Uranium sales to India will not start quickly: Gillard

[Fireurimagination]

Uranium sales to India will not start quickly: Gillard

Sydney, Oct 16 (IANS) Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who is on a three-day trip to India, has said that uranium sales to India will not start quickly and a safeguard agreement may take one or two years, it was reported here.

Gillard hosed down any suggestions that uranium sales to India will start quickly, saying that negotiating a safeguard agreement is likely to take one or two years, rather than months, reported Sydney Morning Herald from New Delhi.

She is in the Indian capital to clear the way for negotiations to begin on a safeguards agreement.
She said Australia knew how to negotiate a proper agreement to ensure uranium was used for peaceful purposes, the media report quoted the Australian prime minister as saying.
The launch of nuclear negotiations will pave the way for the sealing of a civilian nuclear deal, and will remove the last stumbling block in accelerating bilateral ties.

Gillard said that action had been taken to ensure the welfare of Indian students and the ban on uranium exports to India had been lifted.

She had visited India as deputy prime minister and education minister to deal with the tensions over violence towards Indian students in Melbourne some years ago.

Australia is home to 450,000 Indians. The attacks on Indian students in Australia a couple of years ago have not dimmed the appeal of that country as an education destination with the Australian government launching a multi-pronged plan to prevent such attacks. Currently, there are about 36,000 Indian students who are studying in Australia.

During her three-day trip that began Monday, Gillard will hold talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during which the prospects of civil nuclear cooperation and intensification of relations in areas like trade and investment, science and technology and education will figure in the discussions.

One or two years WTH what kind of agreement are they drafting?

 

[INDIC]

Not a problem, our nuclear power plants are not going to completed very soon.

 

[illusion8]

Yes Mrs Australian - your safeguard amounts to jack when it comes to u selling Uranium to your biggest buyer from there it makes it's way to NK, Pakistan and most probably Iran and you are worried about our safeguard. Take this BullSh!t somewhere else.

 

[janon]

Yes Mrs Australian - your safeguard amounts to jack when it comes to u selling Uranium to your biggest buyer from there it makes it's way to NK, Pakistan and most probably Iran and you are worried about our safeguard. Take this BullSh!t somewhere else.

It doesn't matter if it takes that long - our nuclear plants that are being built are not going to be ready for some time. Currently fuel is not the constraint, it's the number of nuke plants.

The fact that they lifted the ban indicated tacit admission from them that India is a nuclear power, and that is not going to change. The fact that the international community has come to accept this is a huge victory for us. They can build as many safeguards as they want - our own reserves will provide for our military program.

 

[anilindia]

 

[mfreak]

These Aussies are not very big when it comes to power, but they talk big. Because they have Uranium. India has 25% or so of the world's Thorium deposits I guess. We have been and can continue using that for both military and civil nuclear purposes even if Australia follows its policy of not selling to non NPT signatories. They have to understand they need India more than we need them. I guess this lifting of the ban itself is a tacit admission of that fact.

But guess they are more worried about uranium exported being used for military purposes.

 

[Kloitra]

These Aussies are not very big when it comes to power, but they talk big. Because they have Uranium. India has 25% or so of the world's Thorium deposits I guess. We have been and can continue using that for both military and civil nuclear purposes even if Australia follows its policy of not selling to non NPT signatories. They have to understand they need India more than we need them. I guess this lifting of the ban itself is a tacit admission of that fact.

But guess they are more worried about uranium exported being used for military purposes.

No we are not, at least not for few more years.
But once we build and run those thorium plants successfully, we wont need uranium for civilian purposes.

OT: what is surprising about it. Which deal was ever finished in short time? It is still faster than most other deals, civilian or military.

 

[perplexed]

When they can literally eat their own words and grant India the status of nuke power, they can deliver it too when we ask for it..

 

[mfreak]

No we are not, at least not for few more years.
But once we build and run those thorium plants successfully, we wont need uranium for civilian purposes.

OT: what is surprising about it. Which deal was ever finished in short time? It is still faster than most other deals, civilian or military.

I thought we were? Uranium exports were banned for India since 74. Since then, whatever nuke plants we have operated, run on Thorium!! Thats What I thought!

Yes I am partially right. India does have Thorium plants, but not all.

INDIA LEADS THE WAY

In the last ten years, India's fast economic growth has doubled its electricity consumption – nuclear power supplies less than 5% of this, largely because the country's uranium reserves are small. India does, however, have large thorium reserves – about six times more than uranium. The country has therefore made thorium a major goal in its nuclear power programme.
India's Kakrapar-1 was the first reactor in the world to use thorium rather than depleted uranium to achieve power flattening across the reactor core. Both Kakrapar-1 and -2 units are loaded with 500kg of thorium fuel to improve their operation at start-up.
In 1995, Kakrapar-1 achieved about 300 days of full power operation and Kakrapar-2 about 100 days using thorium fuel. A 30kW mini-reactor has successfully operated at India's Kamini reactor at Kalpakkam. And the use of thorium-based fuel is planned in Kaiga-1 and -2 and Rajasthan-3 and -4 (Rawatbhata) reactors.

http://www.power-technology.com/features/feature1141/

 

[karan21]

Aww chalo hasina maan to gayi. Aaab next time when she comes she will being come with her.

