NUCLEAR POWER

Nuclear energy thrust

Nuclear Power Corporation is poised for a leap in its generation capacity.

T.S. SUBRAMANIAN

HAVING consolidated its generation programme in the past several years, Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPC) is all set to accelerate it in the Tenth and Eleventh Five-Year Plan periods. The Tenth Plan got under way in April. Eight reactors are being erected in different parts of the country. Their capacities range from 220 MWe to 1,000 MWe, representing a judicious mix of indigenous and imported units.

At Kaiga, Tarapur or Rawatbhatta, where new reactors are under construction, or Koodankulam, where construction work is on, the mood is upbeat. There are now 14 reactors operating in the country. Their average capacity factor in 2001-2002 stood at 86 per cent, up from 82 per cent the previous year and 60 per cent in 1995-96. The gestation period of the projects, which was a "shameful 13 years", has now been cut down to five and a half years because of the "speed of construction and engineering excellence". Also, the units are coming up at sites where reactors already exist, eliminating the time-consuming process of land acquisition.

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Work in progress at the Koodankulam Atomic Energy Project.

The NPC is also at a high level of profitability, which is poised for a leap during the Tenth Plan period. Profit before tax shot up from Rs.153 crores in 1995-96 to Rs.1,123 crores in 2000-2001 and to Rs.1,300 crores in 2001-2002.

V.K. Chaturvedi, NPC Chairman and Managing Director, said on March 31, "The Tenth Plan will be an important period which will decide in which direction we shall gallop. And we shall gallop on our own technology."

March 31, 2002, was the last day of the Ninth Plan period. That day was significant in several respects. It marked the start of two giant reactor projects of 1,000 MWe capacity each at Koodankulam in Tamil Nadu. At a function to mark the first pour of concrete, Dr. Anil Kakodkar, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), characterised the building of the Russian-designed VVER-1000 reactors as "an additionality to our domestic programme". Although imported from Russia, the NPC will build them.

March 31 also marked the beginning of the construction of the third and fourth reactors at Kaiga in Karnataka. R.C. Sinha, Project Director, Kaiga Atomic Power Project, was confident that his team would build these reactors at a cost of Rs.3,100 crores, while Rs.4,200 crores has been allotted. A few days earlier, the Union government had approved the construction of the fifth and sixth reactors at Rawatbhatta, Rajasthan. The saving of Rs.1,100 crores at Kaiga will go into the financing of the reactors at Rawatbhatta.

Dr. Kakodkar said V.K. Sharma, senior executive engineer (technical), NPC, Mumbai, and R.C. Sinha, had done "wonderful work" in saving the project cost in terms of time-schedule, outlay and budgetary level.

The Kaiga and Rawatbhatta units are Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWRs), which have become the workhorses of India's nuclear electricity generation programme. These PHWRs have been designed, developed, built and operated indigenously. Of the 14 reactors operating now, 12 are PHWRs. The other two are Light Water Reactors, built at Tarapur by General Electric of the United States. Of the eight reactors under construction, six are PHWRs, including those being built at Kaiga, Rawatbhatta and Tarapur. While those under construction at Kaiga and Rawatbhatta have a capacity of 220 MWe each, the two at Tarapur are scaled-up versions, at 540 MWe. The other two are the Koodankulam units. All the eight reactors will have a life of 60 years.

March 31 was important in another sense. The detailed project report (DPR) on India's futuristic Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR) was ready that day. The AHWR's design has been frozen. On May 25, the AEC, which met at Kalpakkam, formally approved the construction of a Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR) there at a cost of Rs.3,000 crores to generate 500 MWe. Pre-project work is proceeding apace. The construction by NPC will begin soon. The Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) at Kalpakkam, headed by its Director S.B. Bhoje, has designed the PFBR. Bhoje told Frontline on July 21 that the construction of the PFBR would start in January 2003. The clearance for the excavation of the site was given by the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) in July. The PFBR will come up adjacent to the two units of the Madras Atomic Power Station at Kalpakkam at a cost of Rs.2,800 crores.

The AERB approved the site in October 2000 after studying its various parameters such as the population density of the neighbourhood, probability of flooding and the seismic conditions. In February this year, the IGCAR received permission from the AERB to manufacture the nuclear components needed in the project, Bhoje said. He said that the excavation would be done to a depth of 16 metres, and then the first pour of concrete for the foundation would take place. The AERB clearance for the first pour of the concrete is expected in December.

After the public hearing held last year on the project, the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) had given the environmental clearance by way of a no-objection certificate to the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests.

The IGCAR had submitted the detailed project report to the AEC, when it met at Kalpakkam, Bhoje said. The AEC had suggested that 25 per cent of the project cost be raised from the market. Various options in this regard would be explored, he said.

The PFBR would use mixed uranium-plutonium oxide fuel. Its forerunner is the Fast Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR) at Kalpakkam.

Dr. Kakodkar was confident when he said, "In India, we have an atomic energy programme that is based on domestic research and development. Despite technological regimes, we are good in the nuclear power programme in the commercial domain. So we are now going from a phase of consolidation to one of acceleration." He added: "We are in a high-tech industry, which has attendant challenges. But the indigenous technology has matured."

