Jay

TAPS unit four to be synchronized to grid soon

Mumbai, May 12 (PTI): The country's first and largest nuclear power plant -- unit four of Tarapur Atomic Power Station (TAPS) -- will be synchronized to the Western grid in a couple of days, chairman, Atomic Energy Commission Anil Kakodkar said here today.

The 540 MW plant at Tarapur, near here, which went critical on March 6, would be synchronized to the Western Grid in a couple of days after the clearance from the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, Kakodkar said on the occasion of Technology Day celebration at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre here commemorating the anniversary of Pokhran II nuclear tests in 1998.

The Nuclear Power Corporation would slowly increase the power (from zero power at present) and get the certification from the AERB in stages, and in a couple of months go commercial, he said.

Being the largest nuclear power plant, we will take all possible care to increase the power and so far the physics experiments and other tests conducted have showed positive behaviour of the reactor as envisaged, he said adding, "This clearly shows the level of maturity our scientists and engineers have perfected in the technology."

Technologically, the Department of Atomic Energy has achieved several milestones including the manufacturing of shamless calendria for the first time in the world for TAPS's unit four and carbide fuel technology for country's first fast breeder reactor at Kalpakkam in Tamil Nadu, he added.

India will be in a leading position in the world in several more technologies like closed fuel cycle, thorium technologies also, Kakodkar said.

The unit three of TAPS is expected to go critical by the end of this year or early next year, he said.

Simultaneously, two units of 220 MW plant each at Kota in Rajasthan, two units of 220 MW plants in Kaiga and two units of 1,000 MW each at Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu are also getting ready and would go critical by the end of next year, he added.

The first Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor of 500 MW, which is under construction, will be commissioned by 2010, Kakodkar said.

Regarding the newly developed and installed teletherapy machine of BARC -- `Bhabhatron', Kakodkar said there is a great demand for the instrument as it is the first indigenised teletherapy machine.

BARC has transferred the technology to a company in Bangalore and it would meet the demand of the hospitals in the country.

India has 248 cobalt-60 teletherapy units -- all of them imported -- out of which 33 are more than 25 years old and have to be replaced, BARC sources said.

During the occasion, Kakodkar felicitated two Padma awardees of the Department of Atomic Energy -- BARC Director Dr Srikumar Banerjee and former director of Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) (Kalpakkam) S P Bhoje.

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus...0505121917.htm

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Karthik

Well BARC and the NPC have a very impressive record on nuclear safety.

There's undoubtely going to be more nuclear plants on the anvil.

I just hope that this record continues, even as an increasing share of our energy demands are met by nuclear power.

We need to manufacture Co-60 units on our own. The importing of this makes radiation therapy very expensive for a lot of people.

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Jay

I guess we already have the tech to make it now...

From the above report...

Blademaster

I thought India had nuclear power plants before this one, the Canadian reactors.

Jay

Tarapur plant to feed MSEB
By: Ram Parmar
May 6, 2005

Palghar: Just when there seemed no hope for Mumbai, a ray of light has appeared. The Tarapur Atomic Power Station (TAPS) will be supplying around 210 MW power to the Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) from the first week of June.

Commercial power generation in the newly-commissioned plant will begin from June 1.

A senior official of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) at Anushakti Nagar, Mumbai, said that to tide over the current power crisis in the state, TAPS had agreed to sell the power by the first week of June, as currently the synchronisation process is on at the plant.

The MSEB will be purchasing the power at around Rs 2.70 per unit, the official said.

As per an agreement between the NPCIL and MSEB, the latter will be getting 39 per cent, Gujarat 19 per cent, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh 17 per cent, and Goa, Daman and other Union Territories will share 32 per cent of the total 540 MW to be generated in the first phase.

The plant, located 100 km north of Mumbai, is the 15th nuclear power plant in the country, built at a cost of Rs 6,000 crore, said S N Ahmed, executive director, NPCIL.

http://ww1.mid-day.com/news/city/2005/may/108866.htm

I think BARC built this plant on its own...

Karthik

Hey, thats good news then.

BTW, I think there was a proposed nuclear plant planned at Mangalore ( about 350 kms away from Bangalore).

But all the leading literary giants here in Karnataka are'nt too impressed with the plan. They are sorta less eloquent when you ask them about the other ways by which we can meet the state's energy demand. They have voiced their bitter opposition to the idea, and my lethargic CM wont bother to look at it till the next state elections.

oneman28

big advance for India.

540MW is still too small at today's standard.

Jay

Thank you. % wise we generate more nuclear power than many in Asia.

Again, we have bigger nuclear reactors that Russia is helping us out, thats twice the size of this one..

oneman28

That's great.

