Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 31 December 2014

National

Commercial power generation begins at KKNPP

• Commercial power generation in the first 1,000 MWe reactor of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) commenced after the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL), the proponent of the project, gave green signal for the much-awaited milestone.

• “Yes… We’ve received the nod from our high command for commencing the commercial power generation from 12.01 a.m. onwards,” said R.S. Sundar, Site Director, KKNPP.

• The first 1,000 MWe VVER reactor, built with Russian assistance, attained criticality on July 13, 2013 and power generation was gradually increased amidst mandatory tests stipulated by the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board.

• After the reactor was synchronized with the southern grid on October 22, 2013, power generation was gradually increased amidst periodic mandatory checks stipulated by the AERB and reached its maximum capacity on June 7 last.

• At a time when the KKNPP officials were eagerly waiting for the start of commercial power generation by the first reactor, a component in the turbine section got unscrewed and hit the diaphragm to cause serious set back to the schedule.

• As the component released at high velocity hit the first and second stage turbine blades and diaphragm, they suffered extensive damage and hence these parts had to be replaced by taking them from the second reactor, which is almost ready for the ‘hot run’.

• Hence, the first unit could not start commercial operations by the earlier specified date of October 22 on account of these unforeseen technical problems. Subsequently, the Commercial Operation Date (COD) had to be postponed.

• Against this backdrop, the NPCIL gave its nod for commercial power generation by the first reactor and an official communication in this connection reached KKNPP topbrass.

• As commercial power generation at KKNPP has started, the Tamil Nadu Government, which will get its share of 462 MWe power as per the agreement signed with Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited, will have to purchase electricity cascading from KKNPP’s reactor at the rate of around Rs. 4 per unit. Prior to the commercial generation, Tamil Nadu was purchasing electricity from KKNPP for just Rs. 1.22.

Special Court finds fault with evidence submitted by CBI

• Discharging Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati fake encounter cases, a special CBI court said that the CBI failed to convince it of the evidence submitted against Mr. Shah.

• “There were reasons for the Gujarat and Rajasthan police to nab him [Sohrabuddin]. If the motive stated by the CBI is to be believed, it is only the Gujarat Police that Mr. Shah could control but no reasons to believe that he could control the Rajasthan police as well,” the court said.

• The call data record (CDR) submitted by the CBI to support its case failed to satisfy the court. Opposing the agency’s argument that Mr. Shah made 38 calls to then IPS officer D.G. Vanzara and 343 calls to the then Superintendent of Police Rajkumar Pandian, the judge commented, “Terrorists activities have increased all over the world; in such a situation, if a Minister of State for Home enters into direct dialogues with ground-level officers, it is not unnatural.”

• “Moreover, the explanation of the applicant [Mr. Shah] that it was his style of functioning can be considered while deciding to discharge him. Only on the basis of the CDR without the content of actual conversation, there is no sufficient ground to link accused applicant to actual conspiracy,” he said.

• Minutes after the order was pronounced, Sohrabuddin’s brother, Rubabuddin, told the media that the CBI was pressured to make a “weak” case against Mr. Shah.

• The court, however, found that Rubabuddin did not implicate Shah in his statement. “The CBI relied on the statements of Rubabuddin, but he did not implicate Shah in any manner.”

• The statement of G.C. Raigar, the then Additional Director-General of Police (Home Guards), who held the additional charge of Crime, which was heavily relied upon by the CBI, did not prove the complicity of the accused in the case, Judge Gosavi observed.

Transport minister wants FDI in waterways

• Boosting the nation’s inland waterways network will be one of the biggest focus areas in 2015, Union Shipping and Surface Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari said.

• “It is my dream to have an inland waterways network just like the national highways… We will try to attract foreign investment in inland waterways,” he told journalists here.

• The first step, he said, would be to develop the Varanasi-Haldia project for which the World Bank sanctioned Rs. 4,200 crore. The project on the Ganga would later be extended to Allahabad.

• Mr. Gadkari said that increasing road safety was a continuing priority. The road transport and safety Bill was expected to be passed by Parliament next year; thereafter, minimum safety standards for all vehicles would be announced.

• “Some time by the middle of next year, minimum safety standards for all car models, economy or luxury, would be notified,” Surface Transport Secretary Vijay Chhibber told.

• Adherence to the minimum standards, which would be in line with the U.N. guidelines, would be voluntary for automobile companies for the first year, after which they would be made mandatory, he said.

• Beyond the minimum standards, carmakers could offer star-rated models with enhanced safety features for a higher price. The norms would require vehicles to pass crash tests with “no fatality” at 56 km/hour.

• Mr. Gadkari said the government viewed the regularisation of e-rickshaws as a humanitarian issue. “It allows a poor person to make a living using technology to ferry passengers.

• It is better than the inhuman manual and cycle rickshaws. E-rickshaw should be compared to manual and cycle rickshaws and not to autorickshaws,” he said.

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International

AirAsia tragedy, debris found in Java Sea off Indonesia

• After three days of intense search, debris of the missing AirAsia aircraft carrying 162 people was found in the Java Sea off Indonesia, but only three bodies have been retrieved so far as mystery remained over the cause of the crash.

• Only three bodies have been retrieved and not 40 as previously stated by naval officials, Indonesia’s National Search and Rescue Agency chief Bambang Soelistyo said.

