History of the Philippines’ Nuclear Programme

By: Darryl Gilbuena

INTRODUCTION

There is no information or belief that the Philippines is in possession of WMDs. Nuclear weapons are expressly prohibited in the Philippines, as stated in Article II Section 8 of the Philippine Constitution [1]. But as time flies, the energy consumption grew higher and higher and the government tends to find a solution to address this problem. The Philippines comprises 7641 separate islands. Its population of about 110 million is growing and is served by just 25.5 GWe of electrical generation capacity as of 2019, and power shortages and outages remain common.The Philippine Department of Energy (DOE) expects peak electricity demand to more than triple by 2040 [3].In order to achieve the growth of the country, the latest constitution suggested to operate a nuclear facility to have a reliable, secure, sustainable, quality and affordable electricity supply, including sufficient reserve to guarantee that there will be no disruptions in the power supply.

After more than three decades, the Philippines is again operating a nuclear facility. A presidential executive order from earlier this year outlines the government's position for the inclusion of nuclear energy in the Philippines' energy mix. The Philippines built a nuclear power plant in the late 1970s, but the project was stopped in 1986, and fuel was not loaded into it [5]. Duterte signed Executive Order No.164, dated 28 February, following the recommendation of the Nuclear Energy Programme Inter-Agency Committee (NEP-IAC), which conducted a pre-feasibility study and public consultation on the matter [2]. It says that the government sees nuclear energy as "a viable component to bridge the gap between rising energy demand and supply," as well as a driver for economic growth. It also recognises nuclear's role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

HISTORY

The Philippine nuclear program started in 1958 with the creation of the Philippine Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) under Republic Act 2067. A year after Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in 1972 because of NPA (New People's Army) rebellion against the government; he announced the decision to build a nuclear power plant at Bataan. This was in response to the 1973 oil crisis, as the Middle East oil embargo had put a heavy strain on the Philippine economy, and Marcos knows that nuclear power is the solution to meeting the country's energy demands and decreasing dependence on imported oil. The plant was completed in 1984. However, two years later in 1986, the year in which Marcos was ousted from power following the People Power Revolution, and the same year in which the reactor at Chernobyl, Soviet Union (now part of Ukraine) accidentally exploded, the new president Corazon Aquino decided not to operate the plant due to the proximity to a major geological fault and to then dormant stratovolcano Mt. Pinatubo which erupted in 1991 [6]. Former Marcos defense secretary Senator Juan Ponce Enrile asserted in 2016 that the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant was built with the intention of being utilized in the development of a nuclear weapons program. Although he insisted that the facility's primary function was the production of electricity, he claimed that the nuclear power plant's secondary function is the development of nuclear weapons. Enrile predicted that China would be discouraged from making aggressive claims in the South China Sea if the Philippines were successful in developing nuclear weapons. But he acknowledged that he himself knew little about the science and technology involved in creating nuclear weapons. American nuclear warheads were covertly stocked up in the nation throughout the Cold War, specifically from 1965 to 1986 under Ferdinand Marcos. It was never made public in the Philippines until long after the regime, and only Marcos was made aware of it after being given a covert update by American military advisers as early as 1966. Yet, there is currently a movement in the nation that attempts to halt the development of nuclear power facilities there as well as the American military presence there, which is thought to be housing nuclear weapons on Philippine land. President Benigno Simeon Aquino III disagreed with allowing the Philippines to have nuclear weapons in spite of China's provocations since the 2010s in the midst of the South China Sea conflicts. He defended it by pointing out that the government lacked the resources to develop such a weapon and that having one would only serve to heighten tensions between the two nations.

Juan Ponce Enrile says once more in 2019 that the Philippines should have acquired nuclear weapons in order to defend its claims, especially in order to uphold the Philippines v. China international arbitration verdict, involving its territorial disputes with China [9]. In reaction to Enrile's claim, defense minister Delfin Lorenzana stated that the Philippines has no plans to build nuclear weapons due to its limited technological capacity and legal commitments, such as being a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty [7]. In actuality, the Philippines ratified the Treaty on the Prevention of Nuclear Weapons on February 18, 2021, after signing it on September 20, 2017 [8].

PICTURE REFERENCES

https://powerphilippines.com/pros-cons-reopening-bataan-nuclear-power-plant/

https://www.facebook.com/EmergingPH/photos/a.326644888207776/1035355934003331/

REFERENCES

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1987_Philippine_Constitution

[2] https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Philippines-relaunches-nuclear-energy-programme

[3] https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-o-s/philippines.aspx

[4] https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/after-34-year-gap-the-philippines-has-a-nuclear-facility-again#:~:text=The%20Philippines%20built%20a%20nuclear,was%20not%20loaded%20into%20it.

[5] http://www10.antenna.nl/wise/index.html?http://www10.antenna.nl/wise/499-500/4935.html

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippines_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#cite_note-wise-1

[7] https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1067698

[8] https://treaties.unoda.org/t/tpnw