How about Nuclear electricity production? Let me show you the data.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/nshare.htm

Mainland China produced 23.4TWh(1.2%) in 2002 and 41.6TWh in 2003(2.2%).
India produced 19.6 TWh(3.7%) in 2002 and 16.4TWh in 2003(3.3%).
That means China used almost 4 times of electricity as what India used in 2003?
Also the trend is obvious.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf63.htm

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf53.htm

Jay

well, as I said % wise India generates more nuclear electricity than most of the countries in Asia.

Also, if you look at the plants in construction, India's capacity will rise to 6600 MWe while for China it'll be aound 8500 MWe (xcluding the ones that are planned).So its not a big difference...

And if Thorium reactors in Kalpakkam becomes operational as shcheduled, you can see a rise in India's capacity.

Blademaster

No one has answered my question.

Jay

I have already answered, check above.

This is India's 15th power plant, but it was entirely desighned and implemented by BARC.

konkerer

India has currently 13 reactors operational for power generation, with addition of this one, # of comercial operational reactors is 14.

There are 8 research reactors run by Barc.

India has currently 7 (including the current one 8) under construction. They are under variuos stages of competion and all them will be online by end of 2007. Two of the reactors are 1000 MW varreity.

Once the current lot of reactors are completed, India will immediately start building 8 more. Thus by 2007 India will have 22 comercial reactors, and by 2012, it will have 30 comercial reactors.

Yes, India has more commercial nuclear reactors for power genration than China.

India I believe is 5th or 6th in the terms of # of operational reactors.

USA is #1 with 104, Japan #2 with 55, France also had 55 but it has shut down many.

konkerer

Actually the company which runs comercial reactors is NPCIL (Nuclear power corporation of Inda Ltd). They are th people desiging and building the reactors. Out of 8 currently under cinstruction ( well now 7 ) the 2 big ones ( 1000 MW) are Russian design and Russia is helping with the construction of those, the rest 6 are Indian desined and being built by UCIL.

I am sure NPCIL works with other nuclear organizations including BARC.

checkout their website for pics of all the reactors under construction.
http://www.npcil.nic.in/

oneman28

More reactors, less capacity.
Less capacity, more percentage.



China to quadruple nuclear power
Posted: 19 May 2005

As China played host this week at the world's top nuclear conference - the International Conference on Nuclear Engineering (ICONE) - the government made clear that it has major plans to nearly quadruple its nuclear generating capacity by the year 2020.
"To meet the need of energy supply and environmental protection, nuclear power will play a more active role in China," said Rixin Kang of China National Nuclear Corporation and conference chair of ICONE 13. "Recently, 10 new nuclear power units have been approved by the Chinese government and this is just the beginning of China's ambitious nuclear power programme."


According to a report by the Environemnt News Service, China has become the world’s second largest consumer of energy and is one of the fastest growing producers of nuclear electric power in the world. Eight new large reactors are currently under construction, which will almost double the country's existing nuclear generating capacity.


China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group recently signed contracts to build the Lingao II project, the country's first 1,000 megawatt-level, domestic-built nuclear power plant, the state news agency Xinhua reported. It will be the third commercial nuclear power plant in South China's Guangdong Province, where China's first Daya Bay nuclear power plant began operation in 1991. It is due to be in operating in 2010.


Chinese companies will take a larger role in the construction of Lingao II than they have in past nuclear projects, according to Qian Zhimin, head of China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group.


'Safety first'


China now operates nine nuclear power plants with a total installed capacity of 7,000 megawatts, about 1.8 per cent of the country's total installed power generating capacity. The government is planning to boost nuclear power development to meet the country's demand for electricity, especially in the eastern provinces that are experiencing severe power shortages.


According to government plans, a total of 32 new 1,000 megawatt reactors are expected to be brought on line by 2020.


The first generating unit of the Lingao nuclear power plant began commercial operation in May 2002, with a capacity of 1,000 megawatts. The second generating unit began operating in January 2003.


A new 6,000 megawatt nuclear complex is planned for construction at Yangjiang in Guangdong province, to begin commercial operation in 2010. A second generating facility also is planned for Daya Bay, site of China's first nuclear power plant.


Commenting on the safety problems in running nuclear installations, and handling its waste, Vice Premier Zeng Peiyan emphasized the industry must be built on "safety first, quality first."


"This is the premise and the safeguard on which our entire nuclear electricity enterprise develops," Zeng said. "If it does not have this, development of the nuclear industry is just empty talk."


China is one of six countries involved in international efforts to produce electricity from nuclear fusion. Rather than producing electricity with today's technology of splitting atoms, the ITER reactor would fuse atoms at temperatures of over 100 million degrees Celsius. The project includes the European Union, Japan, South Korea, Russia, and the United States, under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency.


Source:Environment News Service


For more information on ICONE click here.