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India’s nuclear power chief wants projects to hurry up

Big ticket nuclear projects have to be operational fast: AEC head Shekhar Basu, Economic Times, By IANS | 25 Oct, 2015 By Venkatachari Jagannathan  CHENNAI: The new chairman of India’s Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) Sekhar Basu seems to be a man with a mission and also in a hurry to achieve this.

“There are some projects that need speeding up so that they restart or go on stream fast. We have to have Indian uranium as much as possible for our reactors. We have to increase production of uranium and work has started towards that,” Basu, 63, told IANS in an interview over the phone. Queried about the delay in restarting of the first 1,000 MW unit at KNPP he said: “The unit was shut down for the first time for annual maintenance after it was commissioned. I will now study the issues faced by Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KNPP) and see how the issues could be set right.”

A Padma Shri awardee, Basu said lots of checking has to be done and some components have to be replaced.

While he did not say he is impatient, Basu insisted: “I want the unit to restart  operations at the earliest.”

Basu is also on the board of Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) that is building two 1,000 MW reactors at KNPP with Russian equipment.

He said as per the current indications, the first KNPP unit is expected to restart later this year and the second unit would go on stream some time next year.

The KNPP unit that was connected to the southern grid in December 2014 was shut down this June for annual maintenance. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/49526271.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

October 26, 2015 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general