First phase of Kaiga atomic plant gets critical

Rajasabai said as against the second unit which took nearly 70 days for synchronisation, the unit which went critical today would take only about 25 days. The criticality was scheduled to take place only next month, however scientists at the station compressed the work so that the major milestone could be advanced.

On the second unit, he said that it had been functioning extremely well and had been operating for more than 50 days continuously without any "poisoning" out. So far it had produced 850 million units and during the current financial year its generation had been 650 million units. It also achieved a full power output of 140 days, he added.

He said that work on refuelling the plant had also commenced and without stopping the unit, 12 of the 306 channels had already been refuelled.

Among those who were present when the unit attained criticality included Nuclear Power Corporation Limited chairman and managing director Chaturvedi, senior executive directors A Sanatkumar and V K Sharma, executive director (projects) P Tiwari and former Mangalore university vice chancellor M I Savadatti.