By Alexander Villafania
INQUIRER.NET
MANILA, Philippines – The campaign season is in full swing and so some of the public executives are in hot pursuit of getting voters’ attention. This means many topics up for discussion are left unfinished, one of which is on nuclear power that was once hot topic among legislators especially with attempts to reactivate the mothballed Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP).
Quietly, while everyone is busy with electioneering, a team of researchers from the Senate Economic Planning Office (SEPO) released their policy brief on the country’s nuclear power capabilities.
The policy brief entitled “Powering the Future: Are We Ready for Nuclear Energy” identifies the Philippines’ current power resources and requirements, comparative power status with other countries, as well as the local and national regulations that the Philippines has to discuss and enforce before coming up with nuclear policies.
The policy brief was prepared by Harry Pasimio, Jr. and Peter Turingan and finished last September. A downloadable version is found in the official website of the Philippine Senate.
The brief uses reports from local and international reports as well.
It identified that the Philippines’ current power demand is pegged at about 9,700 megawatts for the entire country and continues to grow as the population grows.
By 2017, peak power demand would reach at least 13,000 megawatts.
Nearly 50 percent of this power is produced oil and coal based power plants. Another 21 percent is hydroelectric, 17 percent is from natural gas and 12 percent is from geothermal.
However, even with about 30 percent of power produced is coming from renewable energy, the majority of the plants are using fossil fuel, which produces 4,078 metric tons of carbon dioxide per gigawatt-hour.
Carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, is associated with the negative effects of climate change. The Philippine government has also been working to reduce carbon emissions.
The increased power demand and plans to reduce ozone-depleting greenhouse gases are pushing options to look into cost-effective and environment-friendly power sources. Nuclear power thus became a major point of contention from legislators, scientists and environmentalists.
In particular was the proposal by Congressman Mark Cojuangco to revive the BNPP, which drew criticism from some scientists who said that the interpretation of certain scientific results were skewed by Cojuangco to justify the dilapidated plant’s reactivation.
Given these situations, the policy brief made one conclusion: that the realization of the country’s nuclear plans would take years to complete unless the government implements many measures to ensure that nuclear power is safely established, distributed, disposed and regulated.
“Current efforts in both Houses of Congress to fast track the rehabilitation and operation of the BNPP are akin to putting the cart before the horse. Before the government can operate the BNPP or any other NPP for that matter, it must first undertake the preliminary business of getting its nuclear power program back on track by updating the scientific/technical, legislative, and regulatory frameworks that will guide the development of the country’s nuclear power industry.”
The points raised by the SEPO policy brief already points to a problem that legislators must first act on before rushing into having nuclear power. Hopefully, these points will be remembered by the next set of legislators after next year’s elections.
13 Feedbacks on "Senate study on nuke power: RP still long way off"
Sage
The writer did not mention the cost of electricity from nuclear. I work here in Canada, for residential, the equivalent to PHP2.5 per KWH is the cost of energy which is four times the rate back home. The average wage in Canada is more than 10 times that of the Philippines. Isipin nyo lang kung gaanong pagpapahirap yon. I am for Nuclear if it will mean cheaper electricity. As usual, it’s going to be foreign technology, foreign expertise and foreign fuel.
cpulimit
@sage:
is that the generation cost? or the total per kwh cost charged on consumers? You’re missing the fact that there are higher costs of operation in Canada. Taxes are higher, distribution costs are higher (canada has a much larger land-mass), wages and salaries are higher…
You can’t make a direct apples to oranges comparison involving costs where canada and the philippines are concerned.
It is a fact however, that where per unit mass of fuel is concerned, nuke just wins out by far over coal and oil in terms of power production. Nobody is disputing the average costs. What’s in question is the whether the country has the necessary prerequisites for the safe and sustainable adoption of nuclear power.
Hitech
We dont want to deny, suppress or deprive Filipinos of Nuclear technology…at least we must learn it… nukes are already in medicine, various industries, ships, satellites, etc.. soon it may be on cars. It would be a big shame if our country and people are ignorant of this technology.
Dont be like the early church who condemned Galileo because he said the earth is round and revolves around the sun!!!
Clive
Such a shame that the role of CO2 is so gravely misunderstood, that this life-sustaining gas is being ignorantly demonised on the backof a purely political UNIPCC. This is the gas of life without which we would not be alive and neither would there be a world as we know it. As any chemistry student knows plants and the biosphere will only thrive with plenty of CO2 which should be greater than 200ppmv for active spread. CO2 is a trace gas which can no way be effective on our climate, which is being affected by celestial dynamic and natural forces way beyond what puny man can effect.
So what does this tell us?
