Bharat Rakshak

Tanaji wrote:https://www.newindianexpress.com/nation ... 91202.html

Keen to engage with India on nuclear test ban treaty
CTBT Organization executive secretary Dr Robert Floyd defends US on subcritical N-tests, would like New Delhi to have observer status on Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty

Reading between the lines, he has been told to get lost.

The third unit of the indigenously developed 700-megawatt electric (MWe) nuclear power reactor at the Kakrapar Atomic Power Project (KAPP3) in Gujarat has commenced operations at full capacity.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on social media platform X, “India achieves another milestone. The largest indigenous 700 MWe Kakrapar Nuclear Power Plant Unit-3 in Gujarat starts operations at full capacity. Congratulations to our scientists and engineers.”

This comes a little over three years since the unit achieved its ‘first criticality’ – a technical term that signifies the initiation of a controlled, but sustained nuclear fission reaction – in July 2020. On June 30 this year, the unit had started commercial operations.

In India’s civilian nuclear programme, this is seen as a landmark event, given that KAPP-3 is the country’s first 700 MWe unit and the biggest indigenously developed variant of the Pressurised Heavy Water Reactor (PHWR). The PHWRs, which use natural uranium as fuel and heavy water as moderator, constitute the mainstay of India’s nuclear power fleet. Till now, the biggest reactor of indigenous design was the 540 MWe PHWR, two of which have been deployed in Tarapur, Maharashtra.

For India, the operationalisation of its first 700MWe reactor is a significant scale up in technology, both in terms of the optimisation of its PHWR design — the new 700MWe unit addresses the excess thermal margins (thermal margin refers to the extent to which the operating temperature of the reactor is below its maximum operating temperature) — and also marks an improvement in the economies-of-scale, without significant design changes to the 540 MWe reactor.

Four units of the 700MWe reactor are being constructed at Kakrapar (KAPP-3 and 4) and Rawatbhata (RAPS-7 and site in Rajasthan currently. The 700MWe reactors are slated to be backbone of a new fleet of 12 reactors that the NDA government accorded administrative approval and financial sanction in 2017 and that are to be set up in fleet mode.

As India works to ramp up its existing nuclear power capacity of 7,480 MWe to 22,480 MWe by 2031, the 700MWe capacity would constitute the biggest component of this expansion plan. Currently, nuclear power capacity constitutes around 2 per cent of the total installed capacity of 4,17,668 MW (May 31).

Significantly, as India’s civilian nuclear sector gears up to its next frontier — building a 900 MWe Pressurised Water Reactors (PWRs) of indigenous design – the experience of executing the larger 700MWe reactor design would come in handy, especially with respect to the improved capability of making large-size pressure vessels, alongside India’s own isotope enrichment plants being developed to supply a part of the required enriched uranium fuel to power these new generation reactors over the next decade or so, according to DAE officials.

The first ‘pour of concrete’ for laying the foundation of KAPP-3 happened in November 2010 and this unit was originally expected to be commissioned in 2015. State-owned Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL), which operates the bulk of India’s nuclear power fleet, had awarded the reactor building contract of both KAPP Unit 3 and 4 to Larsen & Toubro at an original contract value of Rs 844 crore. The original cost of two 700 MWe units was pegged at Rs 11,500 crore and the tariff per unit was originally calculated at Rs 2.80 per unit (kWh) at 2010 prices (roughly a cost of about Rs 8 crore per MWe). The costing is expected to have seen some escalation, given the project delays.

The capital investment for these nuclear power projects is being funded with a debt-to-equity ratio of 70:30, with the equity part of NPCIL being funded from internal resources and through budgetary support.

In terms of safety features, the PHWR technology scores high, with the biggest advantage of the PHWR design being the use of thin walled pressure tubes instead of large pressure vessels used in pressure vessel type reactors. This results in a distribution of pressure boundaries to a large number of small diameter pressure tubes and thereby lowers the severity of the consequence of an accidental rupture of the pressure boundary than in a pressure vessel type reactor.

Additionally, the 700 MWe PHWR design has enhanced safety through dedicated ‘Passive Decay Heat Removal System’, which has the capability of removing decay heat (the heat released as a result of radioactive decay) from the reactor core without requiring any operator actions, on the lines of similar technology adopted for Generation III+ plants to negate the possibility of a Fukushima type accident that happened in Japan in 2011. The 700 MWe PHWR unit, like the one deployed in KAPP, is equipped with a steel-lined containment to reduce any leakages and a containment spray system to reduce the containment pressure in case of a loss of coolant accident.

This video talks about a new type of nuclear fuel called ANEEL that can potentially help India use its thorium reserves.

India has a lot of coal but it is not an ideal fuel because it emits a lot of carbon dioxide. So, India is looking for alternative fuels, and thorium is a good candidate. However, there were challenges in using thorium as a fuel before. This video talks about a new type of nuclear fuel called ANEEL that can help India use its thorium reserves. ANEEL is a mixture of uranium and thorium, but it uses very little uranium and more thorium. This means that it does not need a lot of uranium 235 or plutonium 239, which are difficult to get. ANEEL also burns up much longer than conventional fuel, and it produces less nuclear waste. Additionally, there is no concern of this being diverted to weapon use.

