NEW DELHI, March 2: India has 15 operating nuclear reactors that produce 3,300 megawatts of electricity, four of which are under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards, according to the country’s Department of Atomic Energy.
Another seven are under construction, two of which would be under IAEA safeguards when completed.
The total nuclear power output would increase to 6,730 megawatts when the seven plants are completed and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has pledged to put about 65 per cent of the country’s power capacity under IAEA safeguards.
India has three plants built between 1974 and 1998 that make reactor fuel assemblies and pellets and one under construction for some power reactors but is running short of fuel for ones bought from the United States before the bar on sales.
The country also has two plants that make mixed-oxide fuel, which is a method of burning plutonium from spent reactor fuel to provide energy and make electricity.
The plants feed an experimental plutonium-based fast-breeder reactor, which makes more fuel than it uses, of 40 megawatts and a 500 megawatt unit under construction. The United States would like to see the fast-breeder reactors under IAEA safeguards because they are considered dual use, but which India has said it would not do.
India produces highly-enriched uranium and products used in nuclear weapons through its Rare Materials Project and a Uranium Weapon Component Facility.
The desert state of Rajasthan is home to India’s weapons test site.
India has a facility aimed at developing nuclear fuel to use in naval reactors as part of a larger program to build nuclear-powered submarines. —AFP
