Pleas galore for dumping nuke Bill
Environmental activists send 36,000 messages; PMO forced to switch off some of its fax numbers
Opponents to the contentious Nuclear Liability Bill flooded the Prime Minister’s Office with thousands of appeals, urging Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to revoke the Bill that seeks to fix an upper limit to the compensation package for the operators of commercial nuclear plants.
With tacit support from political parties, environmental activists Greenpeace faxed 36,000 messages to 7 Race Course Road compelling the PMO to switch off some of its publicly known fax numbers since Friday.
Signed by different individual and myriad groups, the appeals are for dropping the Bill for the moment and go for a country-wide consultation.The activists have approached MPs in both the Houses requesting them not to support the Bill that, they argued, would only further the nuclear industry’s interest.
The Bill seems to suggest that Indian taxpayers would have to bear the bulk of compensation package rather than nuclear operators, in case of any nuclear accident a la Chernobyl or Three Miles Island.The government, however, wants to ready the legislation before US President Barak Obama’s visit later this year.
Nuclear liability is determined by three documents — International Atomic Energy Agency’s Vienna Convention on civil liability for nuclear damage of 1963, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Paris Convention on third party liability in the field of nuclear energy of 1960 and Brussels Supplementary Convention in 1963. These conventions were linked by a joint protocol adopted in 1988.
According to these documents, liability of a nuclear operator is limited with regard to financial compensation. The ceiling is 300 million special drawing rights (SDR) which tantamount to 360 million Euro.
In the Centre’s civil liability for nuclear damage bill, 300 million SDR is believed to have been translated into the 300 to $ 450 million (roughly Rs 500 crore), which would be the upper ceiling for operator’s compensation. The rest, close to Rs 2,400 crore would be the state’s responsibility — in other words, taxpayers’ money.The proposed Bill seeks to set up a nuclear damage claims commission as well for claim disbursement.
Risky area
Initially operator’s responsibility was kept lower at the global level to attract private investment in nuclear industry as it was considered a risky area for business. But there is a global understanding that since the industry matured over the last 50 years, the compensation package could be revised.
In 2004, contracting parties to the OECD Paris and Brussels Conventions began a fresh process to amend the existing documents for widening the scope of nuclear damage and hike the compensation package accordingly.
New liability limits were set for operators (insured) 700 million euro, installation state (public funds) 500 million euro and collective state contribution of 300 million euro — total liability of 1,500 million euro.
The new protocols are expected to be ratified by individual countries once they consulted with industry stakeholders and then drafted the necessary legislation. As of now, they are not yet in force and the old limits still apply.The liability documents have been modified over the last 12 years to recognise long-term ecological impacts of nuclear accidents and also widen the time frame for making the compensation claim. But states with a majority of the world’s 440 nuclear power reactors — USA, UK, Russia, Japan, Canada, Finland and China are not yet party to any international nuclear liability convention though all of them have their national laws.
BILL (BOARD)
The Bill seeks to fix an upper limit to the compensation package for commercial
nuclear plant operators
Taxpayers will have to bear the bulk of compensation package in case of any
nuclear accident
The Bill seeks to set up nuclear damage claims commission for claim disbursement