The speaker of the video, M.Rames, interviewed the CEO of Clean Core Thorium Energy, which is the company that developed ANEEL. The CEO, Mr. Sha, explained that ANEEL is almost market ready and they anticipate commercializing it in 2026. Overall, this video is about a new type of nuclear fuel that has the potential to help India use its thorium reserves and transition to green energy.

I hope this summary is helpful!

bala wrote: ↑18 Apr 2024 07:51 INDIA'S THORIUM LEAP TOWARDS SELF SUFFICIENT NUCLEAR ENERGY by LT GEN P R SHANKAR (Retd)

bala wrote: ↑18 Apr 2024 07:51 INDIA'S THORIUM LEAP TOWARDS SELF SUFFICIENT NUCLEAR ENERGY by LT GEN P R SHANKAR (Retd)

...

LT GEN P R SHANKAR explains a complicated matter (Thorium Nuclear Fuel program Cycle) in a simple manner and also tells the viewer about the strategic implications - Thorium Reactors are a game changer for Bharat. Lots of research material from the outcome of twenty year scientific research and trials. Very detailed and in-depth coverage of fast breeder technology.

Me: Has anyone heard of the hybrid fusion-thorium design, where a fusion reaction operating below breakeven acts as the neutron source for a thorium blanket, thus producing energy to feed/sustain that same fusion reaction. No uranium is required!

Him: Fusion is next generation...

Me: thanks for your reply, sir! Fusion below breakeven (running at an energy deficit instead of net energy output) is something that can certainly be done right now. And it would enable us to breed more Plutonium & U233 in the meantime, just like the rest of Phase 2 -- but it does not require any Uranium, and thus bypasses that limitation which you had pointed to.

sanman wrote: ↑03 May 2024 08:54
I posted a comment to his video which he replied to:

Me: Has anyone heard of the hybrid fusion-thorium design, where a fusion reaction operating below breakeven acts as the neutron source for a thorium blanket, thus producing energy to feed/sustain that same fusion reaction. No uranium is required!

Him: Fusion is next generation...

Me: thanks for your reply, sir! Fusion below breakeven (running at an energy deficit instead of net energy output) is something that can certainly be done right now. And it would enable us to breed more Plutonium & U233 in the meantime, just like the rest of Phase 2 -- but it does not require any Uranium, and thus bypasses that limitation which you had pointed to.

JTull wrote: ↑03 May 2024 15:24 Using hybrid and fusion in the same sentence can be confusing to many.

Hybrid fuels are common used but hybrids with Thorium need further investigation. Using the hybrid isn't straightforward as achieving initial criticality may not be easy with Thorium absorption. Studies must be conducted on neutron flux and how it changes with thorium conversion.

Fusion carries different meaning in case of nuclear science. It is not a jugalbandi. I see many problems with idea. Why would you want to bring Thorium into the mix when a sustainable fusion reaction can give you for an energy source for eternity? Let humanity first build commercial fusion reactors before we worry about the rest.

Dr Anil Kakodkar was chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission from 2000 to 2009, during which India signed the civilian nuclear agreement with the United States. Before that, from 1996 to 2000, he was director of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, a period during which India conducted two nuclear tests in May 1998.

I asked my colleagues, after these doubts to develop a 3-D model, to look at the rock movement consequently shock, arising out of a nuclear blast.

These movements are different from a normal blast because the strain rates are high, hence the equations to be used are not the same.

Mind you at that time, nobody had developed such a model, including in the US.

Outsiders cite the profile of a test site from satellite pictures after the test and the teleseismic data from some earthquake monitoring stations like they have in Uppasala, Sweden, etc to talk with so much confidence and create doubts about our claims.

So to call that bluff, I said. We not only developed a 3D model but also qualified by using data from Baneberry test (external link) in the US which unfortunately had vented -- leaked radiation.

Because it had vented there was an enquiry and hence a lot of data came out in the public domain.

So we used the Baneberry data and our predictions and sent a paper to a well-known US journal.

wig wrote: ↑06 May 2024 15:09 https://m.rediff.com/news/interview/dr- ... 240506.htm
interview with Dr Anil Kakodkar. worth while to read the complete articlequote]
Dr Anil Kakodkar was chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission from 2000 to 2009, during which India signed the civilian nuclear agreement with the United States. Before that, from 1996 to 2000, he was director of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, a period during which India conducted two nuclear tests in May 1998.


So to call that bluff, I said. We not only developed a 3D model but also qualified by using data from Baneberry test (external link) in the US which unfortunately had vented -- leaked radiation.

Because it had vented there was an enquiry and hence a lot of data came out in the public domain.

So we used the Baneberry data and our predictions and sent a paper to a well-known US journal.