Four sites cleared for nuclear plants: Govt

New Delhi, Feb 23 (UNI) The government has accorded in-principle clearance for four sites to set up additional nuclear power plants, the Rajya Sabha was informed today.

These sites are Kundankulam-Tamil Nadu, Kakrapar-Gujarat, Rawatbhata-Rajasthan and Jiatapur-Maharashtra.

In a writen reply to the upper house, Minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office Prithviraj Chavan said these sites cleared are for a cumulative capacity addition of 6,800 MWe.

Mr Chavan said with the completeion of unit-four of Tarapur Atomic Power Station by Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited, a public sector undertaking of the Department of Atomic Energy, seven months ahead of the projected schedule, and the work on eight other reactors progressing as per schedule, there is no time and cost over-run in the completion of the ongoing projects.

He said the indigenous uranium available in the country can support a capacity of 10,000 Mwe. However, with the closed fuel cycle approach needing reprocessing of spent fuel which India has adopted, the potential of electricity generation is enhanced many times.

The first of its kind reactor-using fuel recovered after reprocessing of spent fuel is under construction at Kalpakkam in Tamil Nadu.

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