The Hindu : Front Page : One unit of power to be generated from Koodankulam project to cost Rs. 2 to 2.50

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Tuesday, Oct 16, 2007
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One unit of power to be generated from Koodankulam project to cost Rs. 2 to 2.50

P. Sudhakar

— Photo: A. Shaikmohideen.

ELECTRICITY: A view of the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Project.

TIRUNELVELI: The unit cost of power to be generated from the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Project will be “highly competitive,” Chairman and Managing Director of Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited S.K. Jain has said.

“One unit of electricity to be generated from the KKNPP will cost between Rs. 2 and Rs. 2.50 as per the present norms applicable to the NPCIL’s nuclear power stations,” Mr. Jain told The Hindu after heading the Indian team in the 19th Joint Coordination Committee meeting with a 30-member Russian delegation, who discussed the progress of the project on Saturday .

Leading Russian firm, Atomstroyexport, which is executing inter-governmental agreements on the construction of nuclear power reactors abroad provides drafts, supplies equipment and materials and trains personnel for the the KKNPP, while the construction and installation activities are carried out by the Indian side.

When work on the KKNPP, launched in March 2002, was progressing, it was thought that unit cost of the electricity would be around Rs. 3.

However, it was then hinted that the NPCIL would work on the possibility of bringing it down considerably.

“I can assure you that this cost will not certainly exceed Rs. 2.50,” Mr. Jain said. Admitting that there “were some delay” in the progress of the work, the chairman said the first unit of the KKNPP would be completed by December 2008 and the second reactor six months later.

The NPCIL, which is currently operating 17 reactors across the country, is about to complete the work on three more.

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