June 16, 2013
The Struggle
Committee
People’s Movement Against Nuclear
Energy (PMANE)
Idinthakarai & P. O. 627 104
Tirunelveli District
Tamil Nadu
Dear friends:
Greetings! Please allow us to
bring the following to your kind attention in the larger interests of our
country, people and most importantly, our democracy and freedom. As the Fourth
Pillar of our democracy, the media in India plays an important role in the
smooth running of our country and the perpetuation of our democratic heritage.
We are sure that you have noticed
the postponement of the commissioning of the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Project
(KKNPP) to July 2013 without giving any reasons or explanations. It is really
so disappointing and upsetting why no print or visual media in our country asks
the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) or its Department of Atomic Energy (DAE)
about this. There has not been one single editorial in any Indian newspaper or
an informed debate on any TV debate on the repeated postponement of the KKNPP
commission since 2005. Don’t the people of India need to know the reasons
behind this constant postponement and continued ducking and dodging by the
prime minister, central ministers, chief minister, and nuclear officials?
We have been crying from the roof
top that there has been massive corruption in the KKNPP and shoddy, substandard
components and spares have been used in the project, but no mediahouse in India
has shown any interest to probe this issue further. Most of the northern Indian
mediahouses have not even shown any interest in the Koodankulam issue as if we
were not part of India.
Although we cannot complain about
the media coverage of our various struggles and campaigns here in Tamil Nadu
both in the Tamil and the English media, a few irresponsible mediahouses have
been portraying a very negative picture of our movement because of their
connection with the nuclear industry, or their “higher caste” bias, or for
cheap monetary gains. They go for sensationalism, profiteering, and
unprincipled and unprofessional reporting. We would also like to point out that
there have been good reports and analysis about the KKNPP issue but there is
hardly any incisive inquiry into the commissions and omissions of the Indian
nuclear industry in the larger media. Also many mediahouses in India tend to
fall silent when power centers frown at them, or twist their arms.
As a result of the gross failure
of the Fourth Pillar in our democracy, criminals wander about as leaders;
‘Merchants of Venice’ dominate the economic affairs; and all-knowing-scientists
and engineers adopt an anti-people attitude in their mega-development projects.
Consequently, there is rampant corruption, inefficiency, wastefulness,
depression, inflation, regress, and overall moral decay all over the country.
Hence it is high time we
undertook a thorough and comprehensive soul-search about the duties and
responsibilities of the media in India. The Koodankulam struggle can be a
cornerstone for undertaking this analysis.
We would earnestly request you to
do a review of your own mediahouse’s policies and practices and see if you feel
and write for the “ordinary citizens” of India or for the vested interests of
our country and the world. We enclose a write-up pointing out the salient
features of the crippled KKNPP that deserves national attention and nation-wide
debate. If the Indian mediahouses fail to do this, all the Neo-East India
Companies from the United States, Russia, France and everywhere else will come
to dominate our socioeconomic-political affairs and enslave us all over again.
Looking forward to your careful
consideration of our letter and favorable actions, we send you our best
personal regards and all peaceful wishes,
Cordially,
S. P.
Udayakumar M.
Pushparayan F.
Jayakumar M.
P. Jesuraj
Coordinator
R. S.
Muhilan Peter
Milton V.
Rajalingam Ms.
S. Lidwin
Please allow us to bring the
following dangerous developments, difficulties and discrepancies in the
Koodankulam nuclear power project (KKNPP) to your kind consideration and
request your immediate intervention to expose the irregularities and
improprieties in the nuclear energy sector in India and save the people from
massive disasters:
[1] Shoddy and Substandard
Equipment from ZiO-Podolsk, Informtech Etc.
First and the most important of
all, the KKNPP has been constructed with substandard equipment and parts
supplied by ZiO-Podolsk, an engineering subsidiary of the Russian company
Rosatom. The company’s official website has declared unequivocally: “Over the
past few years ZiO produced and implemented a set of equipment for foreign
nuclear power plants with VVER-1000: Tianwan (China), Busher (Iran), Kudankulam
(India)” (http://aozio.ru/production/ob-atom/). ZiO-Podolsk
began shipping shoddy equipment in 2007 or perhaps even earlier. In February 2012,
the procurement director, Mr. Sergei Shutov, was arrested for buying low
quality and cheap raw material, passing it off as more expensive grade and
pocketing the difference. The Federal Security Service, or FSB, the successor
organization to the KGB, has been investigating the case that has serious
implications for the safety of nuclear power plants built by Russia.
