The asean path to nuclear power starts in thailand

The announcement was made by Vitavas Srivihok, director-general of Asean Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during two regional energy forums.

Normally, such a general statement means nothing in practice; it is just diplomacy before regional gatherings. But this time it might be different.        

"Dr Surin Pitsuwan will be Asean's secretary-general from August. We will use this opportunity to push energy and global warming to the top of the agenda under our leadership," said Vitavas.       

"Both issues are important global concerns. We will strengthen cooperation between Asean countries and our partners China, Japan and Korea in these areas," he explained.         

Without going into detail, this statement is plain, but there are interesting signals on topics for the two regional energy forums: nuclear and biofuels.       

Officially, the two forums are the Asean 3 Forum on Nuclear Energy Safety and the East Asia Summit (EAS) Workshop on Biofuels. "This is an academic forum," stressed the Foreign Ministry senior official, who co-organised the forums.

Another interesting point is that this is the first time the Foreign Ministry has worked closely with the Energy Ministry on "energy diplomacy". It is one activity under the Bt1.8 billion budget for the  integration of foreign affairs with other ministries in various activities.

 Nuclear and biofuels both release less carbon dioxide, which could help combat global warming, and both are non-oil energy sources, which could help reduce the oil crisis. In the short term, biofuels will provide a solution. In the long term, nuclear power may be the best way to fight global warming, and the agenda will be implemented through cooperation within Asean.

Thailand would like to play a "pioneer" role in biofuels and join other nations to push for nuclear power projects in the region.

"We have experience in biofuels, especially the widespread use of gasohol. We also use bio-diesel in the transportation sector, the only one of ten Asean members to do so," Energy Minister Poonpirom Liptapanlop said.

Poonpirom also revealed the latest policy on biofuels. "The Thai Ministry of Energy has now revised the target of growth for renewable energy usage in Thailand over the next four years to be at least 10 per cent of total energy consumption. Specifically, we set the target for oil substitution with biofuel products such as ethanol at up to 2.4 million litres per day, and bio-diesel at up to 3 million litres per day, by 2011," the energy minister said.

On the nuclear issue, the safety implications might be worrying for the anti-nuclear lobby. But after years of unclear and unconfirmed rumours, it is now official that Asean, with Thailand at the helm, will walk the path toward nuclear power.

"Thailand plans a 4,000-megawatt nuclear power plant in the next 13 years. Vietnam has plans for its first 2,000-megawatt nuclear plant in 2020 and another 2, 000-megawatts in 2021. Indonesia plans a 1,000-megawatt plant in 2017 and another 2,000-megawatt plant in 2019. The nuclear plan for the Philippines is being considered,while Malaysia is giving more priority to nuclear power," Norkun Sitthiphong, the Energy Ministry's deputy permanent secretary, said.

This means that over the next ten years, this region may have at least ten nuclear power plants with a capacity of 1,000 megawatts each - if the five Asean governments' plans go ahead as scheduled.

This news was heard among the voices at the two academic energy forums, the first such regional forums, held in Bangkok this week. Among the quiet voices are the other five Asean nations yet to plan for nuclear power plants, not to mention Asean citizens who believe that the majority of people have not even heard about nuclear nor biofuels. To the Thai public, nuclear and biofuel will be two words to be heard more and more often from now on.

Like it or not, people will be forced to participate in this discussion, and they had better be prepared to decide which side they will take on this important energy debate. The other question for Thais is, do they agree with the Thai leadership of Asean pushing the region toward nuclear dependency?