Newsclick interviewed Prabir Purkayastha on the US-India agreement on building 6 nuclear reactors in India. According to Purkayastha, the 4th visit of Modi to the US has very little to show as achievements and the deal is being made to revive dying US firm Westinghouse.
Newsclick interviewed Prabir Purkayastha on the US-India agreement on building 6 nuclear reactors in India. According to Purkayastha, the 4th visit of Modi to the US has very little to show as achievements and the deal is being made to revive dying US firm Westinghouse. The reality is that after 8 years of negotiations on the Westinghouse reactors, India has now shifted the location from Mithivirdhi in Gujarat to Srikakulam in Andhra Pradesh. The negotiations for the deal with Westinghouse are still stuck, and only a new beginning is being sought with this new site. All that Westinghouse has agreed is that they will do some preliminary work for this new site -- “start of the preparatory work”. Purkayastha also points out the cost being paid for these reactors which is around 2.8 Lakh crores. He explains that the cost of such nuclear power would be as high as Rs. 12-14 per unit (KWh), or about three to four times that from coal fired plants, and far higher than the wind and solar costs.