Suspense continues as to who will be named chairman and managing director (CMD) of India's fast breeder reactor power company Bharatiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Ltd (BHAVINI), officials said Wednesday.
"The suspense still continues as to the person who would be chosen as the CMD of BHAVINI. However the suspense is expected to end in a day or two," atomic power sector officials told IANS.
The central government in October last year had appointed Rajani Sankaran as the officiating CMD for three months. She succeeded Prabhat Kumar, BHAVINI's first CMD, and her term comes to an end Jan 31.
Industry sources told IANS that officials from the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL) and the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) were in the race for the top post.
BHAVINI is setting up the country's first indigenously designed 500 MW prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) at Kalpakkam, around 80 km from here.
Officials told IANS that the project was at a very crucial stage and if every technical challenge was sorted out, then the plant would go on stream in less than two years time.
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Interestingly, the reactor was designed by IGCAR.
A breeder reactor is one that breeds more material for a nuclear fission reaction than it consumes. The PFBR will be fuelled by a blend of plutonium and uranium oxide, called MOX fuel. While the reactor will break up (fission) plutonium for power production, it will also breed more plutonium than it consumes. The original plutonium comes from natural uranium.
The issue now is whether the government would choose a person from IGCAR which had designed the plant so that the reactor is commissioned on time sorting out technical glitches, or a person from NPCIL.
If it is the former, then perhaps it will be the first time a scientist from ICGAR would head a company that is implementing a power project designed by the research organisation.