US objects to China-Pakistan nuclear deal

[ambidex]

@Tech Lahore: I have no doubts that sino-pak deal will not be done. It will go ahead as per plan.

I was only answering why west and USA thinks not good about that. China has helped Pakistan exceptionally and will also be able to Improve its own nuclear reactor designs (China is not a well versed nuclear reactor trader) via this deal (my assumptions) and further will provide nuclear fuel from its own stock or its Australian purchases.

Why India was not signing the CTBT and NTP was not because we are poor with our calculations about minimum credible deterrence but to expose and protest how China has exploited the International norms. I was wondering what could be the scene if India had signed the above two, Pakistan had followed the suite and China had opened its doors to Pakistan without any restriction. Why India will be watching closely to this deal is not because it will give Pakistan the requisite recognition as legitimate nuclear power but how China will set precedence for future Indian aspirations without its so called influence on Indian decision making. Obviously China will do this deal at the cost of India but the beneficiary will be India as well including Pakistan enjoying diplomatic clashes of US-China.

Please don't say to me i am now defencive, we know how many and what minimum types of nukes we need to deter both China and Pakistan but how many Pakistan and China need to deter US Russia and India collectively is the catch of this deal. i will pray to god that this deal will be done.

Please read this link it will help you to understand why investing in Nuclear energy for civilian needs is ineffectual (as you say and i don't trust), full of risks and a costlier for ordinary Pakistanis to buy.

Notably, even if the development of nuclear power meets high estimates, it will not be likely to constitute a significant contribution to the overall mix. Currently, Pakistan has two nuclear power plants with 300 megawatts and 125 megawatts of capacity (Chashma-1 and Kanupp). Pakistan’s third nuclear power plant, Chashma-2, is expected to be completed by 2009 and comprise 325 megawatts of installed capacity. The Government of Pakistan estimates suggest a 13% growth rate which would yield approximately 6-8 gigawatts of nuclear power generation. This would comprise only about 3-6% of the electricity generation by 2030.

The projections for the various supply options are almost uniformly ambitious, but especially so for nuclear. From 2005 to 2030, it is expected that nuclear generation will increase at a growth rate of 13%.

Because nuclear faces immense challenges in terms of capital intensity and accessibility of supplies and technology, the growth rates implied for nuclear development suggest the attainment of targets that very few countries in the world have been able to achieve. However, as a non-signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, there are international embargoes on the transfer of such technology to Pakistan.China is currently the only supplier of nuclear power plants and components to Pakistan, but to meet the projections Pakistan would require access to advanced nuclear supplies and technologies from Western countries.

Globally, the historical data of nuclear power development suggests that few countries have been able to achieve and maintain a consistently high growth rate for nuclear development as per Pakistan’s estimates. South Korea comes the closest to reaching the trajectory and sustainability of nuclear power generation with a 14.3% growth rate over the 15 years from 1980 to 2005. The U.S. and France both had much faster growth from 1980 until approximately the early 1990s (at 7% and 14% respectively), but their nuclear development programs have since leveled off.23By contrast, India has only attained a 4.9% growth rate for its nuclear development.24 In order for Pakistan to meet its own nuclear power development estimates over the next 30 years, it would have to emulate or surpass the efforts of countries like South Korea, France, or the United States.

Nuclear development also requires considerable coordination between the private and public sectors, requiring rather strong government effectiveness, regulatory quality, and control of corruption since nuclear projects require large capital expenditures. Relative to countries such as the U.S., France, and South Korea that have successfully developed nuclear power generation at impressive growth rates, Pakistan’s measure on these governance indicators is significantly lower.

Conclusion:
With a portfolio approach encompassing traditional and renewable energy sources, along with energy efficiency measures, Pakistan can meet its electricity needs through 2030 if it chooses to forego nuclear power development. The role of nuclear in the mix of electricity generation by 2030 is not vital. First, the estimates for nuclear development are quite ambitious and rest on the assumption that Pakistan could replicate the development trajectory of the U.S., France, and South Korea. Second, nuclear development requires significant private and public sector coordination, resting on a solid foundation of government effectiveness, regulatory quality, and control over corruption. Compared with those countries that have successfully developed nuclear power in the past, Pakistan falls short of these metrics. Finally, even if the high estimates are achieved by Pakistan, the resulting contribution would represent only 3-6% of total electricity generation. Furthermore, Pakistan’s overall contribution to global carbon emissions remains miniscule at 0.4%, so substitution through an aggressive nuclear energy program does not suggest meaningful progress on the climate change agenda.

http://www.npolicy.org/files/20081107-Dalberg-Pakistan.pdf

 

[trident2010]

NSG exemption mandatory for China-Pak nuke deal: US


WASHINGTON: The US appeared in a publicly 'non-opposing' mode over China's proposed civil nuclear deal with Pakistan, but insisted that Beijing needs an NSG exemption to go ahead with the agreement as was done in the case of the US-India atomic pact.

