A bigger nuclear power plant in the Western Ghats, anyone?
The National Green Tribunal has suspended a plan to expand the Kaiga atomic power plant in the absence of a study of its impact on the fragile ecosystem.
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Editor's note: The Western Ghats are home to hundreds of unique plants, birds, reptiles as well as wild animals, dense forests, waterfalls, cliffs… and a nuclear power plant. Commissioned in the year 2000 in Karnataka’s coastal Karwar taluka, the Kaiga atomic power plant is located in one of the world’s hottest biodiversity hotspots. The plant required clearing evergreen forests in a tiger habitat. Its reactors are cooled by water drawn from the Kali river that originates in the ghats and courses past forests that have, since 2007, been designated as a tiger reserve. This would look like a horror story for lovers of nature and critics of nuclear power (often, but not always, the same people). To some others, this would represent the ultimate techno-utopian setting—where natural heritage coexists with a futuristic and (supposedly) clean source of power. These two sides are usually in conflict. Personally, I’m on the fence about nuclear power and its cleanliness. But Kaiga is a unique example of a debate not just about nuclear safety and economics, but one about trade-offs in a warming world. Recent developments …
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