During July 15-18, 2012, the
Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) delegation that included Special Secretary
Mr. A. P. Joshi, Deputy Secretary Mr. Ninian Kumar and the Manager of the
Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) Mr. Dzhogesh Pady visited ZiO-Podolsk and
discussed a range of issues related to the preparation for the launch of
KKNPP-1, the progress of the KKNPP-2 etc. and signed a number of contracts
relating to the implementation of the current phase of the KKNPP. (AtomEnergoMash,
Posted 19.07.2012).
However, when we asked the
Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL) under RTI on January 28,
2013 for “a list of those equipment and parts that have been supplied by
Zio-Podolsk to the KKNPP units,” the NPCIL replied tersely on February 20, 2013
(No. NPCIL/VSB/CPIO/2460/HQ/2013/371): “No Information regarding any
investigation against Zio-Podolsk is available to NPCIL.” It is a gross untruth
and deception because the top DAE officials had just visited the ZiO-Podolsk
and they must have followed up the developments. The NPCIL is hiding serious
and important information from the Indian public and misleading the entire
nation possibly to protect some Russian and Indian middlemen and profiteers.
When we asked the Atomic Energy
Regulatory Board (AERB) on January 28, 2013 for “a list of those equipment and
parts that have been supplied by Zio-Podolsk to the KKNPP units” they responded
on February 12, 2013 (No. AERB/RSD/RTI/Appl. No. 329/2013/2421) very evasively:
“Selection of a company for supplying any equipment to NPCIL, is not under the
purview of AERB. However, with respect to Quality Assurance (QA) during design,
construction, commissioning and operation, a set of well established AERB
documents on QA Codes and Guides are published and they were followed during
the safety review of KKNPP.”
Later the NPCIL confirmed
officially (in its letter No. NPCIL/VSB/CPIO/2574/KKNPP/2013/737 dated April
29, 2013) that the controversial and corruption-ridden M/S ZiO Podolsk has
supplied the following equipment and parts to the KKNPP: “Steam Generators,
Cation and anion filters, Mechanical Filter, Moisture Separator and Reheater,
Boric solution storage tanks, Regenerative blow down heat exchanger, Pipelines
and fittings of different systems, Insulation materials, PHRS Heat exchanger.”
In other words, the Koodankulam project in its entirety is unsafe and
dangerous.
Another Russian court has
convicted one Mr. Alexander Murach, Director of another notorious Russian
company, Informtech, for fraud and sentenced him to three years in prison for
selling counterfeit measuring equipment for nuclear and hydro power plants'
turbines. The NPCIL has just confirmed in its letter dated May 24, 2013 (No.
NPCIL/VSB/CPIO/2670/HQ/2013/884) that they have received “Communication
equipment” from Informtech.
Some ten Czech and Slovak
companies have also supplied valves, pumps and cables to the Koodankulam
project. Leoš Tomíček, Executive Vice-president of Rusatom Overseas
says: “We already work with Czechs today. For example, for two blocks of the
Indian Koodankulam nuclear power plant, nine Czech companies supplied us with
valves, pumps, cables and other equipment worth 58 million dollars.” There have
been many cable-related accidents and deaths at the KKNPP. T. S. Subramanian
says in a 2009 article: "Cabling is under way in the state-of-the-art
control room for Unit-1, which is akin to an aircraft’s cockpit. M.I. Joy,
Additional Chief Engineer (Site Planning), KKNPP, said, “Once the cabling is
completed, the entire control of the plant, including the reactor and turbine,
will be done from the control room.” The plant’s control room is
humidity-controlled. “The atmosphere is so pure here that the cables will not
be spoiled,” said Joy.
Since shoddy and substandard
equipment and parts in a massive nuclear power park pose enormous dangers of
epic proportion to millions and millions of innocent people in Tamil Nadu,
Kerala and elsewhere, this issue has to be thoroughly and comprehensively
probed in collaboration with the officials of Rosatom,Atomstroyexport, Federal
Security Service (FSB) and most importantly, with independent nuclear experts
in India.
[2] The Reactor Pressure Vessel
(RPV) Lies!
Izhorskiye Zavody, which is part
of United Machinery Plants (OMZ) holding, signed a contract with India for the
construction of two nuclear reactor bodies for Kudankulam's station in 2002.
They shipped a new nuclear reactor body that would be the first power unit of
India's Kudankulam nuclear power plant to the city's sea port. Yevgeny
Sergeyev, general director of Izhorskiye Zavody, said at a ceremony sending off
the reactor: "We were so sure of our partners that we started to produce
the first reactor bodies four months before the official contract was
signed." Sergeyev said the reactor was completed six months before
deadline (The St Petersburg Times, 19 November 2004, http://sptimes.ru/index.php?action_id=2&story_id=2135).
