The power generation of the first unit of the 1,000 MW Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) has been suspended for 60 days as a part of annual maintenance and refuelling works.
Unit-I, which is presently generating 600 MW, will be shut down from June 24 for 60 days, KNPP Site Director R S Sundar said on Wednesday. He said the unit would resume generation of 1,000 MW after the works.
Sundar said the maintenance works were being carried out to change one third of the fuel pins. The pins have to be changed every year.
According to the official, the unit has so far generated 6,873 million unit as on June 24 and turbine generator has remained in service for a cumulative period of 9,267 hours.
As per the the Central Electricity Authority, since December 31, Tamil Nadu received the lion share of 562.50 MW every day followed by Karnataka, which got 221 MW. Kerala was supplied 133 MW while Andhra Pradesh and Puducherry got 50 MW and 33.50 MW, respectively.
During the trial run, the electricity was supplied at the rate of about Rs 1 per unit. However, since the commercial production has started, now the power rate was about Rs 4 per unit.
The first unit of KNPP is India’s first pressurised water reactor belonging to the light water reactor category. It was set up at a cost of more than Rs 17,000 crore.The construction works for the third and fourth unit of the KNPP, for which India has signed an agreement with Russia recently, has commenced.
Russia and India signed an agreement for building the third and fourth units of the KNPP at a cost of Rs 33,000 crore. A general framework agreement was signed between the NPCIL with representatives of Russian-based Rosatom.
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