Vladimir Zhidkikh, member of Federation Council Nuclear Energy Committee

– India is one of the first countries that have undertaken responsibility for energy supply of its future generations

The first lot of nuclear fuel for Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant was delivered to India on May 25. Kudankulam NPP is supposed to have two 1,000MW units. The general contractor of the project is Atomstroyexport CJSC (Russia).

India is one of the first countries that have undertaken responsibility for energy supply of its future generations. That country perfectly understands that without cheap energy it will not be able to develop its economy. It is good that India has chosen Russia as its partner in this sphere: today, Russia owns the most progressive technologies in the world. The Indian Government is planning to increase the capacity of its nuclear power plants to a total of 40GW. The key problem of India is that its electric networks cover only 80% of its territory. So, the key priority for the country is to develop its energy sector and, particularly, the nuclear energy industry.

The construction of Kudankulam NPP is a big achievement for India. The peculiarity of this project is that it is carried out by India with Russia acting as exporter of expertise and equipment. Particularly, we are training personnel, drafting design documents and supervising the construction of the plant. That’s why the project involves just 80 Russian specialists instead of 2,000 specialists involved in the construction of Tianwan NPP.  The construction and installation is being carried out exclusively by the Indians. Their wish to build the plant themselves is quite easy to understand: India urgently needs energy and new NPPs. So, it needs to learn how to build them. In this respect, the Indians are pioneers: they are not afraid of difficulties, delays and reoperations and are confidently moving to the launch of Kudankulam.