6 Nov (NucNet): The head of US-based developer of thorium-based nuclear fuel designs Thorium Power has said the marketplace for new opportunities in India’s commercial nuclear energy sector is worth an estimated 150 billion US dollars (116 billion euro).
Seth Grae, president and chief executive officer of Thorium Power in Virginia, said in an interview* with the weekly Indian newspaper ‘Project Monitor’: “We have been engaged in serious discussions with many entities in the private sector and government, and we recognise the growing interest in non-proliferative nuclear power.”
Mr Grae said his company was looking for partnerships in India’s private and state-controlled sectors. “There is a clear movement towards thorium fuel… Also, India has always been at the scientific and technological forefront, and India's experts understand the distinct advantages of using thorium in the nuclear fuel cycle,” he added.
In April 2008, India’s Bhaba Atomic Research Centre said that a low-power test reactor – a so-called critical facility – achieved first criticality. The critical facility’s main purpose is the testing of fuel configurations for India’s first 300-megawatt advanced heavy water reactor, which will derive two thirds of its energy from thorium-based fuel.
India’s 500-megawatt prototype fast breeder reactor at Kalpakkam, which is to be fuelled with uranium-plutonium oxide and include a thorium blanket to breed fissile U-233, is scheduled to achieve first criticality in 2010 and begin commercial operation in 2011.
*Project Monitor is published by the Mumbai-based Economic Research India Limited. The interview with Mr Grae, published last month, is available in full on Thorium Power’s web site (http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/irol/12/121550/articles/PM_Interview.pdf).
– by John Shepherd
>>Related reports in the NucNet database (available to subscribers)
First Criticality For Experimental Indian Reactor (News in Brief No. 50, 23 April 2008)
Thorium Power Boosts Senior Management Team (News in Brief No. 93, 19 August 2008)
