The Hindu Business Line : Scope exists for pvt participation within present Atomic Energy Act

Tiruchi, Dec. 11 Indian private sector companies need not wait for an amendment of the Atomic Energy Act to participate in the development of nuclear power in India. They can well do that within the framework of the existing Act — by joining hands with the public sector Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL), says Dr Anil Kakodkar, Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission.

He observed that since it would not be possible to handover running of nuclear power plants to a company that does not have experience in operating a nuclear plant in India, Indian companies that are interested should first work with NPCIL and gain expertise.

Dr Kakodkar was here in connection with a ‘Symposium on joining materials, 2008’, SOJOM 2008, organised jointly by the Indian welding society, Welding Research Institute and Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd.

‘Will take time’

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the conference, he said while the legislative framework for nuclear co-operation with foreign countries is now ready, commercial negotiations are on. Such is the nature of these negotiations that they would take time to come to fruition.

These negotiations include key aspects such as fuel supply guarantee and “progressive localisation”, Dr Kakodkar said.

Answering a question, he said that India is looking at 5-6 sites, each housing 6-8 units. This, he said, would be enough to give the “initial boost”. These would be light water reactors built with technology and fuel from abroad.

Asked about the scope for standardisation, he said equipment could be standardised for all the units at a site, but not across all sites. “Standardisation is never permanent,” he said.

On the fast breeder reactors, Dr Kakodkar said that at least four more sites (“may be six”) were being looked into.

Earlier, speaking at SOJOM 2008, Dr Kakodkar said that India would need a new breed of engineers and technologists because “tomorrow’s power sector development would be on completely different set of technologies”.

Create new talent pool

Pointing to a need for creating a “new breed of people who understand the physics and can build large projects based on the new technologies”, Dr Kakodkar noted that joining of materials would pose a different set of challenges than today.

For example, there may be a need to join two materials that are thermal conductors but electrical insulators, or vice versa. There may be a need to connect a super conducting wire with a normal wire, or a super conducting material with an organic conductor, Dr Kakodkar said.

He described India’s three-phase nuclear power programme and said that overseas assistance would help get more projects off the ground in quick time. He said that nuclear power capacity of about 40,000 MW would help obviate the need to import a billion tones of coal annually.

More Stories on : Power

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page