Speaker 1: You're listening to a CNA podcast.
Speaker 1: 27 June 1954, the world's first nuclear power station came
Speaker 1: online in the Russian city of Obninsk, 100 kilometers southwest
Speaker 1: of Moscow. Connected to the capital's grid, this power plant
Speaker 1: launched a new era in electricity production.
Speaker 1: Today there are about 440 nuclear power reactors operating in
Speaker 1: more than 30 countries, providing about 9% of the world's electricity.
Speaker 1: Singapore is looking at whether it would make sense to
Speaker 1: join that nuclear club. Hello everyone, I'm Lee Ling Tan,
Speaker 1: and thank you for joining me on Climate Conversations. My co-host,
Speaker 1: Jack Board is on assignment or on holiday, who knows,
Speaker 1: but that means you're stuck with me.
Speaker 1: And today, the topic goes nuclear. The Singapore government recently
Speaker 1: announced that it will study the potential deployment of nuclear
Speaker 1: power in the island state and see if this is
Speaker 1: an energy solution that the country can deploy in a
Speaker 1: safe and cost effective way.
Speaker 1: It's an exciting announcement in an exciting time for nuclear power.
Speaker 1: Recent advancements in small modular reactors or SMRs could be
Speaker 1: a game changer. They're said to be smaller, more scalable,
Speaker 1: and safer than conventional nuclear plants.
Speaker 1: To better understand the pros and cons of advanced nuclear
Speaker 1: energy and what it could mean for Singapore and the region,
Speaker 1: I spoke with Doctor Alvin Chew, senior fellow at the
Speaker 1: S Rajaratnam School of International Studies at the Nanyang Technological University.
Speaker 1: Doctor, thank you for joining us on Climate Conversations.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker 1: So Alvin, we're talking about the possibility now of a
Speaker 1: nuclear power plant right here at home in Singapore on
Speaker 1: this tiny land constrained, densely populated island state. What's made
Speaker 1: something that was historically impossible for us.
Speaker 1: Now quite plausible.
Speaker 2: Well, nuclear energy is a clean source of energy. What
Speaker 2: it means is that it does not actually emit any
Speaker 2: carbon dioxide or greenhouse gasses in this process of producing electricity.
Speaker 2: But when one looks at Singapore's energy mix, probably more
Speaker 2: than 95% of our electricity is produced from the burning
Speaker 2: of natural gas.
Speaker 2: And for that, it's very pollutive. So we actually solve
Speaker 2: this clean energy equation by having renewables, but then solar
Speaker 2: power is probably the only viable renewable in Singapore. We
Speaker 2: are looking at probably about 10% of our electricity coming
Speaker 2: from solar by 2050 and when we can only accommodate
Speaker 2: like 10%.
Speaker 2: And we are trying to import electricity from our neighbors
Speaker 2: for about 40%. We still need to take up about 50%
Speaker 2: of them running on natural gas because we are so
Speaker 2: reliant on our gas imports that we actually need to
Speaker 2: build more resilience and that we need to actually generate
Speaker 2: some of our sources in order to produce electricity and
Speaker 2: that's where nuclear actually comes in.
Speaker 1: For
Speaker 2: the
Speaker 1: longest time, we rolled it out because nuclear plants require
Speaker 1: so much land, so much investment.
Speaker 1: But now it's become plausible because of advancements, especially around
Speaker 1: the small modular reactors, right? So in terms of Singapore's
Speaker 1: decision to further study the viability of deploying nuclear energy here,
Speaker 1: how big of a role do these SMRs actually play?
Speaker 2: I think in 2008.
Speaker 2: Later minister mentor actually came out and mooted the idea
Speaker 2: of Singapore deploying nuclear energy. So it wasn't something that
Speaker 2: is new. And at the time, we didn't even think
Speaker 2: of SMRSs. But the question remains is that where are
Speaker 2: we going to site the nuclear power plant.