The PHWRs, which use natural uranium as fuel, represent the first phase of India's indigenous atomic energy programme. The PFBR represents the second phase. It will use plutonium-uranium oxide as fuel. In the second phase, a series of fast breeder reactors will be built. A beginning has been made with the FBTR operational at Kalpakkam.

Chaturvedi called fast breeder reactors "the bread and butter of our country". According to him, whatever might be the experience of countries with breeder reactors, "ours will be different". The AHWR, which is Dr. Kakodkar's pet project, represents the third phase. The KAMINI research reactor at Kalpakkam heralds the AHWRs.

NPC has not only scaled up the domestic 220 MWe PHWRs to 540 MWe but will build innovative PHWRs of 680 MWe/700 MWe capacity. Its design is being pursued aggressively. NPC's plans are that if India is unable to import light water reactors such as those being built at Koodankulam at favourable commercial rates, it will go ahead and build these 680 MWe reactors. India has also plans to build 1,000 MWe PHWRs on its own. Jaitapur, a coastal site in Maharashtra, is a candidate for the 680 MWe or 1,000 MWe PHWRs.

The Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) is propelled by the Vision 2020 document, which projects 20,000 MWe of nuclear electricity generation by 2020. The 14 reactors now in operation generate 2,720 MWe. By the end of the Tenth Plan in 2007, the NPC will generate another 1,300 MWe from the third and fourth reactors (2x540 MWe) at Tarapur and the third unit at Kaiga (220 MWe). During the Eleventh Plan, Kaiga-4, 5 and 6, the two reactors at Koodankulam, the fifth and sixth reactors at Rawatbhatta, the PFBR, the AHWR (235 MWe), the seventh and eight reactors at Rawatbhatta (540 MWe), and one imported light water reactor (1,000 MWe) will be connected to the grids. They will together generate 5,915 MWe. Thus, by the end of the Eleventh Plan, the NPC's total capacity will be 9,935 MWe.

Chaturvedi said: "Our plan is that all the time 10 to 12 units should be under construction. They will be either 700 MWe or 1,000 MWe reactors."

According to S. Krishnan, senior executive director, (corporate planning), NPC, these reactors will use "a combination of our own internal resources, borrowings and government budgetary support, and the Russian credit for Koodankulam."

AT Koodankulam, the first pour of concrete was an emotional moment for the former top brass of the DAE, especially for Dr. M.R. Srinivasan, former Secretary. It was during his stewardship that the Koodankulam project had its beginning V.V. Kozlov, Director-General of Atomstroyexport, Russia, recalled Srinivasan's visit to Koodankulam in 1984. The project has become a reality after 18 years.

Dr. Srinivasan, Dr. P.K. Iyengar, and Dr.R. Chidambaram, all former Chairmen of the AEC, and S.L. Kati, former Managing Director of NPC, and a number of others took turns to break coconuts, marking the occasion. E.A. Reshetnikov, Russia's Deputy Minister for Atomic Energy, and Kozlov also tried their hand at smashing coconuts.

M.S.S. Raghavan, former Director (Projects), NPC, said he was amazed at the speed with which the Koodankulam site had been readied - with administrative buildings, a compound wall, a meteorological tower - for the first pour of concrete. T.V. Prabhakaran, former Director (Infrastructure), and C.R. Prabhakaran, former Associate Director (Infrastructure), who were both associated with Koodankulam, called it a memorable occasion.

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During the first pour of concrete on March 31, signalling the start of the construction of the project.

The Russians sought to use the occasion to sell the idea of building four more VVER-1000s at Koodankulam. The Russian team pointed out that the Koodankulam site could accommodate four more reactors.

The DAE was interested in importing light water reactors as an "additionality" to the indigenous programme. Kakodkar said, "This site can take more units. How they come, we have to see. In principle, yes."

Chaturvedi said that if anybody presented a proposal that was beneficial to us commercially, that would certainly be considered. "We have our own programme, a very strong programme, and I will put up four units of 700 MWe each here," he said.

Plans are under way to convert Koodankulam into a "nuclear island". More reactors will come up. "They may be 700 MWe PHWRs, they may be 500 MWe/1,000 MWe Fast Breeder Reactors. There may be waste management facilities... It is an ideal site for a nuclear power station," the NPC Chairman said. More such sites will come up where four to six reactors can be built.

What will attract attention is the 235 MWe AHWR, which has gone through sustained efforts in terms of design and research and development at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Trombay. "This (the AHWR) is completely new, very innovative," Kakodkar said. So BARC will go through a period of intense debate on the AHWR for about two years. Simultaneously, safety review of the reactor and site-related reviews will be conducted.

An important objective of designing the AHWR is to use the country's vast reserves of thorium, billed the fuel of the future. The reactor will use naturally available thorium and convert it into uranium-233, which will undergo fission in situ to generate electricity. A small amount of plutonium will be used as driver-fuel. A decision on when to start the reactor's construction will be taken in 2004. The three cardinal tenets in the development of the AHWR are safety, economy and thorium utilisation.