Regional Developments in Nuclear

In the past decade, driven by the demand for energy to support economic development, countries in the Southeast Asian region have been actively exploring the adoption of nuclear energy. The momentum was dampened by the Fukushima crisis of March 2011, which shifted the world’s attention to the safety of nuclear energy. However, recent developments clearly show that long-term interest in nuclear energy in the region has not been significantly affected, in spite of the safety concerns generated by the Fukushima crisis.

Vietnam had previously signed agreements with Russia and Japan to build two nuclear power plants (NPP) in the southern Ninh Thuân province, to be operational by 2020 and 2024 respectively. These plans were deferred in November 2016 in favour of gas and coal power. Indonesia has a greater depth of experience and infrastructure in nuclear technology than any other country in Southeast Asia. They plan to build a 10MWt high temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTR) in Serpong. Other plans include conventional large light water reactors (LWR) on Bali, Java, Madura and Sumatra from 2027 onwards, and floating nuclear power plants (FNPP) for their smaller inhabited islands. Thailand is also seriously looking into the construction and commissioning of NPPs in the next decade, and The Philippines is considering re-commissioning their Bataan nuclear power plant which was built in the 1980s but never fuelled. As any NPP incident in the region could lead to trans-boundary consequences, these developments have important implications for the safety of Singapore.