The Koodankulam reactor pressure
vessel (RPV) arrived at the Tuticorin Port in January 2004. The first unit of
the power plant was expected to be synchronized in December 2007, and the
second unit by December 2008. Mr. S. K. Aggarwal, the then project director
said: "The project officials have targeted to complete the works for
synchronisation of both the units in March and September 2007 respectively.”
The Russian Federal Service for
Ecological, Technological and Nuclear Supervision, Rostekhnadzor, claimed in
2009: “The main causes of violations in the NPP construction works are
insufficient qualifications, and the personnel’s meagre (sic) knowledge of
federal norms and rules, design documentation, and of the technological
processes of equipment manufacturing. In particular, the top management of
Izhorskiye Zavody have been advised of the low quality of the enterprise’s
products and have been warned that sanctions might be enforced, up to
suspending the enterprise’s equipment production licence”
[3] Fiddling with the Reactor
Design and Doing an Unauthorized Refit
When the People’s Movement
Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE)’s dialogue with the Central Government’s Expert
Group got aborted due to the violent attack on us by some anti-social elements,
the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister appointed a team of four members to study the
KKNPP issue. When that group included Dr. M. R. Srinivasan, the former Chairman
of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), we objected to his inclusion in the
team. However, he continued to be part of the team and we did have a dialogue
with the team on February 19, 2012 in Tirunelveli.
During our interaction that was
held in the presence of the Tirunelveli District Collector and other officials,
Dr. Srinivasan never mentioned once that the DAE had made changes in the core
of the reactor. It is also not revealed to the public until now if he and the
team included this unauthorized fiddling in the report they submitted to the
CM. However, Dr. Srinivasan has publicly acknowledged now: "We sought an
additional safety mechanism well before the Fukushima disaster. The safety
mechanism consists of valves. The original reactor design had to be altered and
I feel this is the basic cause for delay." According to him, the valves
were designed partially in India and Russia and compatibility with the reactor
led to some hiccups (http://newindianexpress.com/states/tamil_nadu/article1517314.ece).
After fiddling with the original
design of the KKNPP reactors, the Indian authorities went back and did an
unauthorized “refit” without revealing the details to anyone. All these things
point out the inherent deficiencies of the Russian reactors, their
vulnerability due to all the fiddling, and their untrustworthiness after the
refit. Since this matter has to do with the lives and sustenance of millions
and millions of people, all the relevant details must be made public.
[4] Blaming the Protests for
Atomic Inefficiency and Inept Engineering
The Russian and the Indian
nuclear authorities are hiding their corruption, wastefulness and inefficiency
by conveniently blaming the struggling people for all the delay and cost
overrun. The Indian Express newspaper asserts that the “delay
is on the supply side from Russia as a whole lot of components have been
replaced, some of which had to be shipped in.” The KKNPP sources have also
confessed that the “containment vessel of the nuclear core too has been changed
since the old one had sprung a leak, which was detected three months ago during
testing” (http://newindianexpress.com/states/tamil_nadu/article1517314.ece).
The KKNPP authorities claim that
“most components meant for Unit-II that were already in the warehouse were used
as replacements for Unit-I.” It is not clear why they were kept in the
warehouse since Unit 2 was also being concurrently constructed along with Unit
1. The nuclear authorities are hiding the plain truth that Unit 1 is a complete
failure and hence they are trying to revive it with the parts of Unit 2. Nobody
knows the total loss that India has suffered because of all these shifting and
shuffling.
The Srinivasan-confessed “refit”
of KKNPP-1 is being blamed on its “idling for months together because of a
major agitation plus litigation in the Supreme Court.” This is an outrageous
falsehood! Even when our agitation was going on between September 2011 and
March 2012, regular and full-swing maintenance work was going on at the
Koodankulam plant on a daily basis. When the Tamil Nadu government changed its
stand on our agitation on March 19, 2012 and pushed us to the village of
Idinthakarai, the Site Director of KKNPP Reactors I and II, Mr. R.S.
Sundar, said the “water chemistry” of the water being used in the
coolant was encouraging as proper maintenance had been carried out with
skeletal staff during the protests (P. Sudhakar, “Croatian experts to inspect
the condition of equipment,” The Hindu, March 23, 2012).
