NE NEWS SERVICE
TIRUNELVELI (TN), JAN 22
A scheduled outage of Unit-2 of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) for carrying out annual maintenance and refuelling has begun, a top official said here on Friday.
The planned close down of the second unit commenced on January 20 for replacement of used fuel in the reactor with fresh fuel assemblies, KKNPP Site Director S V Jinna said.
KKNPP-2, a 1000-MW VVER (water-cooled water-moderated reactor) that belongs to the Pressurised Water Reactor category, uses uranium oxide fuel to generate electricity.
“The unloading of spent fuel from the reactor core and loading of fresh fuel will be carried out with the help of a sophisticated and fully automated refuelling machine,” the Director said in a statement.
Also, various maintenance activities of systems and equipment and all the scheduled surveillance tests would be conducted, he said, adding, all the safety systems shall also be tested as per the regulatory norms.
After completion of the second refuelling outage, KKNPP-2 was connected back to grid on March 14, 2020. Since then, the unit supplied 6,709 million units of electricity before being shut down for the third refuelling outage.
The other operating unit, KKNPP-1, at the Kudankulam site is running at its full capacity. The nuclear power plant is situated at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu.