Speaker 1: That's
Speaker 1: a big question.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so obviously technological advancements in terms of SMRs has
Speaker 2: Actually helped to open up the possibilities of Singapore, siting
Speaker 2: a nuclear power plants on this tiny island, mainly because
Speaker 2: they are made smaller and they are also safer. The
Speaker 2: newer technologies will not incorporate that kind of, you know,
Speaker 2: what's going to happen to a catastrophic failure, what we're
Speaker 2: going to see in Chernobyl or in Fukushima case. But
Speaker 2: despite having all these technological advancement, we cannot say and
Speaker 2: no one can say that it is risk-free.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that. You mentioned
Speaker 1: it in a commentary recently that Singapore is learning from
Speaker 1: the International Atomic Energy Agency about how to respond.
Speaker 1: To a nuclear emergency and protect population from radiation fallout, right?
Speaker 1: What does that entail? What kind of learning, what kind
Speaker 1: of prep are we talking about? I mean, is the
Speaker 1: preparation for worst case scenario, what's involved in those discussions?
Speaker 2: Well, if you understand that all these kind of guidelines
Speaker 2: that are actually drawn out, you know, the safety parameters
Speaker 2: are all actually applicable to existing reactors, and these are
Speaker 2: reactors that are currently in operation, the Gen 2, Gen
Speaker 2: 3 and Gen plus light water reactors.
Speaker 2: They are the large ones. They have not developed the
Speaker 2: planning parameters for small modular reactors yet, but they are
Speaker 2: in the process of developing and when that is coming
Speaker 2: out in a couple of years' time, because some of
Speaker 2: these SMRRs are going to be rolled out soon, uh,
Speaker 2: it's likely going to be a much smaller planning parameter
Speaker 2: and that actually opens up the option for uh Singapore
Speaker 2: to actually consider setting a nuclear power plant. But that
Speaker 2: is only on the planning side.
Speaker 2: Because you need to have like a guideline to say
Speaker 2: that well, apart from let's say 30 kilometer zone, now
Speaker 2: you're you're just going to be like restricted to the
Speaker 2: zone parameter of the nuclear power plant and that's all. Well,
Speaker 2: there are some countries who don't have the luxury, not
Speaker 2: just Singapore, who doesn't have the luxury to actually, you know,
Speaker 2: evacuate within the 30 kilometer zone, but if we will
Speaker 2: ask ourselves carefully, what
Speaker 2: Entails the nuclear fallout. What are some of the effects?
Speaker 2: Why do we need to evacuate when there's a radiation
Speaker 2: fallout from the nuclear power plant? You know, it's not
Speaker 2: going to be like a bomb exploding or what we
Speaker 2: see in the Hiroshima, and also it's not going to
Speaker 2: be the same as in the Fukushima incident as well,
Speaker 2: because of the tsunami, people need to evacuate.
Speaker 2: Well, when we ask ourselves, we don't even have a
Speaker 2: place to evacuate and basically, we have to go and
Speaker 2: protect ourselves and the best protection is actually to stay indoors. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So when our authorities go and interact with the IEA
Speaker 2: we are just trying to find out some of the
Speaker 2: measures even for existing nuclear technology that is ongoing. How
Speaker 2: are we going to respond?
Speaker 2: Eventually, we might not adopt an SMRR because they are
Speaker 2: not really, they don't have that kind of track record
Speaker 2: to understand the safety principles. Yeah. So having the abilities
Speaker 2: or the capabilities or the competence to actually respond to
Speaker 2: a disaster is more important.
Speaker 2: Right now, if we haven't got that capability, I think
Speaker 2: no matter how advanced or the SMRS technology are, we
Speaker 2: will not make it the kind of decision because safety
Speaker 2: is of primal importance.
Speaker 1: So we talked about the worst case scenario already. Let's
Speaker 1: talk about the best case scenario. So let's just say
Speaker 1: we find that this is viable. Where would this, you
Speaker 1: know where I'm going with this.