Mr. S. T. Arasu, Senior
Maintenance Engineer at KKNPP said: “We have operated all the pumps to measure
the vibration level, which is less than the desirable baseline data and it
shows the quality of our skilled workforce. Though this section could not be
given complete attention during the past five-and-a-half months, the equipment
are functioning in an amazing fashion” (P. Sudhakar, “Employees at Kudankulam
project site a charged lot,” The Hindu, March 24, 2012).
Mr. Yevgeniy N. Dudkin, the head
of the Russian Specialists Group, said that none of the Russian specialists of
Atomstroyexport had left the project site during the protests. He pointed out
that some additional works needed to be done and said, “It is not a huge work…”
(P. Sudhakar and S. Sundar, “Primary coolant pumps to undergo another
trial,” The Hindu, March 29, 2012.)
Similarly, when the Supreme Court
began its hearing on a batch of petitions in September 2012, they refused to
give a ‘stay’ to halt the ongoing work at KKNPP and allowed the authorities to
continue with their work. Accordingly, the AERB allowed fuel loading in
September 2012 dismissing the feelings and sentiments of millions of struggling
people in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Now the Supreme Court has given a green signal
to run the project subject to 15 stringent recommendations.
But the KKNPP, NPCIL, AERB, and
the DAE officials are conveniently blaming their inordinate delay in
commissioning the KKNPP-1 on the “corrosion and leakage since sea water was
used as the coolant.” If the pipes leak and corrode within such a short time,
the government should order a probe into the quality of these pipes, the
quality of the various equipment and spares that were sent by the Russians. If
these pipes and parts cannot withstand one year of sea water circulation, how
are they going to function safely for 40-60 years?
[5] Mounting Costs and Massive
Corruption
Every single deal that India has
signed with Russia has proved to be a disaster and big loss for India. The INS
Vikramaditya/Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier has been delayed by five years
with the final cost hovering in the $2.9 billion range. The time overrun and
cost escalation also plagues another mega Indo-Russian defense deal of
upgrading MiG-29 fighter planes. The KKNPP is yet another disaster.
The approved cost of the KKNPP 1
& 2 project is Rs. 13,171 crores. But the DAE and the NPCIL claim that they
have spent an additional amount of Rs. 4,000 crores on the non-performing
project. Nobody knows the exact end cost of the KKNPP or the breakdown of the
final amount. The former AERB Chief, Dr. A. Gopalakrishnan, has claimed that
the decision to import 40,000 MW capacity Light Water Reactors (LWRs) in
early 2006 was taken without any techno-economic evaluation by the Atomic
Energy Commission (AEC) or any other agency. According to Dr. Gopalakrishnan,
“The decisions, price negotiations and supply terms are being negotiated by the
UPA- 2 government in haste, with the intention of fulfilling the PM’s
commitments to these foreign governments and their companies before he demits
office. …The decision was merely a quid-pro-quo to give business to the reactor
manufacturers in those countries which helped India get a Nuclear Suppliers’
Group (NSG) waiver” (DNA, February 16, 2013).
The Russian nuclear company,
Atomstroyexport, has just released its financial statement for the year 2011.
The company claims that losses in 2011 were twice bigger than the losses of
2010, and that the company is on the brink of bankruptcy. This has seriously
affected the Russian nuclear projects at Koodankulam in India and Busher in
Iran <http://www.interfax.ru/business/txt.asp?id=283928>. We
wonder if the Indian government is secretly helping the Russian company with
its losses and bankruptcy.
The NPCIL authorities have
claimed that the Rs.4,000 crores cost overrun at Koodankulam is due to the
“increase in interest during construction (IDC), escalation on works,
contractor’s overheads and establishment charges” (RTI reply dated February 20,
2013). It is pertinent to note that the Russian government is not making such
financial compensation to India for all the delay and cost overrun in all of
the above projects.
Instead of explaining these
mounting costs and massive irregularities, the Russian Ambassador to India Mr.
Alexander Kadakin simply misleads Indians by unnecessary and unacceptable
comments on our internal affairs. We wonder if the Indian nuclear
establishment is secretly helping the Russian company with its losses and
bankruptcy. We wonder if the Koodankulam financial irregularities involve
both Indian and Russian nuclearocrats, diplomats and politicians.
[6] Commissioning the KKNPP Every
15 Days
Instead of reporting to the
citizens of India inside India about the largest and imported nuclear power
park at Koodankulam, the Prime Minister of India goes to South Africa and
reassures the President of Russia of its commissioning process (no pun
intended). When the Prime Minister had announced in Moscow that the KKNPP would
be commissioned “in a couple of weeks” on December 15, 2011, the Tamil Nadu
Chief Minister expressed her dissent and displeasure immediately.
