My Blogs : Nuclear Issues ; Radiation Protection Issues ; My Voice

My Website : www.radsafetyinfo.com

Friday, June 29, 2007

HYDROGEN ENERGY IS THE ANSWER TO CONTROL GLOBAL WARMING

It is time that everybody world over realize that Global Warming scenario is much more serious than expected by the scientific community. The major two contributors for the emission of greenhouse gases responsible for global warming are the power sector and surface transportation, i.e., automobiles using diesel, petrol and gas. Fusil fuels used in the thermal power plants, coal or gas – based, are the ones which emit carbon dioxide, a “popular” greenhouse gas. India government has a separate ministry called The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy to promote alternate routes, such as solar, wind, etc. for generation of electricity. It is reported that the government is also setting up a National Centre for Hydrogen Energy and Fuel Cell Technology for carrying out the necessary R & D in the field of using “clean energy” (without emission of any greenhouse gases) from the application of hydrogen for meeting the energy requirements.

Governments, world-over should wake up to the reality, and develop / promote, on war footing, the hydrogen generation / storage capacity using appropriate technologies, and co-ordinate the efforts in this all important issue to prevent further global warming.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

BUFFER ZONE AROUND HAZARDOUS UNITS

The so-called “buffer zone” around hazardous plants is not new. It is used as part of Defense-in-depth concept in siting of nuclear power reactors. So many lives (in thousands) would not have lost in Bhopal (in the State of Madhya Pradesh, India) chemical gas leakage disaster if the concept of defense-in-depth were used while siting the plant. The basic problem everywhere is: to begin with, the hazardous industries are located far away from the populated areas or city limits. But in due course of time, the city limit expands, population density increases and so is the health risk. In-spite of best design and efforts, accidents can still happen and the risk of fatalities due the accidents in the plant increases to unacceptable levels. This is particularly true when the housing colonies for the staff members of the plant are located close-by for operational convenience of the plants.

The lesson learned fro the Bhopal incident should never be forgotten. The defense-in-depth concept of exclusion zone (1.6 km) and Sterilized zone (5 km), together called Buffer zone should be followed while locating hazardous industrial units, including nuclear fuel cycle facilities, for the safety of the resident workers and public in general. The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) of India Government has rightly decided (as per news paper reports) to relocate personnel around big industrial units using hazardous chemicals to create a “buffer zone” to mitigate the effects of any serious accidents.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

WHERE IS PURE MILK?

It is a shocking revelation in the news papers that 25% of the milk in the state of Maharashtra is adulterated at the dairy levels itself. This is besides possible adulteration at different other levels in the long chain of milk supply to the consumers. As usual, the government appoints committees involving dairy department, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and officials from Home ministry to look into the matter; high-level meetings are held and recommendations are made again and again.

It was found out that the milk adulteration is a small scale industry in itself. The chemicals used, besides water for adulteration are: starch, caustic soda, oil, sugar and even detergents! These chemicals are biologically dangerous. They can cause gastro-intestinal problems and even cancer. Not that the country does not have enough legislation to curb this menace. There are Food Adulteration Act-1954 and Food Safety and Standards Act-2006 to tackle such situations. But who cares? Government is only promoting one more small scale industry!

Monday, June 11, 2007

PRIVATISING / OUTSOURCING FOR WHOSE FUTURE?

The buzz words these days are outsourcing and privatising, where government or semi government organizations give away their assigned jobs and responsibilities to private parties. As we all know, the organizations are provided with adequate manpower, initially to carryout the jobs and the government is held responsible if the jobs are not done or not done properly. Now, due to the so-called manpower shortage or growing indiscipline in the government workforce, city services and even the sensitive jobs/responsibilities of some of the departments are outsourced under very small pretexts. The long term results of such actions are bound to be:
1. Favoritism in giving the contracts to “connected” people. Opinions of expert committee’s comments will be ignored. More often, such procedures may not be followed or followed for namesake only.
2. Contractors may not be suitably qualified for the job. The actual job responsibilities, as written on the contract are not known to the supervisory level staff or not transparent.
3. Due to the corruption while giving the contract, not much control can be exercised over the contractors by the departmental supervisors.
4. The existing staff members recruited for the jobs will be wailing away their time doing nothing or doing personal things and waiting for the retirement. Redeployment of specialist workers is difficult.
5. In due course of time, the hold of private organizations over the essential services, such as water supply, supply of electricity will result in resistance to comply or non-compliance with the requirements stipulated by the government. Public will be at the mercy of private organizations. Government can wash off their hands blaming private organizations?