"If China wishes to proceed with this (nuclear deal with Pakistan), they are going to require an exemption from the Nuclear Suppliers Group," a senior State Department official told reporters.

Asked about US' stand on the issue, the official said, it had asked China to clarify the details of its second sale of additional reactors to Pakistan but stopped short of opposing it publicly.

"The NSG operates by consensus and we will have the opportunity to weigh in," he said.

The official was responding to questions as to why the United States is "not publicly opposing" the China-Pak nuclear deal, despite the fact that it has serious concerns over Pakistan's track record on nuclear proliferations.

"We have asked China to clarify the details of its second sale of additional nuclear reactors to Pakistan," State Department spokesperson P J Crowley told reporters at his daily news briefing yesterday.

This appears to extend beyond cooperation that was grandfathered when China was approved for membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group, he said in response to a question.

"We believe that such cooperation would require a specific exemption approved by consensus of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, as was done for India. So we're not looking at any difference between the two," Crowley said.

The State Department spokesman said that the US has been taking up this issue with the Chinese periodically.

"I believe this was an issue that we've had, you know, periodic discussions with China for some time," he said.

The China-Pak nuclear deal is expected to come up before the 46-nation NSG meeting next week in New Zealand.

In a recent article, a prominent American nuclear expert said this would breach international protocol about the trade of nuclear equipment and material.

"The move would breach international protocol about the trade of nuclear equipment and material," Mark Hibbs, said in the latest issue in the June issue of the prestigious Foreign Policy magazine.

The Washington Post said China has suggested that the sale is grandfathered from before it joined the NSG in 2004, because it was completing work on two earlier reactors for Pakistan at the time. But US officials disagree on the issue.




NSG exemption mandatory for China-Pak nuke deal: US - Pakistan - World - The Times of India

 

[Jazzbot]

interesting, lets see what they come up with in NSG.
thanks for sharing.

 

[trident2010]

interesting, lets see what they come up with in NSG.
thanks for sharing.

Yes. I think if china can pursue US and other 3 UNSC members then it won't be too difficult.

Cheers !!

 

[Marxist]

China Must Seek NSG Exemption For N-Deal With Pakistan: US

(RTTNews) - The United States has hinted that it has no objection to China's proposed civil nuclear deal with its close ally Pakistan, but insisted that Beijing needs to seek an exemption from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) to proceed with the agreement as was done in the case of the U.S.-India atomic pact.

"If China wishes to proceed with this (nuclear deal with Pakistan), they are going to require an exemption from the NSG," State Department spokesperson P.J. Crowley told reporters at his daily press briefing on Tuesday.

"The NSG operates by consensus and we will have the opportunity to weigh in," the official said.

The official was responding to questions as to why the U.S. is "not publicly opposing" the China-Pakistan nuclear deal despite the fact that it has serious concerns over Pakistan's dismal track record on nuclear proliferation.

The China-Pakistan nuclear deal, under which China National Nuclear Corporation is financing for two new reactors at Chashma in Pakistan's Punjab province, is expected to come up before the 46-nation NSG meeting next week in New Zealand.

On whether China informed the U.S. about the sale of these two nuclear plants, the State Department spokesman said that the U.S. had been taking up this issue with the Chinese periodically.

Asserting that Washington had asked Beijing to clarify the details of its second sale of additional reactors to Pakistan, Crowley said this nuclear deal appeared to extend beyond cooperation that was grandfathered when China was approved for membership in the NSG.

"We believe that such cooperation would require a specific exemption approved by consensus of the NSG, as was done for India. So we're not looking at any difference between the two," Crowley said.

The Washington Post said China had suggested that the sale of two new reactors to Pakistan was grandfathered before it joined the NSG in 2004, because it was completing work on two earlier reactors for Pakistan at the time. However, U.S. officials disagree on the issue.

The Obama administration, so far, has chosen to maintain a low profile over the deal, which has triggered concerns among non-proliferation officials in both Washington and New Delhi over its impact on the nuclear non-proliferation regime.

Experts have said that the deal appears to be violating international guidelines forbidding nuclear exports to countries that have not signed the NPT or do not have international safeguards on reactors in place.

