Govt gives go-ahead for nuclear power plant by 2021

Govt gives go-ahead for nuclear power plant by 2021 (The Star)

Saw this interesting news just a moment ago. I could imagine the sound of protest that would be coming from the opposition and environmentalist.

Personally, I quite like this. Malaysia's power generation industry is in a mess mainly due to political reasons. Natural gas is running out and soon we'll need to buy gas from the open market at market price. Coal is imported. With price of oil looks set to increase, the cost of generating electricity will have to go up. And although the rakyat doesn't like it, the cost of electricity delivered to our homes will also have to increase sooner or later. It's simply economics. You can't expect TNB to swallow all the bitter pill, while you keep your A/C running 24/7!

Having said that, nuclear energy is not really so unsafe as what most people think. The reliability and safety standards of nuclear plants are quite high (well maybe not in Iran or North Korea). The biggest problem is how the nuclear waste would be dealt with. Nobody has yet have any concrete solutions for a sustainable method to handle the waste. And nuclear fuel is not renewable, i.e. it will also deplete like oil at some point of time. I've read somewhere that in fact, nuclear fuel available nowadays are less rich and not of the best quality. So I don't really know how long this industry can last. Nevertheless, I look forward to a nuclear power plant in Malaysia. Looks kinda interesting.