Thinking a little more about this, I think I’ve come up with some possible motivations for Yemen’s pursuing nuclear power. I’ve talked about this before here and here. There’s no question that Yemen needs more power but I wondered why they didn’t go for the much more affordable (to build) natural gas power plants. I think the answer comes from their goals of installing desalinization plants. Yemen is facing a sever water crisis, mostly caused by the wasteful agriculture methods (see here). Desalinization takes quite a bit of power, and power costs money. Nuclear is, I believe, one of the most cost effective methods of power production, the government here always takes great pains to make sure that people understand that the nuclear power will be cheaper than the current production methods. I think that they are trying to kill two birds with one stone.
And it might work, IF getting the Uranium here isn’t a problem, IF the price of Uranium doesn’t start to go up like other fuels have and IF the public and opposition political parties can wait that long. It is expected that the first power plant will come online in 2012. If my calculations are correct, that will make up for the power deficit that they currently have. They will then have to build more power plants to provide for the desalinization plants. And of course they will have to build the desalinization plants… That timeline will not head off the water crisis that is expected to hit here very soon. It is estimated that Sana’a will run out of water by 2015, and other cities and rural areas will probably run out sooner. Ta’izz is already experiencing water problems… People are agitating for change right now. I actually think the government is doing what it can, but nothing will be immediate. If real elections are held and the current ruling party is thrown out (I’m not holding my breath), I’m not sure that whoever comes in will have such a long term view. Investing in infrastructure is always a long term project, but it is made more difficult in third world countries by impatience inspired by the current conditions.