by DiaNuke.org |
D. Narasimha Reddy
D. Narasimha Reddy has done his Ph.D on nuclear policy and has been a long standing, active critic of nuclear energy programmes. He works for promotion of handloom sector and natural-based farming through awareness, capacity building and advocacy activities
The Nuclear Fuel complex, at Hyderabad, is the most important link in India's Nuclear Fuel cycle. It produces fuel for all the nuclear power reactors of the country. It has plants for conversion of yellow cake into ceramic-grade natural uranium oxide, enriched uranium hexa-fluoride into enriched uranium oxide, zircon sand into zircaloy components, and uranium dioxide to cintered pellets and to fuel assemblies. It also produces components such as blanket fuel containing thoria pellets, nickel and steel reflector assemblies’ etc. for FBTR. A plant for manufacturing very highly pure materials for electronic industry is also located here. NFC also produces seamless stainless tubes.
NFC has produced a special alloy of Nioblung-Hafnium and Titanium for India’s space programs, which has been successfully tested.
The present operating capacity of the plant is about 80 tonnes of fuel per year for pressurised Heavy Water Reactor (PHWR). Enriched uranium oxide fuel, required specifically for Tarapur Atomic Power Reactors, is also manufactured here using enriched uranium hexafloride imported from France. It was planned to expand the production capacity from 80 tonnes to 225 tonnes to meet the recurring demand from different plants, including the Narora Atomic Power Project. Separate facilities are under consideration for meeting the requirement of fuel for 10,000 MWe programme. Daily consumption of Nitric acid is anywhere between 10 to 12 Metric tonnes. Magnesium (M-Du) wastage is one of the major problems.
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