On December 17, 2023, India’s largest indigenously developed 700-MWe pressurised heavy water reactor (PHWR) – the fourth unit in Kakrapar, Gujarat – attained criticality. Six months earlier, another 700-MWe unit in the same facility had started producing commercial electricity. In 2024, another unit with the same capacity is expected to be commissioned in Rawatbhata, Rajasthan. Behind all these reactors is the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL). Its chairman and managing director B.C. Pathak told The Hindu NPCIL plans to “commission a nuclear power reactor every year” hence.
Mr. Pathak is a Distinguished Scientist of the Department of Atomic Energy and has more than 30 years of experience implementing the NPCIL’s nuclear power projects, including 220-MWe, 540-MWe, 700-MWe and 1,000-MWe reactors of both PHWR and pressurised water reactor (PWR) technologies. He assumed his current charge in NPCIL in February 2022. On December 13, 2023, he spoke to The Hindu on India’s nuclear power plans and strategy. Excerpts from the interview follow.
In the conference on ‘Nuclear for Clean Energy Transition’ (in December), organised by the Indian Nuclear Society in association with the NPCIL, you made a distinction between electricity generation and energy. You said much of the energy currently comes from fossil fuels. Can you expand on this?