Speaker 1: Where do you think the options are to place this plant?
Speaker 1: Are we talking about multiple SMRs? Are we talking about one,
Speaker 1: are we what are we talking about? What is it
Speaker 1: gonna look like? I mean, portable, you know, integratable can
Speaker 1: be prefabed almost, right? That's pretty much what it is.
Speaker 1: What's it going to look like and where?
Speaker 2: Yeah, uh, you're asking me where to cite them, right? Yeah. Uh, well,
Speaker 2: I mean, uh, it's I think really a problem. Do
Speaker 2: you want the technical answer to it or you want
Speaker 2: the social or political answer to it? OK,
Speaker 1: so technical.
Speaker 2: OK, so you have to conduct sightings feasibility studies to
Speaker 2: ensure where to cite them. Technically, the ground has got
Speaker 2: to be stable.
Speaker 2: Alright, OK, so I mean Singapore, we are not stable.
Speaker 2: We're not yeah, yeah. I mean, even if we are
Speaker 2: just like Japan is full of earthquakes, but the reactors
Speaker 2: can actually be designed to withstand the resistance can be
Speaker 2: designed to withstand an earthquake. So basically, when you talk
Speaker 2: about siding in Singapore, it's not so much of a
Speaker 2: technical issue, it's more of a Social issue. Yeah, yeah, way, uh, no,
Speaker 2: if I said a nuclear power plant on the western
Speaker 2: part of Singapore.
Speaker 2: I'm not saying where it's going to affect the entire Singapore.
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter where I cite them, yeah, I saw
Speaker 2: them in the Jurong is going to affect uh places
Speaker 2: in China. If an incident were to happen. I think
Speaker 2: the most important thing is how do we know we
Speaker 2: are going to respond to it? Yeah, and if we
Speaker 2: are able to respond to it, it doesn't matter where
Speaker 2: we sit down.
Speaker 1: Sitting on the mainland is not out of the question.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 2: OK,
Speaker 1: so it could be on the mainland, it could be
Speaker 1: maybe Pulau bukong, it could be anywhere.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it could be on one of our islands, but
Speaker 2: then again we have to think in terms of feasibility
Speaker 2: connected them to our main grid because you're not just
Speaker 2: going to support.
Speaker 2: Supply electricity to just an island like a, you know,
Speaker 2: Semakau or whatever because you want to supply electricity to
Speaker 2: mainland Singapore and I think citing dam here would be
Speaker 2: one of the possibilities whereby you can get it connected
Speaker 2: to our main grid and also you have to think
Speaker 2: in terms of the security. I mean, living close to
Speaker 2: a nuclear plant is a very secure place.
Speaker 2: Would you live next to a like close to OK
Speaker 2: so
Speaker 1: you're OK.
Speaker 1: You OK with that?
Speaker 2: if you ask me, uh, basically, uh, I I I
Speaker 2: I've known this field for for a long time. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so this is something to do with the social aspects, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, like, uh, in some countries whereby they incentivize
Speaker 2: people to live close to the nuclear power plant. Yeah,
Speaker 2: because there's job security and they can give them some
Speaker 2: other freebies like a tax breaks and things like that, yeah.
Speaker 2: But these issues that we can consider subsequently isn't proven
Speaker 2: to be too popular thing.
Speaker 1: What does one SMR constitute a plant or
Speaker 2: no, no. OK, so when we talk about SMR, I
Speaker 2: think we start small, say probably about 70 megawatts or so,
Speaker 2: which is very small. But then subsequently, we can have
Speaker 2: multiple units being added on. Like, for example, if you
Speaker 2: look at a new scale and they would say like
Speaker 2: maybe 6 or 12 units.
Speaker 2: that could be added on. Yeah. The thing about them
Speaker 2: being modular is that the scales get smaller and if
Speaker 2: anything does happen, it's restricted to just that plant.
Speaker 1: How much
Speaker 1: does one unit?