Prominent American nuclear experts have already expressed concerns about the likelihood of such a deal and the Obama administration turning a 'blind-eye' for the sake of safeguarding American interests in Afghanistan, where it is critically dependent on Pakistan to battle the Taliban.

Lisa Curtis and Nicholas Hamisevicz, South Asia experts at Heritage Foundation, a Washington think tank, have urged the Obama administration to block the China-Pakistan deal as Pakistan does not have a clean proliferation record compared to India.

China Must Seek NSG Exemption For N-Deal With Pakistan: US

 

[TechLahore]

@ambidex: I appreciate you taking the trouble to cut and paste all this data, but you see, Pakistan is not seeking counsel on whether or not we need these nuclear plants and whether or not they are safe and will produce cheap electricity. That is our conclusion to draw and our decision to make. We are not interested in other people's opinions on those subjects.

I do agree with your initial assertion though, that the deal will go through. That is the real point of discussion and I think we agree on that.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Bringing up a criminal record is also a dead horse , it does not matter to anyone except the victims.

A.Q Khan was involved in Nuclear tracking for the highest bidder and his punishment house arrest in Pakistan. Which is more shielding the national shame then anything else.

one does no show up in courtroom and plead his case saying if you forget about my crime , i am a really nice person.

How many organizations in the West and China were involved in 'proliferating' to Pakistan and Israel so they could set up their nuclear weapons programs? Aren't all these nations part of the NSG now?

So quite obviously 'proliferation' itself is not the major issue, otherwise there are a lot of nations in the NSG currently who should not be there.

The yardstick (if there is one - remember that the NSG only talks about 'NPT signatories' - this whole drama about 'India's clean proliferation record' is something invented by the US to justify breaking the NSG rules) that 'proliferation' is to be measured by should then be put into writing by the NSG, and whether effective controls and cooperation on shutting down proliferation networks qualifies nations for civillian nuclear cooperation.

 

[Ruag]

Pakistan needs energy more than anything else. These new reactors provide clean, renewable & cheap electricity. We are building numerous dams, investing in solar and wind farms, taking short term measures to bring up fossil fuel powered rental power plants, while in parallel, developing Thar coal reserves and installing units that can use this abundant source of coal to generate power.

Despite all these simultaneous projects, we are still a nation hungry from more electricity due to our population growth rate, which stands at about 1.6%/year (Adding more people than the population of New Zealand in less than 2 years) and the upward mobility of our masses which is increasing per capita energy consumption.

In the future, as we face a water shortage - along with much of the rest of the world - we will need electricity for desalination, extracting water from deeper wells and for powering more efficient water distribution infrastructure in our agricultural sector. We have a thoroughly legitimate claim to energy technology and nuclear power.

These reactors are essential for Pakistan, and any external interference in these projects is unwelcome, illogical and devoid of legitimacy.

It is fascinating to see some people have such high hopes from nuclear fission energy.

I hope you all do realize that there are limited and increasingly declining uranium reserves.

 

[Solomon2]

Interesting. This is something I didn't expect. I wonder what Obama hopes to accomplish here, other than annoying an ally and alienating an economic partner (if strategic competitor.)

Then again, the Obama Administration has shown a real talent for alienating America's friends, so maybe I should have expected this...

 

[deckingraj]

It is fascinating to see some people have such high hopes from nuclear fission energy.

I hope you all do realize that there are limited and increasingly declining uranium reserves.

So is other non-renewable resources...So what's the point mate??

 

[ramu]

^^ 1GW being added by these two plants alone will bring nuclear energy (existing operational reactors + new ones) to about 7-8% of total production. Given the massive advantages of nuclear energy, that's not bad. And we're not going to stop with these two, so it stands to reason that overall percentages will continue to go up in future.

As to whether the US can stop this deal, let's just wait and see. My feeling is that they will be utterly powerless to do anything at all to stop this transaction from moving forward. Pakistan is going to continue to invest in Nuclear energy and China will continue working with it. That has been the pattern thus far, it is also reflected in the situation on the ground, and is the announced intent of both governments for the future. It happened even when Pakistan was setting up the Khushab reactors - purely for weapons purposes - and when Pakistan was sanctioned pre 9/11. So it will most certainly continue in the current climate. Given history and the body of evidence, I think it is for the naysayers to prove that things will go off course...

