SC satisfied with KNPP safety directions

The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a petition to stall commissioning of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) in Tamil Nadu, while expressing satisfaction over the steps taken by the authorities to ensure safety standards.

A bench of Justices K S Radhakrishnan and Vikramjit Sen rejected a plea to appoint a committee headed by a former Chairman of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) to review the safety measures and to further examine if the directions issued by the apex court in its May 2013 verdict were being properly implemented.

After examining the responses filed by the Nuclear Safety Corporation of India Ltd, AERB and the Tamil Nadu government, the court did not find any reason to issue any further directions on the petition by anti-nuclear activist G Sudarrajan. It noted that authorities had taken adequate steps towards storage of spent nuclear fuel, transporation of such fuel, heat control, disaster management and other pertinent issues.

“The directions given by this court are being properly addressed by the respondents and there is no laxity on the part of the respondents in not carrying out various directions of this court,” the bench said.

The bench added that for implementation with all its directions, the authorities will require some more time.

In May last year, the court had given its go ahead for the plant to the government while directing it to comply with a set of safety measures before commissioning it.

Those directions were divided into short-term and long-term measures.

Asserting that India cannot afford to be a nuclear isolated nation, the apex court had had accorded its approval to the national policy for establishment of KNPP. In a fresh plea, the petitioner, however, claimed that the AERB had on July 4 given a clearance for commissioning of the nuclear plant without satisfying itself that all the requirements had been complied with as per the court’s directives.
He also claimed that the authorities used sub-standard equipment and failed to decide location of the spent fuel permanent repository.
DH News Service