The Hindu Business Line : Nuclear action to kick off at Jaitapur, Koodankulam

New Delhi, Sept. 8 Post the NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group) waiver, action on the Indian nuclear space is likely to kick-off at Jaitapur in Maharashtra, where up to six imported reactors of 1,600 MWe are slated to be set up by State-owned Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) through a collaboration with the French Government, and Koodankulam in Tamil Nadu, where four additional reactors of 1,000 MWe each are likely to come up with Russian assistance.

According to Department of Atomic Energy officials, the Jaitapur coastal site in Ratnagiri district — one of the six locations earlier identified by a Government site-selection panel for housing imported light water reactors — is likely to host European pressurised reactors (EPR) developed by Areva NP, a joint venture between Areva SA of France and Siemens AG of Germany. While the Centre had initially envisaged two units of 1,000 MWe each for the Jaitapur plant, NPCIL is also preparing a techno-economic evaluation report for the deployment of Areva’s latest 1,600 MWe reactors.

Besides Jaitapur, the Koodankulam site — where two 1,000 MW units are already under construction through Russian assistance — could see the construction of four additional units at the same location. The collaborations on the new units are expected under a pact, reached between India and Russia in January last year. Under the pact, both countries agreed to collaborate on building up to 10 nuclear units across various sites in India.

In case of the two Koodankulam units currently under construction, the Russians are slated to shortly ship to India custom-built equipment designed specially for the Koodankulam station — a 300-tonne airlock manufactured by Russian firm OMZ and a reactor refuelling system made by Uralmash OJSC. The delivery is expected to speed up the work in the reactor compartment to enable the project to kickstart operations of its first unit by late this year, and the second one in 2009. With the key shipment coming in, the procedure for the first 1,000 MWe Koodankulam unit’s criticality, including loading the enriched uranium fuel bundles into the reactor, would start over the next couple of months, officials said.

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