India is an important member of the 'International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor'. If this experiment succeeds, what is the immediate advantage for India?
- (a) It can use thorium in place of uranium for power generation
- (b) It can attain a global role in satellite navigation
- (c) It can drastically improve the efficiency of its fission reactors in power generation
- (d) It can build fusion reactors for power generation ✓ UPSC's answer
Why the answer is (d)
• ITER, under construction at Cadarache, France, is a tokamak designed to prove that nuclear fusion — fusing deuterium and tritium as in the Sun — can yield net energy; India joined in 2005 and contributes about 9% of the cost in components like the cryostat.
• If it succeeds, India gains the technology to build fusion reactors for power generation — clean, with abundant fuel and no long-lived waste — option (d).
• Thorium use (a), satellite navigation (b) and fission-reactor efficiency (c) are unrelated to fusion.
• Hence option (d).
Why the other options are wrong
- (a) It can use thorium in place of uranium for power generation
- Thorium relates to fission, not fusion.
- (b) It can attain a global role in satellite navigation
- ITER has nothing to do with navigation.
- (c) It can drastically improve the efficiency of its fission reactors in power generation
- ITER is fusion, not fission efficiency.
Asked in the GS Paper I of the UPSC Civil Services Preliminary Examination 2016, held on 7 August 2016. Question and answer key: Union Public Service Commission. Explanation: UPSC Answer Check.