 

[vk17]

I am really waiting to see for some more substantial development in Thorium Reactors, though we have soem good news in recently about India's operational Kakrapar-1 reactor which is the world's first reactor which uses thorium rather than depleted uranium to achieve power flattening across the reactor core.

India, which has about 25% of the world's thorium reserves,
and is developing a 300 MW prototype of a thorium-based Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR).
The prototype is expected to be fully operational by 2013, after which five more reactors will be constructed.

The reactor is a fast breeder reactor and uses a plutonium core rather than an accelerator to produce neutrons. As accelerator-based systems can operate at sub-criticality they could be developed too, but that would require more research.

India currently envisages meeting 30% of its electricity demand through thorium-based reactors by 2050.

Good news for us is that United States has second largest thorium reserves, therefore we can use their huge expertise in Nuclear energy field for Thorium Plants!! I think JV with US for research and development in this field of Thorium based Nuclear Plant for civilian purpose might happen in coming years!

Source: Thorium - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[faithfulguy]

So India has or uranium plant, no thorium plant, so this is another thread about the future. India will always be the nation of tomorrow

 

[kurup]

I am really waiting to see for some more substantial development in Thorium Reactors, though we have soem good news in recently about India's operational Kakrapar-1 reactor which is the world's first reactor which uses thorium rather than depleted uranium to achieve power flattening across the reactor core.

India, which has about 25% of the world's thorium reserves,
and is developing a 300 MW prototype of a thorium-based Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR).
The prototype is expected to be fully operational by 2013, after which five more reactors will be constructed.

The reactor is a fast breeder reactor and uses a plutonium core rather than an accelerator to produce neutrons. As accelerator-based systems can operate at sub-criticality they could be developed too, but that would require more research.

India currently envisages meeting 30% of its electricity demand through thorium-based reactors by 2050.

Good news for us is that United States has second largest thorium reserves, therefore we can use their huge expertise in Nuclear energy field for Thorium Plants!! I think JV with US for research and development in this field of Thorium based Nuclear Plant for civilian purpose might happen in coming years!

Source: Thorium - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Also ,

India's 300 MWe AHWR (pressurized heavy water reactor) reactor began construction in 2011. The design envisages a start up with reactor grade plutonium which will breed U-233 from Th-232. After that the input will only be thorium for the rest of the reactor's design life

Nuclear Energy Encyclopedia: Science, Technology, and Applications - Google Books

You can read more about India's Thorium Research here - India's three-stage nuclear power programme - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


And haters just STFU .....

 

[Kloitra]

I thought we were? Uranium exports were banned for India since 74. Since then, whatever nuke plants we have operated, run on Thorium!! Thats What I thought!

Yes I am partially right. India does have Thorium plants, but not all.

INDIA LEADS THE WAY

In the last ten years, India's fast economic growth has doubled its electricity consumption – nuclear power supplies less than 5% of this, largely because the country's uranium reserves are small. India does, however, have large thorium reserves – about six times more than uranium. The country has therefore made thorium a major goal in its nuclear power programme.
India's Kakrapar-1 was the first reactor in the world to use thorium rather than depleted uranium to achieve power flattening across the reactor core. Both Kakrapar-1 and -2 units are loaded with 500kg of thorium fuel to improve their operation at start-up.
In 1995, Kakrapar-1 achieved about 300 days of full power operation and Kakrapar-2 about 100 days using thorium fuel. A 30kW mini-reactor has successfully operated at India's Kamini reactor at Kalpakkam. And the use of thorium-based fuel is planned in Kaiga-1 and -2 and Rajasthan-3 and -4 (Rawatbhata) reactors.

http://www.power-technology.com/features/feature1141/

As far as I know, after talking to people from DAE/BARC, they are experimental plants. It has been a long time, and none I talked were from plants themselves but other divisions. What I know is there is still some time where we could say we have a (non-experimental) thorium reactor.

http://www.dae.nic.in/writereaddata/lsus1721.pdf

Read the last answer, hope this clears all.

And no, we were not completely without U. This is how we managed nukes. Thorium cycle doesnt gives you weapons grade U/Pu. We had sufficient (for then) U to get nukes.
Th had just been used as experiment.

 

[Kloitra]

So India has or uranium plant, no thorium plant, so this is another thread about the future. India will always be the nation of tomorrow

Read the topic, and the opening post before commenting.