The calendar for commissioning of
KKNPP-1 has been shifted some 20 times in the past one year by politicians,
bureaucrats and the nuclear authorities. In fact, this “commission dating”
process has been going on from 2005 onwards and the Union Minister of State,
Mr. V. Narayanasamy has set a record of sorts for himself in this calculated
and irresponsible misinformation campaign. All these people have been
lying to the nation repeatedly and recklessly and hence we cannot trust
these authorities with our and our families’ safety and well-being. If there is
any truth and decorum in public life in India, all these officials should resign
from their respective posts.
[7] No Information, No Liability,
No Pollution Safeguard
The Government of India and the
DAE have not shared any basic information with us about the KKNPP. Even after
the Central Information Commission (CIC) has instructed them, they have not
shared the Site Evaluation Report (SER) and the Safety Analysis Report (SAR)
with us. They have not heard our opinions or allayed our fears and concerns
about the lack of fresh water resources, the changes in the design of the
Reactor Pressure Vessel (RPV), the management of liquid and solid waste and so
on.
Neither have the Indian nuclear
authorities got any liability from the Russian government and/or companies for
KKNPP 1 and 2. The Government of India is not even willing to share the secretive
Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) that they signed with the Russian government
in 2008. Even as we are dealing with KKNPP 1 and 2, the Government of India is
announcing the agreement on KKNPP 3 and 4 with utter disregard for the
sentiments of the local people and the people of Tamil Nadu as a whole.
The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control
Board (TNPCB) has also given consent to discharge enormous amounts of sewage,
trade effluent, desalination plant effluent, demineralization effluent, steam
generator effluent, suspended solids, dissolved solids, and many other waste
products into the sea. The TNPCB fixed the temperature of the effluents at the
discharge point as 45 degrees and later summarily reduced it to 36 or 37
degrees. They have also allowed the KKNPP to release significant amounts of
Sulphur Dioxide, Nitrogen Dioxide, particulate matters and many other harmful
radioactive pollutants into the air. Nobody seems to bother about the impact of
all these on the sea, sea food, crops, dairy, food security, nutrition, health
and wellbeing of us, our children and grandchildren.
Furthermore, it is revealed now
that the NPCIL does not hold valid and legitimate clearances for all the
various buildings and installations in the KKNPP from the Tamil Nadu Coastal
Zone Management Authority under the Coastal Regulation Zone Notification of
2011.
[8] The Tamils Get Elegy and the
Others Get Energy!
Even though the Tamil Nadu Chief
Minister has written to the Prime Minister on March 31,
April 25 and August 19, 2012, demanding all the power from the KKNPP to Tamil
Nadu, the Prime Minister or his PMO never even acknowledged those letters.
Earlier the CM had demanded more power from the Central Pool and financial help
for various power generation schemes, but the UPA government always ignored her
genuine requests and earnest efforts.
If this is the way the UPA
government treats the Chief Minister of an important State and popular leader
of millions of Tamil people, one can possibly imagine the feelings and attitude
they may have towards the poorest of the poor who have been struggling on our
own for almost two years now. The Congress Party and the UPA government seem to
have scant regards for the Tamil fishermen, Tamil women, and the Tamil people
as a whole.
It is also strange that our
neighboring states would not share the Nature-given river waters with us but
we, the Tamil people, have to suffer nuclear waste, thermal pollution, saline
refuse, and most importantly, nuclear radiation and give them all risk-free electricity.
It is quite preposterous that the Congress government in Kerala stakes a claim
for 500 MW from the KKNPP; in fact, the Congress governments in Delhi and
Thiruvananthapuram can together decide to set up a few nuclear power plants
somewhere in Kerala. The intelligent and Nature-loving people of Kerala would
never allow that and the political parties there, whether Congress or
Communists or BJP or others, would never let that happen also.
Given the above situation, may we
request you to demand an inquiry into the construction, equipment, overall
quality, performance and the viability of the entire Koodankulam nuclear power
project; removal of the fuel rods from the core of the Unit 1 reactor;
conversion of the KKNPP into a pro-people and Nature-friendlyModel New Energy
Park; bringing about renewable energy projects all over our country; rectifying
the transmission and distribution issues, and protecting the interests and
well-being of the Tamil people and our progeny please.
If we let this shoddy, substandard,
unsafe, and corruption-ridden nuclear power project to go critical and fail in
our collective historic duty to protect our people, preserve our Natural
resources and prop up the interests of newborn and unborn generations of India,
we all will be held responsible and answerable for all the upcoming calamities
and uncalculable harms to our people.