Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd.,Technical Director S A Bharadwaj announced on 12 March that they have developed the first of its kind Advance Heavy Water Reactor(AHWR) of 300 MW capacity for thorium utilization. This design would of course go through the regulatory mill of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board. The conventional path of using Uranium 235 has strict limitations since India has very limited reserves of uranium and import even after we signed the Test Ban Treaty are less difficult but clearly a part of global power play. I have been a supporter of going the thorium route since we have almost unlimited reserves of thorium and as I showed in my Fuel for Power extensively used lecture this is the only way of completing the energy cycle. Its initial costs would in financial terms be higher but these would come down. Placid Rodrigues who had developed the first experimental reactor working on the thorium route,in September 3003,when asked on the economics gave the example the present author gave him of the cost of the steam generator for the PHWR manufactured by BHEL was brought down in a dispute between BHEL and NPCIL. BHEL took 1,679 days to manufacture the first PHWR steam generator,the manufacturing time of the eighth steam generator came down to 258 In many regions in India nuclear power after the initial front up costs are met would be a viable option economically if transportation and other costs are accounted and could be a part of business like cooperation options.
This experimental reactor on the thorium route,Kamini was developed at the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research(IGCAR) at Kalpakkam and was a major achievement of Indian technology since nobody else was interested in thorium based technology. It is only in this country that achievements of this kind are swept under the carpet while all kind of so called innovators hold the two minute byte on the screen. The IGCAR celebrated in 2010 the silver jubilee of the operation of the Fast Breeder Test Reactor. They also showcased the progress in designing Fast Breeder Reactors with improved economy,safety and higher fuel burn ups They had also commissioned a state of the art Training Simulator of the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor,a milestone for India.
After Fukushima the debates are going to get more brittle in the days ahead and as Karnik has pointed out in the Space case we need a sense of balance on these issues of the highest importance to Indias future.