• The bodies were spotted along with debris floating in the Java Sea off the Indonesian part of Borneo, close to the area where contact was lost with the aircraft.

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Business & Economy

SEBI proposed a new set of norms for issue of municipal bonds

• To help in the Government’s ‘smart cities’ programme, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), proposed a new set of norms for listing and trading of municipal bonds on stock exchanges, while channelising household investments for urban infrastructure development.

• Issuing draft regulations for such municipal bonds, also known as ‘muni bonds’, SEBI said that that issuing authorities would need to contribute at least 20 per cent of the total project cost for which they wish to raise funds.

• Besides, these municipal authorities would need to have a strong financial track record and such bonds should have a minimum tenure of three years.

• “Conservative Indian investor mainly invests in fixed deposits, small saving schemes or gold. Bonds issued by municipalities having good financial track record would be an good alternative investment opportunity for such conservative investors, as it provides reasonable return with less risk, which in turn may accelerate the capital markets,” SEBI said.
  ‘Muni bonds’ are very popular among investors in many developed nations, especially in the U.S., where these have attracted investments totalling over $500 billion and are among preferred avenues for household savings.

IOC faces mounting inventory loss

• Indian Oil Corp (IOC) and other state-run fuel retailers have piled up inventory loss of over Rs.10,000 crore which together with depreciating rupee has severely strained their finances ahead of a revision in petrol and diesel prices.

• IOC along with Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) and Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) were to decide on revising petrol and diesel prices, amidst clamour for a rate cut on falling crude oil prices.

• The firms, however, rue that petrol and diesel prices are not set based on trends in crude oil prices. They are benchmarked against internationally-traded rates of gasoline (for petrol) and gas oil (for diesel) as well as rupee-dollar exchange rate.

• Industry sources said rupee had depreciated against the U.S. dollar since the last revision on December 16, making imports costlier. Rupee had averaged Rs.63.46 to a dollar since then as against Rs.61.95 factored in the last price cut.

• On top of this, margins, which is differential between raw material (crude oil price) and product rate, had halved to $8-9 per barrel, they said.

• While the slump in international crude oil prices had resulted in successive cuts in petrol and diesel prices, for oil companies they had meant inventory losses as they would typically buy crude at one rate but by the time it was processed and marketed its market value would have come down.

• In April-September, the three state oil firms had an inventory loss of Rs.5,300 crore which had risen by ‘two to three times’ since then.

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Sports

MS Dhoni retires from Test cricket

• Mahendra Singh Dhoni retired from Test cricket after the third Test between India and Australia concluded in a draw at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Tuesday.

• The long-standing India captain’s battling unbeaten 24 played a key role in his side saving the third Test. The innings turned out to be his last act in Tests.

• Dhoni’s decision came as a surprise since there is one more Test remaining in the series. He did not make the announcement in his post-match conference. Even as the correspondents were typing their reports, the bombshell came from the BCCI.

• The Board said in a press release: “M S Dhoni has chosen to retire from Test cricket with immediate effect in order to concentrate on ODI and Twenty20 formats.

• One of India’s greatest Test captains under whose leadership India became the No. 1 team in the Test rankings, Dhoni has decided to retire from Test cricket citing the strain of playing all formats of cricket.” Virat Kohli will lead India in the final Test beginning on January 6 in Sydney. Australia has already regained the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with a winning 2-0 lead.

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Science & Technology

Water vapour in Martian atmosphere: NASA researchers

• Scientists, including NASA researchers, have created a ‘map’ of the distribution of water vapour in Mars’ atmosphere.

• Researchers observed seasonal variations in atmospheric concentrations in Mars using data collected over ten years by the Russian-French SPICAM (Spectroscopy for Investigation of Characteristics of the Atmosphere of Mars) spectrometer aboard the Mars Express orbiter.

• This is the longest period of observation and provides the largest volume of data about water vapour on Mars, said scientists from the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the MIPT (Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology), who worked with the French laboratory LATMOS and NASA’s Goddard Centre.

• Conditions on Mars like low temperatures and low atmospheric pressure do not allow water to exist in liquid form in open reservoirs as it would on Earth. However, on Mars, there is a powerful layer of permafrost with large reserves of frozen water concentrated at the polar caps.

• There is water vapour in the atmosphere, although at very low levels compared to the quantities experienced here on Earth. If the entire volume of water in the atmosphere was to be spread evenly over the surface of the planet, the thickness of the water layer would not exceed 10-20 microns, while on Earth such a layer would be thousands of times thicker.

• Data from the SPICAM experiment allowed scientists to create a picture of the annual cycle of water vapour concentration variation in the atmosphere.

• The content of water vapour in the atmosphere reaches a maximum level of 60-70 microns of released water in the northern regions during the summer season, researchers found. The summer maximum in the southern hemisphere is significantly lower, about 20 microns.

• The scientists have also established a significant reduction in the concentration of water vapour by 5-10 microns during global sandstorms, which is probably connected to the removal of water vapour from the atmosphere due to adsorption processes and condensation on surfaces.

• “This research, based on one of the longest periods of monitoring of the Martian climate, has made an important contribution to the understanding of the Martian hydrological cycle - the most important of the climate mechanisms which could potentially support the existence of biological activity on the planet,” said co-author of the research Alexander Rodin, deputy head of the Infrared Spectroscopy of Planetary Atmospheres Laboratory at MIPT.

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Sources: Various News Papers & PIB

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