NTPC, NPCIL signed joint venture agreement

Shifting gears to accelerate nuclear power programme in the country the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) has formally signed a joint venture agreement with NTPC to pave way for the formation of a new company to set up atomic power plants in the country.

NPCIL said its chairman and managing director S K Jain and NTPC chairman and managing director R S Sharma signed the agreement in New Delhi in the presence of Atomic Energy Commission (EC) chairman And secretary Department of Atomic Energy S Banerjee and Secretary (power) Harishankar Brahma.

NPCIL will have a 51 per cent stake with NTPC contributing to 49 per cent of the equity.

Union Minister of Power Sushil Kumar Shinde and Minister of State for Science and Technology, Earth Sciences, Prime Minister’s Office, Prithviraj Chavan, and Minister of State for Power Bharatsinh Solanki were present on the occasion.

A coffee table book Our Flying Guests was brought out by NPCIL on this occasion. The book evidences the harmony of nuclear power with nature and covers the diversity of avifauna at power stations in India.

NPCIL had recently commissioned two nuclear power reactors each of 220 MW at Rajasthan in February and March 2010 taking the nuclear power capacity in the country to 4,560 MW. The power generation during the year 2009-10 at 18,831 MUs was 26 per cent higher than the generation last year.

NPCIL is setting up seven nuclear power reactors of 5,020 MW.

While three reactors at Kaiga (1) and Kudankulam (2), Tamil Nadu are under advanced stages of completion, work on four pressurised heavy water reactors (PHWRs) of 700 MW each, two units each at Kakrapar in Gujarat and at Rawatbhata in Rajasthan had commenced this year. The total nuclear power capacity in the country will reach 10,080 MW by 2017 including 500 MW Fast Breeder Reactor being set up by BHAVINI.

NPCIL has planned to commence work on four PWHRs of 700 MW two each in Haryana and Madhya Pradesh and also light water reactors with foreign cooperation at the coastal sites in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu by the year 2012.

UNI