Indian firms to run control and instrumentation at Russian-designed Kudankulam 5 and 6 reactors

Public sector Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) and Mumbai-based TEMA India have been awarded the nearly Rs 1,600-crore project to set up the systems in 42 months.

The Kudankulam nuclear complex hosts Russian-designed 1,000 MW VVER reactors. (Express Archive)

A consortium of two Indian companies has won the contract for installing and managing the control and instrumentation package at the under-construction Kudankulam 5 and 6 nuclear reactors, marking another step forward towards greater indigenisation of the nuclear ecosystem in the country.

Public sector Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) and Mumbai-based TEMA India have been awarded the nearly Rs 1,600 crore project to set up the systems in 42 months.

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Control and instrumentation package comprises all the equipment, sensors, logic software and other systems that monitor the plant functioning, facilitate decision-making, and ensure an efficient and safe operation.

ECIL, a public sector company under the Department of Atomic Energy, was set up mainly to do the control and instrumentation work at the indigenous Indian reactors, and has been running the systems at all the Indian-made Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors. But this is the first time, it has tied up with a private company to set up control and instrumentation at foreign made reactors.

Only reactors designed overseas

The Kudankulam nuclear complex hosts Russian-designed 1,000 MW VVER reactors. The first two reactors in the complex, the only foreign-designed reactors in India right now, have been operational for more than a decade. Units 3 to 6 are under various stages of construction. Control and instrumentation of the first two units was tied to the overall reactor supply framework. With units 3 and 4, a process of indigenisation of these systems was started. An Indian company BGR Systems provided many of the specified equipment and sub-systems, under the overall architecture designed by the Russian suppliers. But for units 5 and 6, the consortium of ECIL and TEMA have been entrusted with end-to-end responsibility, including engineering, integration, testing and execution.

This is in keeping with the policy to incentivise greater role for Indian companies in the nuclear sector which is poised for a significant expansion following the recent change in the nuclear energy law which enables private players, including foreign entities through partnerships, to establish and operate nuclear power plants.

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While a company like ECIL has long experience in this field, the presence of TEMA, an engineering and manufacturing company with a rapidly growing footprint in the nuclear sector, in the consortium would ensure enhanced capacity building in other Indian firms as well as they prepare for increased role in the nuclear industry. Founded by directors H K Sippy and Chetan Doshi, TEMA had recently been entrusted with the job of testing the equipment required for ‘upgrading of depleted heavy water’ at the PHWRs, a job that used to be carried out by Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) till now.

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“This is evidence of our TEMA’s excellent track record in the nuclear field, and a recognition that private companies like TEMA can deliver quality work with very high safety standards,” Narendra Rao, chief operating officer of the company, said.

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