UPSC Prelims 2016 · Question 4 of 98

UPSC Prelims 2016 question on ITER Fusion Reactor

India is an important member of the 'International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor'. If this experiment succeeds, what is the immediate advantage for India?

  1. It can use thorium in place of uranium for power generation
  2. It can attain a global role in satellite navigation
  3. It can drastically improve the efficiency of its fission reactors in power generation
  4. It can build fusion reactors for power generation
Show answer

Answer: D. It can build fusion reactors for power generation

Verdict

The answer is that India can build fusion reactors for power generation. ITER is a fusion experiment, so success would deliver fusion capability.

Analysis

The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor is an international nuclear fusion research and engineering megaproject, and it will be the world's largest magnetic confinement plasma physics experiment. The immediate advantage of success is therefore the ability to build fusion reactors. The thorium option belongs to India's three stage fission programme, which is a separate line of work. The satellite navigation option has no connection to nuclear energy at all. The third option confuses fusion with fission, since ITER does not improve fission reactor efficiency.

Source

The Hindu science commentary on ITER.

How to crack it

Decode the acronym and let it answer the question. Thermonuclear means fusion, so the benefit of a thermonuclear experiment must be fusion related, and every option describing fission or navigation falls away at once. The wider habit worth building is to separate India's fission programme, which is the thorium and three stage story, from its fusion participation, which is ITER, because UPSC repeatedly builds distractors by mixing the two.

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