and products.

Some countries and regions such as the U.S. and the European Union already have fairly successful carbon pricing regimes in place in the form of carbon taxes and emissions trading schemes. Some other countries have introduced general taxes on energy consumption instead of direct taxes on carbon content. This can be a good starting point for a shift in policy by countries while they deliberate on a harmonised carbon tax regime. The political consensus in favour of a direct carbon tax will be difficult to achieve in low- and middle-income countries that have developmental priorities and lack the capacity to administer such regimes. A general tax on energy consumption combined with a technology-centric policy that promotes entrepreneurs and investors who develop low-energy intensive products can be a good starting point from where they can gradually move towards a direct carbon tax. Another near-term approach can be a ‘cap-and-tax’ which combines the strengths of both quantity and price approaches. Cap-and-tax might also address the concerns of environmentalists that a price-based approach does not impose hard constraints on emissions.

Africa as a priority region

We conclude with a few areas of further deliberation to move forward on an effective harmonised carbon tax regime. Countries must negotiate and share policy experiences and researches in this area. They also must decide upon the appropriate forum to discuss and implement any such mitigation policy. The WTO could be the preferred forum, given the important nexus between international trade and climate change. Finally, any prospective policy regime must give the highest importance to the African continent. A rapidly growing African economy must then be able to learn from past lessons without having to choose between economic growth and climate change mitigation.

A carbon tax policy might not seem a magic wand, but it is also less likely to face political opposition and compromise while creating new sectors for businesses and growth.

The data set revision for the IIP and WPI reflects a macroeconomic resilience

The data set revision for the IIP and WPI reflects a macroeconomic resilience

The latest revisions to the base year for the Index of Industrial Production and the Wholesale Price Index reveal an overall macroeconomic picture that is at once heartening, given the underlying resilience reflected in the data. IIP data founded on the new base year of 2011-12 show that industrial output has grown annually at an average pace of 3.82% over the last five fiscal years, with a 5% rate of growth in the 12 months ended March 2017. Contrast this with the 1.42% average pace based on the previous 2004-05 base year, with 2016-17 showing a paltry 0.7% expansion. It is clear that the change in the base year with accompanying changes to weights of the component sectors, and restructuring of the individual sectoral constituents have all helped signal industrial activity as having been far more robust over the entire time period than had been previously posited. The caveats and explanations too need to be mentioned upfront. For one, the simultaneous updating of the base year for WPI to the same 2011-12 means the deflator applied to the 109 items captured in value terms in the new IIP (54 in the older series) has also changed, with a more benign wholesale inflation reading automatically lifting the value of the corresponding industrial item. Also, the Central Statistics Office makes clear that the growth rates of the two series are not strictly comparable since the indices for 2011-12 have been normalised to 100 at a monthly level. The breadth and relatively contemporary nature of the data capture — with an increase in the number of reporting factories and the exclusion of shuttered units and restructuring of the items basket — has meant that the information is now appreciably more representative.

Manufacturing sees its weight in the index raised by slightly more than 2 percentage points to 77.63%, while electricity, which now includes renewable sources, has had its weight pared to just under 8% in the new series. And most interestingly, a mechanism in the form of a Technical Review Committee has been put in place to periodically review the products featuring in the item list and to revise the series dynamically. The reviews, to be undertaken separately for both the IIP and the WPI, will help ensure that data pertaining to industrial output and wholesale price inflation will be relatively current and more accurately reflect economic trends. It would be interesting to see to what extent the recent divergence between the IIP and the GDP numbers will narrow, or even disappear, with the new series. While the significance of the IIP figures as a policy determinant cannot be overstated, especially given that the RBI considers it as a key gauge of economic health while reviewing its monetary stance, all data will finally need to stand the scrutiny of consistency and credibility against the conditions prevailing on the ground.

The politics of territory

China’s Belt and Road Initiative is a wake-up call for India: Geography is tied to economics and strategy

f Delhi was conspicuous by its absence at China’s Belt and Road Forum this week in Beijing, it cited a number of reasons for staying away. None of them was more important than the question of India’s sovereignty over Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK), through which an important part of China’s Silk Road Industrial Belt runs. In a statement late on Saturday, hours before President Xi Jinping opened the forum in Beijing, the foreign office in Delhi referred to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and affirmed that “no country can accept a project that ignores its core concerns on sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

Contrary to the warnings of some in Beijing and the fears of many in Delhi, international isolation is not India’s biggest problem as China’s connectivity projects under Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative gather momentum. India is too large an economic and political entity to be isolated by another power. Occupying a critical geographic location, India can contribute to the success of China’s Belt and Road Initiative or create needless complications. India’s real challenge is to match its claims on territorial sovereignty with effective action on the ground.

India’s arguments with China on the BRI have had one important effect. It has helped bring the triangular dynamic between India, Pakistan and China in Jammu and Kashmir into sharp focus. Although the popular discourse in India sees Kashmir as a bilateral issue with Pakistan, China has always made it a three-body problem. Unlike the Anglo-Americans who fancied mediation between India and Pakistan in the past, and the Hurriyat separatists who now pretend to be the third party, it is China that is the real third force in Kashmir.

Beijing is in occupation of a large part of Ladakh in the north-eastern part of J&K. To the west, Pakistan had ceded part of the territory controlled by it to Beijing after the Sino-Indian border conflict of 1962. China’s first trans-border infrastructure project in Kashmir — the Karakoram Highway — dates back to the late 1960s. Since then, China’s presence in Pak-occupied Kashmir has steadily grown. As the CPEC deepens the integration between Pakistan occupied Kashmir and China, Beijing looms larger than ever before over J&K.