Tuesday, June 5, 2007

GLOBAL WARMING POTENTIALS (GWP)

World Environment Day is commemorated each year on June 5 to enhance the awareness regarding our environment. As on today, greenhouse gas emissions and the resulting climate change, i.e., global warming is the global issue of great concern.

Climate change is generally understood as change of the climate on a large scale of space and time as a result of anthropogenic activities which are not of natural origin. Greenhouse gas effect is the increase of the heat content of the environment due to absorption or trapping of the infrared heat by the greenhouse gases. The concentration levels of the greenhouse gases are increasing by the industrial activities, mainly from fossil fuel fired power plants. Global warming is only a part of the greenhouse effect. Some of the typical greenhouse gases are CO2, CH4, N2O and CF4.

Assuming CO2 as the reference GHG, the effect of other greenhouse gases is expressed in the CO2 equivalents. This conversion factor is called Global Warming Potential (GWP). This is the ratio of the time integrated radiative forcing of the atmosphere due to an instantaneous release of 1 kg of a greenhouse gas relative to that of 1 kg of CO2. It is reported that for a time horizon of 20 years, the GWP for methane (CH4) is 35 times higher and for nitrous dioxide (N2O), it is 260 times higher than carbon dioxide (CO2).

The implication of this finding is that even though the release of CH4 and N2O may be in small quantities as compared to CO2 in some industries, the greenhouse effect can be more severe than CO2 and hence needs proper understanding and assessment of its overall contribution to global warming. For example, in ultimate analysis, the contribution from global warming due to the release of methane (from the decay of submerged forestry and vegetation) in hydroelectric power generation may be comparable to the CO2 release from fossil fuel powered plants! Any comments?

Sunday, June 3, 2007

GLOBAL GOAL – DELAY THE GLOBAL WARMING

G-8 Summit, that is the group of 8 Industrialized Countries, is on the way in Germany. India and China are the two out of the five invitees to the summit. The countries are also the rapidly growing economies in the world today. As reported, the US is emitting more greenhouse gases than the emissions from the two countries combined! Again, US will use the arm-twisting technique (the way it is trying in nuclear deal) to force India to control its emissions. One has to watch and see whether India is bold enough to say: let US mind its own business and first curtail its own greenhouse gas emissions as per the Kyoto Protocol. Every nation has a right to develop and improve its standards of living.

If at all the emissions have to be curtailed on industrialization, let the so called developed and industrialized nations provide the clean technology to developing nations to process the environmental releases so that greenhouse gas emissions are under control. It should be provided free for countries which can not afford the technology.

Global goal should be to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and delay the frightening global warming scenarios as long as possible.

GUJJARS AS SCHEDULED TRIBES?

Even after 60 years of independence, well known communities such as Gujjar community in the State of Rajastan in India are fighting for the status of schedule tribes (ST) to reap the quota benefits! Generally, people fight to have a better status in society but here the gujjars claim they are schedule tribes! So many lives were lost seeking the quota benefits. It is high time that the government should curtail the quota benefits significantly so that it is not worthwhile for the communities to fight claiming that they are still tribals. It is reported that the union government had earlier rejected their demand since they are not fulfilling the requirements to be called as tribals.

As long as the caste system, and the unnecessary benefits bestowed on some communities come to an end, the country will remain undeveloped in a real sense of open, happy and ONE society.