CHENNAI: The annual World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR), released on Tuesday, at the Central European University in Budapest, has flayed the poor performance of Kudankulam nuclear power units and the overall slow progress of nuclear sector in India.
“The last major imported reactors operating in India are Kudankulam units (1&2). But, their performance has been poor. Unit-1 had a load factor of 54%, and Unit-2 had a load factor of just 35.2% in 2018. The problems have continued in 2019. Unit 1 has not generated power in March and according to TN Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco), the state’s distribution company, only one unit was functioning at any given time last year,” the report said.
An unnamed senior director of Nuclear Power Corporation with decades of experience in designing and commissioning nuclear power reactors, said Unit-1 has been facing problems since the day it was commissioned and had undergone breakdowns and closures.
The unit 1 has been closed for most of the time since its commissioning and it’s a serious concern, the report said.
It also said that such frequent shutdowns were causing its power generation to be so uncertain that it was being tarred with the brush of “intermittent” renewable sources of electricity. An official from Tangedco said, “We are not able to prepare any schedule based on Kudankulam supply. It’s as good as not being there.”
Anti-Kudankulam activist G Soundarrajan told TNIE that Unit-1 had tripped 49 times since its’ commencement in 2014, while Unit-2 has tripped 19 times since 2017.
In fact, Kamlesh Nilkanth Vyas, Secretary of Dept of Atomic Energy and Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, in April this year, said the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited is trying to fix the issues.
To improve performance, Russia-based Rosatom State Atomic Energy Corporation, which happens to be the tech consultant and main equipment supplier, will be providing a new nuclear fuel called TVS-2M.
It also offers higher uranium capacity, fuel burn-up and enhanced operational safety, and reduces nuclear waste.