Although Delhi did often object at the bureaucratic level to China’s role in PoK, India was continually tempted to sweep the problem under the carpet in the name of larger political solidarity with China. Thanks to Xi’s huge political investment in the BRI, the special importance that Beijing attaches to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, and the intensity of India’s opposition to the CPEC, the triangular nature of the Kashmir question can no longer be masked.

In the last few days, Beijing seemed eager to address India’s sovereignty concerns about CPEC. Delhi was not impressed though, for the pickings seemed meagre. Nevertheless, the effort by the two countries to address the tricky issue of territorial sovereignty in Kashmir are welcome and must continue. While it may be prepared to talk, Beijing is unlikely to suspend work on its economic and strategic projects in Pakistan occupied Kashmir.

Even as it engages in a necessary and patient dialogue with China, Delhi needs to take a number of steps of its own. For one, Delhi must step up the effort to modernise and deepen J&K’s connectivity with the rest of India. Second, Delhi must test the sincerity of the Pakistani and Chinese statements that CPEC is open for Indian participation. Delhi has not been averse to cross-border infrastructure cooperation in Kashmir and it has made specific proposals to both Pakistan and China in the past. Delhi must now articulate a political framework for economic and commercial cooperation across the contested frontiers of Kashmir in all directions.

Third, the Sino-Indian argument on CPEC in Kashmir is deeply connected to the question of Arunachal Pradesh. While China asks India to downplay the sovereignty argument in Pakistan occupied Kashmir, Beijing objects to all Indian activity, political or economic, in Arunachal Pradesh. The state is part of the Indian Union, but is claimed in entirety by China. In Arunachal, Delhi needs to raise its game on accelerating the state’s economic development and its connectivity to the rest of India.

Fourth, Delhi must devote high-level political attention to the long-neglected Andaman and Nicobar islands that sit across China’s planned maritime silk routes in the eastern Indian Ocean. It is only by realising the full strategic potential of the island chain that Delhi can cope with the maritime dimension of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

Fifth, in opting out of the Belt and Road Initiative for now, Delhi has renewed its strong commitment to promoting connectivity with neighbours in the Subcontinent, South East Asia and the Gulf. On Saturday, the foreign office identified a number of projects currently under implementation. There is no doubt that the Modi government has imparted new energy to these projects, some of which date back to the Vajpayee era. Completing these projects quickly is critical for lending credibility to Delhi’s tough posture on the BRI.

Whether it is in Kashmir, Arunachal, the Andamans or the neighbourhood, India’s neglect of its frontier regions has weakened its regional position. Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative promises to worsen that disadvantage, unless Delhi presses ahead with its own connectivity initiatives within and across its frontiers. While the geographic imperative has driven modern China’s strategic policies, it has not been one of independent India’s strengths. But President Xi appears to have shaken India out of its geopolitical stupor.

India’s belated rediscovery of the relationship between geography, economics and strategy is probably one of the more interesting but unintended consequences of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

Farmer suicides in India: myths versus realities

Across states, economic factors such as poverty, bankruptcy, or farming-related issues (crop failures, inability to sell etc.) are the key drivers of farm-related suicides

Fewer farmers than non-farmers commit suicide but they are more likely to kill themselves because of economic distress compared to others

With an ongoing petition in the Supreme Court on farmer suicides , and a growing clamour for farm loan waivers across several states of the country, the debate on farm suicides in India seems to be heating up once again.

Several commentators and researchers have claimed for long that farmers are the most distressed group in the country as their suicide rates are higher than that of others, based on their analysis of National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data. Other researchers have claimed—based on demographic surveys—that farmers are not the most suicide-prone group in the country, and that those who do commit suicide need counselling rather than economic palliatives.

As often happens in a sharply polarized debate, the truth perhaps lies in the middle. And it is possible to get a better handle on it thanks to changes in the way NCRB now provides data on suicides.

Earlier, NCRB used to provide data on farmer suicides, without specifying whether this included agricultural labourers or just cultivators. Most analysts assumed that the farmer suicide data referred only to cultivators and used population figures of cultivators to arrive at the suicide rates. However, in 2014, NCRB began publishing statistics for both agricultural labourers and farmer-cultivators, and it showed that they had so far been including suicides by both groups in their classification of farmer suicides. The old estimates had overestimated farm suicides because of the faulty assumption, it now turned out.

A reconstruction of the suicide rates by economists Deepankar Basu and Kartik Misra of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Debarshi Das of IIT-Guwahati published last year in the Economic and Political Weekly showed that except for Maharashtra and Kerala, the ratio of suicide rates (or the suicide mortality rates, as the researchers describe the rates) for farm-related workers and non-farm-related workers was less than one in all states between 1995 and 2011. Basu and his co-authors used these findings to argue that farmer suicides are a regional problem, not a country-wide phenomenon.

The overall trend of farm-related suicides being lower than non-farm suicide rates seems to hold for the post-2011 period as well, if one normalizes the latest NCRB figures (available till 2015) with estimated population figures. The estimated population figures are based on Central Statistical Organisation’s (CSO) 2016 projection for overall population growth, and on the occupational distribution figures provided by the 2011 census for the distributional split. The latest NCRB figures seem more robust than earlier years, when non-reporting (or zero reported rates of farmer suicides) was a major problem.

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From 2015 onwards, NCRB also began publishing the reasons for farm suicides. And it shows a stark difference between farmers and non-farmers. While only a minority of suicides by non-farmers are due to economic distress, an overwhelming majority of farmers commit suicides because of economic distress, the data shows. Across states, economic factors such as poverty, bankruptcy, or farming-related issues (crop failures, inability to sell etc.) are the key drivers of farm-related suicides.

The evidence seems to suggest that although farm distress may be present in several parts of the country, the problem of farmer suicides—an extreme manifestation of such distress—seems concentrated in a few regions of the country.