Question

The Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant of Tamil Nadu was the outcome of an inter government agreement between which of the following countries with India?
A.Bangladesh
B.China
C.Russia
D.USA

Answer 1

Hint: The Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) is being developed by the Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL) at 650 kilometres south of Chennai, in the Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu, India. Two units are already installed and the construction of units three and four, which started in 2016 will be operational by 2023. The power plant will have a total capacity of 6000 MW upon final commissioning of its six units.

Complete answer:
Construction of The Kudankulam power plant started in 1998 under the supervision of NPCIL and Rosatom, the initial cost was designed to be 140 billion Indian rupees (2.47 billion dollars) and the total cost of the project for the six units is Rs 1.11 trillion Indian rupees (16.3 billion dollars). Phase one of the construction started in 2001 and the first two units were commissioned in 2013 and 2016 respectively. Kudankulam nuclear power plant has 60 years of production life that can be extended by another 20 . The first unit of the plant supplies power at a cheaper rate of about 3.89 rupees per unit. Kudankulam is the first nuclear power plant in India to use imported PWR technology. These nuclear power plants use pressurised heavy water reactor technology or boiling water reactor technology. KNPP uses VVER 1000 type reactors, also known as water-water power reactors, an improved variant of Russian-developed PWR nuclear technology. More than 1500 years of operational time have been achieved by VVER technology. Atoms troy export, a subsidiary of Rosatom, the Russian State Nuclear Energy Agency, is responsible for technical design, supervision of the construction and technical support for the commissioning of the reactor, as well as training in the operation and maintenance and procurement of equipment and materials. The machines at the plant are configured by Bharat Heavy Electricals and construction, erection and commissioning are undertaken by NPCIL. In the building of units one and two, HCC India was involved.

Hence, the correct answer is option (C).

Note: Since its inception, Kudankulam NPP has been a contentious project, with protests by local residents and different environmental groups over possible radiation risks and concerns related to the disposal of nuclear waste. KNPP is reportedly situated in a tsunami-prone area and in the case of any
nuclear disaster, more than one million people living within a 30 km radius of the nuclear power plant cannot be safely evacuated. At the forefront of the anti-Kudankulam drive is the People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE). Opposition to the plant was further fuelled by the discovery of four defective critical valves in the Kudankulam reactors and the arrest of Russian officials for sourcing substandard materials for nuclear equipment.