Abstract
Bangladesh government is in the final stage of setting up one nuclear power plant with two units at Rooppur, Ishwardi, each having 1200 MW capacity, to be launched in 2023 to meet the energy shortage urgently. The financial cost of the project is the US $12.65 billion. The primary purpose of this paper is to calculate the economic cost of setting up this plant by using the estimation method developed by Du and Parsons (2009), MIT (2003; 2009; 2018), and Singh et al. (2018). It has been found that the economic cost is amounted to 9.36 cents/kWh for the capacity of 2400 MW. In contrast, for a similar plant in Kudankulam, Tamil Nadu, India, the corresponding cost figure is 5.36 cents/kWh for 2000 MW. Even though it seems costlier than India, the study suggests that policymakers should prefer nuclear power, as it is cost-competitive, considering the production cost of other electricity facilities. The main advantage of nuclear power is cost-competitive baseload power generation with zero carbon emission. This nuclear power plant (NPP) project is expected to boost the energy sector of Bangladesh by transforming the country from an energy deficit country into an energy surplus country.
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Source: Own calculation from the model data
Source: Authors’ calculation
Source: Authors’ calculation
Source: Own calculation from the model data
Source: Own calculation from the model data
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The dataset is available at Harvard Dataverse: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/UGJCUW
Notes
We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for suggesting us to add this section in the introductory part for sharpening the focus of the paper.
We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for bringing up the issue of developing countries with high population density and low geographical space.
Unit 1 and 2 of Kudankulam are operating from 2013 and 2014, respectively.
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Funding
This study is funded by North South University, Dhaka, Bangladesh, under its internal research grant for faculty members entitled “Conference, Travel, and Research Grant,” Cycle: 2019–20.
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Gour Gobinda Goswami: Formulating idea, writing, reviewing, investigation, and editing, validation, supervision.
Umama Rahman: Methodology, levelized cost estimation, model, original draft preparation.
Mehdi Chowdhury: Literature review, editing, draft preparation, organization of the paper.
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Highlights
• Bangladesh government is setting up two units of nuclear power plants in Rooppur with 1200 MW capacity each for the first time in its history.
• The total financial cost of this construction has already been estimated to be US$12.65 billion.
• This paper attempts to assess the broader economic cost of setting up this plant at Rooppur, Bangladesh, by using the discounted present value method developed by Du and Parsons (2009), MIT (2003; 2009; 2018), and Singh et al. (2018).
• The levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) has been estimated to be 9.36 cents/kWh, whereas the rate is 5.34 cents/kWh for a similar plant of Kudankulam Tamil Nadu, India.
• In terms of Bangladeshi currency, the LCOE is amounted to BDT 7.94/kWh. Hence, if the government can sell the electricity above this price, the project will be economically viable or profitable.
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Goswami, G.G., Rahman, U. & Chowdhury, M. Estimating the economic cost of setting up a nuclear power plant at Rooppur in Bangladesh. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 35073–35095 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-18129-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-18129-3
Keywords
- Nuclear power plant
- Rooppur
- Nuclear power
- Nuclear energy
- Atomic energy
- Levelized cost of electricity (LCOE)
- Cost–benefit analysis
- Discounted present value method
- Bangladesh
- India