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during the peak month. If the country Minister’s Office Jitendra Singh is of the
tehelka bureau is to grow at seven or eight per cent till view that awareness needs to be cre-
2050 and even where energy efficiency ated among the public about busting the
is pushed, we will need around 8,000 bil- myths associated with the use of nuclear
hen the Minister of lion kilowatt hours. If we were to push energy. The nuclear energy is a source
State (Independent electrical vehicles it could be as much as of energy to meet the rising energy
Charge) Atomic Energy 12,000 bkWh. demands of the country and it is an
and Space, Dr Jitendra Also to increase standardisation and instrument of ‘ease of living’ in one’s day-
W Singh in written reply bring modularity in building atomic to-day life.
to a question in Rajya Sabha informed power reactors, the Nuclear Power Cor- The fact is that even when we have
on November 21, 2019 that the electri- poration of India Limited (NPCIL) is going fully developed our hydro capacity, we
cal energy requirement of the country for fleet mode construction for future will still need balancing power. Since gas
for year 2018-19 is 1274595 MUs whereas projects. As many as 17 new reactors are has to be imported, it is a limited option.
projected energy requirement for year now in the pipeline, with seven already Nuclear plants have been run in the past
2021-22 is 1566023 MUs, he made a per- under construction. The fleet mode for with more or less constant load. Howev-
tinent observation that country urgently construction reduces construction costs er, with some design change it should be
needs nuclear power plants for electric- and speeds up construction time. India is possible to run them in a load following
ity generation. an old player in the nuclear energy sec- mode. France has been operating some
India’s potential for hydro power is tor with the first research reactor in Asia nuclear plants in this mode.
150,000 MW at 35 per cent load factor being commissioned in the country. In- The cost of nuclear electricity will
that means around 460 billion units per dia’s learning curve has been steep and it depend on how it is financed. With a
year. It is unevenly distributed across could ramp up the reactor construction capital cost of 10 crore per MW, with a
months. The generation from run-of-the to 22 reactors and it would become the debt/equity ratio of 4/1, debt interest of 12
river plants during the lean month may seventh largest fleet in the world. per cent, return on equity of 15 per cent,
be as low as 10 per cent of generation The Minister of State in the Prime and annual generation of 7,000 MWh,

Why do we need nuclear plants

for electricity generation?