Speaker 2: Well, it's not just the facility with
Speaker 1: one facility
Speaker 1: with the unit.
Speaker 2: You also have to incorporate the adjacent and all these
Speaker 2: complementary infrastructures like the pipings and so forth, the turbine generators, yeah.
Speaker 2: So it can get pretty massive. But when we do
Speaker 2: the kind of assessment, we are just looking at just
Speaker 2: the reactor itself.
Speaker 1: So who else
Speaker 1: in the region are looking into nuclear power as a
Speaker 1: potential energy
Speaker 1: source?
Speaker 2: Singapore actually came in quite late, the first plant was
Speaker 2: actually built in the Philippines.
Speaker 2: But it didn't operate because of a protest at the time.
Speaker 2: But now they are definitely very keen in this Marcos
Speaker 2: administration to actually start the plow. So they are getting
Speaker 2: the Koreans to try to do an assessment to see
Speaker 2: whether is it possible to start the plant. They have
Speaker 2: actually built the plant already. But at the same time,
Speaker 2: they're also looking at SMRs, the smaller ones, because of
Speaker 2: the archipelagic nature, you know, of the grid. Next in
Speaker 2: line would be Indonesia.
Speaker 2: Indonesia has all about build up the largest infrastructure of
Speaker 2: nuclear capabilities. They don't have any operating nuclear power plants,
Speaker 2: but they do have research reactors and they do have
Speaker 2: quite a lot of IE experts being parked over there.
Speaker 2: But the Malaysia, they have considered some of the sites
Speaker 2: that they're going with small modular reactors, but they haven't
Speaker 2: really finalized on the kind of technology. I think the
Speaker 2: Indonesians are, they are actually looking at developing the technology themselves.
Speaker 2: And Vietnam also planning to have a nuclear power. Vietnam
Speaker 2: was the first to actually announce the nuclear power in 2008,
Speaker 2: and eight years later, in about 2016, they decided that no,
Speaker 2: they are not going ahead with the nuclear power, but recently,
Speaker 2: because of their energy demands that they feel that solar
Speaker 2: is not sufficient and it's also going to be expensive,
Speaker 2: so they have actually revived their nuclear power plants.
Speaker 1: OK, so lots of interest in SMRs as well in
Speaker 1: the region.
Speaker 2: When I made a presentation in 2010 on the nuclear
Speaker 2: energy in Singapore, somebody came up to me and said that, well, Alvin,
Speaker 2: may I know whether do you have any children or not?
Speaker 2: And I said, no, I don't have any kids then.
Speaker 2: And he says, ah, I see there's a problem because
Speaker 2: if anything does happen, like what happens to Sugar, Fukushima
Speaker 2: hasn't happened yet.
Speaker 2: He says, then what's happened to the future generation of Singapore?
Speaker 2: So I don't have answers. I haven't got any kids then,
Speaker 2: but nowadays, I always bring this anecdote up and I
Speaker 2: say that I'm still advocating for nuclear energy simply because
Speaker 2: I've got a 9 year old boy now studying in
Speaker 2: primary school, and I say that it is for his
Speaker 2: future because of what happens to climate change. We need
Speaker 2: nuclear energy, we need to keep our environment clean because
Speaker 2: we have to stop burning fossil fuels, if not, uh, well.
Speaker 2: Not talking about Fukushima or Shinobi. Uh, I don't know
Speaker 2: what's going to happen in 2050 if we don't meet
Speaker 2: our net zero carbon emissions.
Speaker 1: I was also going to ask you whether you had kids,
Speaker 1: but I was too polite, so I'm
Speaker 1: I'm glad that you brought it up because a lot
Speaker 1: of the question is about do we want to subject
Speaker 1: our future generations to the safety risks and at what price,
Speaker 1: then you think about the climate change thing, we're kind
Speaker 1: of leaving that kind of a legacy for them as well.
Speaker 1: So what's worse, right? Now the other question I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask you is what's going to happen to all
Speaker 1: the nuclear waste?