DesiGuy: No more responses to you because your ridiculous line of reasoning "ooo, but is it safe?" is nothing more than a pathetic attempt to troll. I was going to spend time pointing out the fact that there have been massive lapses in the nuclear security of other states; an Indian nuclear scientist was abducted or went missing for days - God knows what info was extracted from him - and he was later found dead. There have been several instances of smuggling of radioactive materials in India. There are instances of loss of control of nukes in the US too, as well as proliferation from the US to Israel, and between South Africa and Israel. In fact the only proven case of proliferation leading to the creation of Nuclear weapons involves SA and Israel... but that is all in vain in response to a troll.

About the statement in bold ...

US will not object to something after knowing it is powerless. It wont take a stand to get embarrassed in front of the the international community. China will take a U turn as Pakistan is dispensable as far as China is concerned.

If China has the will and the commitment to take Pakistan through NSG and get an exemption similar to what India has, then hats off to China - Pakistan relations.

 

[v9s]

It is fascinating to see some people have such high hopes from nuclear fission energy.

I hope you all do realize that there are limited and increasingly declining uranium reserves.

Uranium is very abundant:

Uranium is present at an abundance 2 - 3 parts per million in the Earth's crust which is about 600 times greater than gold and about the same as tin.
Nuclear Power Education - Availability of Usable Uranium

The present reserves are low because many countries haven't explored much after they found enough for their then present needs, for example the US stopped exploring for uranium relatively soon after they started looking, since they rapidly found “all they needed”, due to sluggish nuclear expansion. Even the majority of known sites and mines lay idle due to the low ore price.

The “proven reserve” estimates are flawed for two primary reasons. First of all they do not consider the fact that very little effort, or money, has been put towards uranium exploration thus far. Second, they do not adequately account for the tiny effect that uranium ore price has on final nuclear power price, and the maximum allowable prices that they use to determine “economically recoverable” reserves are far too low.

The effort made thus far in uranium exploration is absolutely negligible compared to the many hundreds of billions (trillions?) of dollars that has been invested in oil and gas exploration, technology development, and extraction, etc… As the history of oil and gas shows, as these investments are made, more and more reserves are found.

Besides, acquiring uranium is not limited to mining. You can mix weapons grade uranium with low grade uranium, you can reprocess the spent fuel of nuclear reactors, you can even get uranium from sea water (in fact it contains one of the largest sources of uranium: Uranium01)

 

[Mauryan]

"Pakistan has not signed the non-proliferation treaty. It may be mentioned here that the US has already signed a civil nuclear deal with India. India has not signed the non-proliferation treaty either."

And Americans still have a reason to "object" Sino-Pak Nuclear deal. Shame on their double standards, shame on Obama regime. This tells why the world hates them to this level.

The hard core fact is that India was NOT a nuclear proliferator ,but on the other hand Pakistan IS.

When we are witnessing an increase in the number of nuclear states,whom do we blame? Certainly on the proliferators.........

Maybe this single line will clear the booze from many minds here.

there is no reason to call US a double edged sword,but NSG has some brainers through who will make sure the deal wont go through.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

The hard core fact is that India was NOT a nuclear proliferator ,but on the other hand Pakistan IS.

Does the NSG charter talk about controlling exports to non-NPT signatories or does it talk about 'a nation's proliferation records'?

And if 'proliferation records' are to be considered, what exactly are China and the Western nations that proliferated to Israel and Pakistan doing in the NSG?

When we are witnessing an increase in the number of nuclear states,whom do we blame? Certainly on the proliferators.........

Certainly blame the proliferators, but why blame Pakistan alone, that has not enabled any country, so far, to become a nuclear weapons State, while ignoring Western nations and China that played key roles in Israeli and Pakistani nuclear programs?

 

[TechLahore]

About the statement in bold ...

US will not object to something after knowing it is powerless. It wont take a stand to get embarrassed in front of the the international community. China will take a U turn as Pakistan is dispensable as far as China is concerned.

If China has the will and the commitment to take Pakistan through NSG and get an exemption similar to what India has, then hats off to China - Pakistan relations.

You may have jumped into the thread without reading my first two posts on the subject. That is exactly what I said; that the US is objecting even though it will be unable to influence the outcome in this case and it will come out looking powerless in the process.

Am I to understand that you are predicting this transaction with China will not go through? Because if so, we can wait and see. I would bet against you, though.

Also, viz the China-Pak equation and whether anyone is dispensable, I understand that India has a big problem with China. I understand that China has exceeded India in every development and military metric, as well as on the World stage. I, consequently, understand that you would like to position China as a soulless giant crushing people left, right and center. Excuse us if we disregard this, though. I think paying much attention to the Indian point of view on what China thinks viz Pakistan is like hiring a hyena to advise you on the security of your flock of lambs.