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Blog / 27 Jul 2020

(Daily News Scan - DNS English) Significance of Kakrapar - 3

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(Daily News Scan - DNS English) Significance of Kakrapar - 3


On 22nd July, 2020, a big achievement was marked for India’s atomic energy sector. The indigenously built third unit of Kakrapar Atomic Power Plant has successfully achieved its first criticality. PM Narendra Modi congratulated India’s nuclear scientists on this achievement, describing the development of the indigenous reactor as “a shining example of Make in India” and a “trailblazer for many such future achievements”.

In this DNS we will talk about KAKRAPAR -3 and its significance.

The 3rd Unit of Kakrapar Atomic power station is the country’s first 700 MWe (megawatt electric) unit, and the biggest indigenously developed variant of the Pressurised Heavy Water Reactor (PHWR).

This Atomic Power Plant has achieved its first criticality. Which means that, KAPP-3 has achieved the regular operating condition of a reactor and the plant is now ready to generate power.

Until now, the biggest reactor size of indigenous design was the 540 MWe PHWR, two of which have been deployed in Tarapur, Maharashtra. The PHWRs, which use natural uranium as fuel and heavy water as moderator, are the mainstay of India’s nuclear reactor fleet.

The operationalization of India’s first 700MWe reactor marks a significant scale-up in technology. It is in terms of both optimisation of its PHWR design — the new 700MWe unit addresses the issue of excess thermal margins and an improvement in the economies of scale, without significant changes to the design of the 540 MWe reactor.

Thermal margin is the extent to which the operating temperature of the reactor is below its maximum operating temperature.

Four units of the 700MWe reactor are currently being built at Kakrapar (KAPP-3 and 4) and Rawatbhata (RAPS-7 and 8). The 700MWe reactors will be the backbone of a new fleet of 12 reactors to which the government accorded administrative approval and financial sanction in 2017, and which are to be set up in fleet mode.

As India is working to ramp up its existing nuclear power capacity of 6,780 MWe to 22,480 MWe by 2031, the 700MWe capacity would constitute the biggest component of the expansion plan. Currently, nuclear power capacity constitutes less than 2% of the total installed capacity of 3, 68,690 MW (end-January 2020).

The work of this 700MWe began in 2010. This unit was originally expected to be commissioned in 2015. State-owned Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) had awarded the reactor-building contract for both KAPP-3 and 4 to Larsen & Toubro at an original contract value of Rs 844 crore. The original cost of two 700 MWe units was pegged at Rs 11,500 crore, and the tariff per unit was originally calculated to be Rs 2.80 per unit (kWh) at 2010 prices (a cost of roughly Rs 8 crore per MWe). However, this costing is expected to have seen some escalation.

This indigenous 700MWe Kakrapar 3 Pressurised Heavy Water Reactor (PHWR) has been developed with modern safety features. These features include- Steel lined inner containment, Passive decay heat removal system, Containment spray system and Hydrogen Management system.

This power plant is very important for India. Data suggest India’s energy demand is likely to grow at 4.2% per annum through 2035. As per the information available on the International Atomic Energy Agency’s website, India used to generate 4.1 billion kWhr power during 1947-48, which increased to about 1,272 billion kWhr, including captive power, in 2014-15. India is a big country so it needs a large amount of electricity generating capacity to cater to the rising energy demand. The country is still heavily dependent on fossil energy for its energy need. The development by India will help in fulfilling the needs of the country to some extent.