Speaker 2: Currently, there are only 2 technical solutions that are available
Speaker 2: in terms of long term storage of high-level spent fuel.
Speaker 2: We're talking about high-level nuclear waste, right, that comes out
Speaker 2: really bad, right? Uh, yeah, those are the long-lived ones.
Speaker 2: All right. So when they come out from a nuclear reactor,
Speaker 2: let's say for example, a light water reactor, right, existing ones,
Speaker 2: you have to spend like 15 to 20 years in
Speaker 2: the spent fuel pool.
Speaker 2: And after that, uh, they will take out the plutonium.
Speaker 2: You have it reprocessed in some other countries, definitely not
Speaker 2: in Singapore or not in the region because of our
Speaker 2: non-proliferation commitments. It's probably going to be processed in countries
Speaker 2: like France or maybe the US, reprocess over there.
Speaker 2: And then when they take out the plutonium and then
Speaker 2: the waste that comes back is quite hefty, the high-level
Speaker 2: waste that we have to store them in a dry
Speaker 2: cast barrels, right, metal containers, and currently what is happening
Speaker 2: now throughout the world is that they are just being
Speaker 2: stored on site and that became an issue. Yeah, except
Speaker 2: for Finland, you should have managed to build an underground
Speaker 2: cavern to actually store this waste storages.
Speaker 2: And the other way, basically, apart from building it underground
Speaker 2: is to actually drill a hole down that's about 2
Speaker 2: kilometers deep. I mean, you can drill as long as
Speaker 2: deep as you want. So, and then if you put
Speaker 2: the waste, the barrels of the waste inside and then
Speaker 2: you seal them up, you will not be able to
Speaker 2: retrieve them forever. So that is the second solution. We
Speaker 2: wouldn't have that waste problem simply because in the contract
Speaker 2: of acquiring the nuclear power plants or the SMRs, they
Speaker 2: are willing to take back the waste.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, OK, let's talk about timeline. Best case scenario, when
Speaker 1: do you think this might happen in your lifetime?
Speaker 2: Certainly, I would think so because we do really have
Speaker 2: an energy security issue that has been plaguing us since
Speaker 2: early 2000s. So in terms of timeline, let's say if
Speaker 2: we are looking at 2050 for net zero, give ourselves,
Speaker 2: let's say 10 to 15 years, the IEA milestones that
Speaker 2: we have to be met before for the first deployment.
Speaker 2: Then if you walk that backwards, I would say that
Speaker 2: perhaps in the middle of 2030.
Speaker 2: We should be able to make a commitment if we
Speaker 2: are serious to go about it. And that is also
Speaker 2: the time whereby some of the SMRs would have been
Speaker 2: rolled out. And maybe this newer technologies like the one
Speaker 2: that Google is funding for Kairos Power and so forth,
Speaker 2: they would be operating and then the IA would be
Speaker 2: able to find a way, some of the mechanisms that
Speaker 2: are able to safeguard this and that can be exported
Speaker 2: to the region.
Speaker 1: In our lifetime, and necessity breeds invention, right? So.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if we just close off this option simply because
Speaker 2: we do not understand the safety aspects of it, then
Speaker 2: I think it's doing our future generations a disservice.
Speaker 1: OK. Great. Thank you so much, Alvin, really appreciate your
Speaker 1: insight here. You've got me a little bit excited about
Speaker 1: SMRs too, so we'll be watching this very closely. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you pleasure.
Speaker 1: And that was Dr. Elvin Che, senior fellow at the
Speaker 1: S Rajaratnam School of International Studies. That brings us to
Speaker 1: the end of this episode of Climate Conversations. Thanks for
Speaker 1: tuning in. Jack Board will be back with us next week.
Speaker 1: Until then, I'm Lee Ling Tan. Big thanks as always
Speaker 1: to the team that put together this podcast, Sai Ye Wind,
Speaker 1: Tiffany Ung, Junaini Jahari, and Kristina Roberts.