Arabic Press - nuclear related 131107

Translated from Arabic

The pace started by 9 Arab countries, at least, towards the establishment of nuclear power plants after taking decisions that seemed quick, is only the start of a new era.
The road to acquire civilian nuclear programs is still long, and some problems will prevent some of those States to reach an end, but two of them started already to lunch their program.

The decision has changed - as mentioned King Abdullah II of Jordan - the rules of the game, at a time where the political influence of Iran's nuclear program and the shock of higher oil prices, and the dreams of revitalization of nuclear projects frozen, pressure everyone and are leading to the fact that most countries in the region fired a nuclear signal of some kind.

Going Nuclear

But what are the parties that can actually become members of the Club?

Many of those decisions are still referred as general declarations of intent, with the exception of Egypt (just two weeks ago), Jordan, Libya, it does not appear that the other had taken final decisions to begin the actual implementation of the process of establishing nuclear plants, and the move is still about studying the feasibility (economic, financial and technical possibilities) and talking about external partners.

[…]

Yemen is the only one that officially signed a Convention with a very specific "Power Corporation" of America to build 5 nuclear reactors of third generation, capacity 1000 MW each at a cost of $ 15 billion, and for the establishment of the first station in 2009, before a problem showed that the whole process was an illusion, since there were not company by that name.

What between 8 and 10 years ?

[…]
Egypt has enjoyed considerable advance, and it has a site equipped for around 4 - 5 reactors, called "DABAA" in the northern coast, but there is a battle over the Iranian diplomat on this site, there are those who object, apparently, to build more, with a limited problem of " tourism sites" around, despite that all countries, simply refers to sites appropriate for these stations, will face some real problems in this regard.

In any case, some Arab countries appear not hasty, and the first oil states that are planning to rely on these stations, in 2015, are the Gulf nations, Algeria and Libya, experiencing a wide movement with studies, related agreements and visits. Even in Tunisia, some officials decide that the proposed station, will be done around 2020.

Possibilities degrees

Another very important factor in determining what will be done after the adoption of the resolution, is the degree of advancement of the different countries. While countries such as Egypt, Algeria and Libya and Morocco have research programs including a list of nuclear reactors, other countries start almost from square one, like Sudan, which appears to have started to decline rapidly their nuclear intentions after the announcement of President al-Bashir in Tehran, which seemed to be driven by political factors.

The real problem the case of a single state, the process of establishing a nuclear program for example, requires political support and technical cadres, and financial and to be accepted internationally, but in many cases the availability of the whole system is not feasible.
States that have financial capabilities, do not have the technical cadres, and vice versa. […]

The difficult steps

The rules of the game have changed already, and all the movements of «Nuclear Suppliers" are prepared to cooperate with the countries of the region, but things are still at the preliminary stage, and may show new directions with time and, perhaps, the pressure on some of them for signing the additional protocol of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

It is true that almost all the Arab countries are trying to benefit from Iranian, no one speaks about enriching uranium as a local source of fuel, thanks to the sensitivity of the process.[…]

Most Arab countries are trying to forget the political stories, they seriously want to own energy programs to deal with future oil shock, far from the illusions of nuclear disarmament, but will not be able to avoid the idea that there are important decisions to take, financing of programs, nuclear safety, nuclear waste management and dealing with external partners and others, and internal factors.

The Arab region will surely witness the emergence of nuclear power reactors in the future, as it happened in Iran.

Source: Al Mesryoun