It tells us that propaganda is alive and kicking for government control reasons, worldwide.
It tells us there is a case for more truthful education education, divorced from fear generated untruths about a situation dreamed up in Europe in the 70’s (Club of Rome) and used for unscrupulous reasons by unscrupulous people. Climate changes are natural, always have been, and is now in a cooling phase.
Get the truth and wise-up. AGW is for suckers.
Mark Cojuangco
Di mo ba po alam na ang rate ngayon dito is 4.5+pesos per Kwh, wholesale.
Di ba almost doble ito ng 2.5 pesos?
Ano ba po ang inirereclamo ninyo?
Hindi ba po mas mura ito?
Sage
Correction on my comment above. I meant the rate of electricity in the Philippines is 3 times higher than the rate in Canada - Manitoba Hydro rate: $.06per kwh, Phil rate $.175per kwh according to ASEAN Power Utilities/Authorities.
Miko Alino
The costs of producing electricity from nuclear energy is expected to shoot up if investors would consider the expenses in disposing nuclear waste (or spent fuel), which unfortunately has been a major problem for countries like Germany and France. While there are facilities available for storing such waste, the existing storages have not been successful in keeping them safe from contaminating surrounding areas. I am even mentioning the external costs of nuclear energy, which ranges from the environmental damage caused by the extraction of raw materials to potential health costs of people at risk of contamination.
andy
I’m for nuclear power in the Philippines because it’s one of the most and cheapest sources of energy. With this day and age, nuclear technology is extremely safe as compared to the past many years, for as long as maintenance procedure and the safe operation are strictly followed, there’s nothing to worry about meltdown.
cebzki patuzki
Clive,
I agree entire with you…this global warming is more of a political than scientific…that is why politicians are riding high on this as well as pot smoking Hollywood celebs.
Read what NASA has to comment on James Hansen, that foster boy of global warming enthusiasts.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/01/27/james-hansens-former-nasa-supervisor-declares-himself-a-skeptic-says-hansen-embarrassed-nasa-was-never-muzzled/
How about this; British Met Office
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/11/climate-change-science-pope
And this,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/11/climate-change-misleading-claims
When Gloria announced to the world that ondoy was the result of climate change caused by the greenhouse gases produced by industrialized countries and they should pay the Philippines.
She only displayed her lack of understanding and advice from her experts. i doubt if she consulted them before making that announcement.
She made herself a laughing stock around the world. Biglang nagka utang pa sila tuloy sa atin..imbes na tumutulong na nga…malay natin baka they even withheld their assistance kc instead na thankful ang Philippines eh nagmukhang naniningil pa tayo sa kanila…
Grace
Electricity cost is also a function of a power distributor’s efficiency, not just of power generation per se. Hindi lang cost ang usapin dito. And when we talk of efficiency, so many things come into play that is also quite beyond a power distributor’s control like the ability of consumers to cross-subsidize each other.
Having said that, I believe we should keep our options open as far as nuclear power is concerned especially now that macro hydroelectric sources are becoming socially objectionable to many. We are one of the top geothermal producers in the world but no great strides seem to be happening in that area lately.
Re CO2, some may question the science but the fact is, it’s no longer a politically defensible position to do so and we may have to live with a world order that “demonizes” fossil fuels. The better question for a country like the Philippines is how do we adopt to this reality.
thwacker
Spent fuel can be reprocess like what Japan is doing now or you could sell the spent pellets as depleted uranium.
nelh
A lot of people are scraming against Nuclear Power Plant operation and im pretty sure thay dont have any experience on how this equipment works. - I suggest that skilled engineers/nuclear scientest with exposure on this equipment should explain the advantages/disadvantages of this Plant. - “Masyadong maingay ang mga taong walang alam”.
A lot of skilled pinoy engineers and scientest are available and even excelled at other counties at nasayang lang
Ang maingay ay yung mga lawyers na wala naman alam sa trabahong technical-
What we need now are Leader who has guts, experience and vision in our country.
Lastly, Wag sayangin ang mga boto sa mga taong maiingay at walang nagawa sa senate at kulang pa sa exposure - dahil kung sa sunod ay magulo/corrupt parin ang susunod na Presedenti, mas maigi kung military na ang humawak sa atin.
Chris
The thing is, Andy, do we even have the funds for such a venture, or would the operation be free of corruption? If Chernobyl can’t be fixed by Russia, how would we fare? Also, unlike many countries which tap this kind of power, we don’t have that much funds to import nuclear fuel, or have our own sources for that matter, as far as I know. I know reviving the BNPP was proposed with good intentions, but we’ll be better off if we can’t make a good job out of it.
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