The Aryavarth Express
Agency (Tamil Nadu): Marking a historic milestone in India’s nuclear power programme, Prime Minister will witness the initiation of core loading of India’s indigenous Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor(PFBR) of 500 MWe capacity at Kalpakkam, Tamil Nadu. This PFBR has been developed by BHAVINI (Bharatiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Limited).
The reactor core consists of control subassemblies, blanket subassemblies and fuel subassemblies. The core loading activity consists of loading of reactor control subassemblies, followed by the blanket subassemblies and the Fuel sub-assemblies which will generate power.
India has adopted a three-stage nuclear power program with a closed fuel cycle. In the PFBR, marking the second stage of the nuclear program, spent fuel from the first stage is reprocessed and used as fuel in FBR. A unique feature of this sodium cooled PFBR is that it can produce more fuel than it consumes, thus helping in achieving self-reliance in fuel supply for future fast reactors.
With minimised nuclear waste generated from the reactor and advanced safety features, FBRs will provide safe, efficient and clean source of energy and contribute to the goal of net zero. This is an important step for India towards thorium utilisation in the third stage of the nuclear power programme. Once commissioned, India will be the second country after Russia to have commercial operating Fast Reactor.
