The Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant’s first unit has returned to power this week following a planned outage for refueling, the Nuclear Power Corp. of India Ltd. (NPCIL) said late last week.
Plant Station Director H.N. Sahu said operations resumed on Jan. 20 under the supervision of Russian specialists and representatives from the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) and NPCIL.
The plant, located in Koodankulam, currently houses one working reactor. NPCIL’s website said there is currently one reactor under construction and is expected to begin operations later in 2016 or in early 2017. The reactor at Kudankulam is capable of generating up to 1,000 megawatts of electricity and is a VVER-1000 reactor developed by Russian nuclear specialists.
Sahu also said refueling and restarting the reactor happened in line with design specifications of the unit and under national regulation requirements set by the AERB.
The World Nuclear Association (WNA) said India anticipates that it will have approximately 63 gigawatts of nuclear capacity by 2032 and aims to have 25 percent of its electricity generated through nuclear plants by 2050.
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