A Nuclear Debut in Bangladesh Tests Developing World’s Atomic Shift

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“The delay has had a massive financial implication for Bangladesh,” said Md. Shafiqul Islam, a professor of nuclear engineering at Dhaka University. “A timely completion would have not only avoided this massive cost escalation but would have also helped us trim our fossil fuel import bill.” 

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Plant operator Hassan, while declining to give details on the estimated cost of generation, is adamant that it will be value for money for the country. 

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“If you assess from the point of view of assurance of long-term supplies, safeguards against supply chain issues as well as the cost of generation, it’s very much competitive,” he said. 

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Bangladesh is now exploring small modular reactors as a longer-term hedge against energy shocks and is in early talks with suppliers including Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc and Chinese manufacturers, according to Power and Energy Minister Iqbal Hassan Mahmood.

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“The government is looking at plants generating 300 to 400 megawatts, small enough to be built along riverbanks and deployed faster than conventional reactors,” he said. “We will not go for large-scale plants anymore because there are huge liabilities.”

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Even the most committed nations will have to deal with the high upfront capital outlay, long construction times, and the risk of delays that increase costs, until new technologies, such as SMRs, mature. The benefits of nuclear power is that it’s low-carbon, reliable and continuous, making it an ideal baseload electricity source to pair with intermittent renewables, like solar and wind, for the energy transition.

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“The Rooppur plant will ensure Bangladesh doesn’t need to build any new baseload capacity in the next five to seven years,” said Shafiqul Alam, the lead Bangladesh analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. “That’s going to provide the opportunity to accelerate renewables installations and invest in grid modernization.”  

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Growing confidence in the country’s abilities, evident from the visitors posing for selfies in front of the plant, has been instrumental in gathering public support for the Rooppur project, Dhaka University’s Islam said. 

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Other developing nations may also be driven by similar sentiments, with the perception of modernity about nuclear energy adding to the hype around it, according to Toby Dalton, a senior fellow and co-director for the nuclear policy program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. 

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He cautioned that governments need to first put in place all the elements needed to run a nuclear plant sustainably, including a competent workforce, a credible and independent regulator, broad public approval, and mechanisms for handling spent fuel. 

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“I worry that the hype that’s been built around nuclear may push countries to make some bad choices,” Dalton said. “I don’t think any developing economy wants to be a laboratory for a technology that hasn’t been proven and demonstrated elsewhere.” 

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Another catch is the dearth of options when it comes to buying the technology, a deal that comes with long-term ties. The global nuclear market is controlled by a handful of suppliers, including the US, Russia, China, France and South Korea, that use a limited number of reactor technologies. 

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China and Russia dominate the world’s 80 reactors under-construction, most of which are in Asia, data from the World Nuclear Association show. The two countries have aggressively pushed their existing technologies — as well as those years away from maturity — to drive interest and widen their geopolitical influence.