India's fast breeder reactor is one approval away from its grid connection
Item 18 of the SRPC OCC-240 agenda tracks the last administrative yards of a two-decade nuclear project. The 230 kV BHAVINI–Kancheepuram lines I & II — the evacuation and commissioning-support path for the 500 MW Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor at Kalpakkam — now have every commercial obstacle cleared: BHAVINI furnished all clearances to TANTRANSCO, PGCIL concurred by mail of 27 June, and TNSLDC's operational approval for charging the feeders "was expected shortly."
The 239th OCC had already flagged the project's "national importance" and ordered a joint BHAVINI–TNSLDC–MAPS–SRLDC study of the proposed injection pattern before power flows — a sensible precaution for a first-of-kind machine feeding a 230 kV network adjacent to the Madras Atomic Power Station.
For the record: the folder documents grid-connection readiness, not reactor criticality or generation timelines, which sit outside these papers. But transmission is usually the unglamorous last blocker for new nuclear, and on this paper trail the PFBR's wires are essentially done. When SRLDC issues the feeder-charging code, it will mark the quiet start of India's Stage-II nuclear programme on the operating grid.
For more such stories, go to Click here
