Atomic power plant gets 30-yr fresh lease of life

Life extension works using indigenous technology have been completed successfully on Unit-1 of Madras Atomic Power Station (MAPS), thus giving the 22-year-old nuclear power plant a fresh lease of life for 30 years.

The works have been completed in a record time of about 14 months. Similar life extension works were undertaken and completed in 19 months on the Unit-II of MAPS, a constituent of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL), located at Kalpakkam, about 70 km south of Chennai.

Addressing a press conference on Saturday, S K Jain, chairman and managing director of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India, said that by spending around Rs 220 crore on the upgradation works, the unit had been made as good as new and would run for another 30 years.

He also said that NPCIL would invest about Rs 4,000 crore in various projects during 2006-07 and was planning to borrow about Rs 2,000 crore from the market. It would approach public sector banks as NPCIL would be in a position to get loans at cheaper rates, he added.

According to Jain, constructing a new nuclear power plant of 220 MW capacity would cost as much as Rs 1,100 crore. The life extension programme was successfully completed in the reactor at Unit 2 of Rajasthan Atomic Power Station (RAPS) a few years ago. The same indigenous technology, which was used in RAPS, had been perfected and finetuned by the team in MAPS to carry out such work in its units.

MAPS and RAPS are of the pressurised heavy water reactors (PHWR) type that uses natural uranium as fuel and heavy water as coolant and moderator. In PHWR of this type, the mid-life channel replacement is required.

Jain said that similar upgradation would be required at three units (two units of Narora Atomic Power Station and Unit-1 of Kakarpar Atomic Power Station), which use Zircoaloy-2 tubes.

The Narora Unit-I has already been shut down to undertake life extension programme.

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A new start

Around Rs 220 crore was spent on upgrading Unit-1 of Madras Atomic Power Station

The works have been completed in a record time of about 14 months

NPCIL plans to invest about Rs 4,000 crore in various projects during 2006-07 and to borrow about Rs 2,000 crore from the market