by Pankaj Yadav

NEW DELHI, April 2 (Xinhua) -- India has 22 nuclear power plants with a power generation capacity of 6,780 megawatts.

Majority of them are spread in southern states of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and western states of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra.

No doubt, power supply situation has improved a lot, even if compared with a period less than a decade ago. Remote villages in large agrarian states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Telangana and Odisha, which used to get power supply as low as two to three hours a day, now get electricity for more than 20 hours a day.

According to official figures as of December 2017, in past three years, electrification was successfully completed in as many as 15,183 villages, while the remaining 2,217 inhabited villages in as many as 13 states across the country are targeted to be electrified by May this year.

The current Indian government has been committed to providing affordable round-the-clock electricity to all households by 2019.

Power supply situation got improved due to a considerable increase in the nuclear power generation capacity over the years. Some of it has come from foreign collaboration with countries like Russia, but most of it is the result of India's indigenous efforts. The country's nuclear experts continue to make efforts towards achieving self-reliance in terms of nuclear power generation capacity.

India signed civil-nuclear cooperation agreements with the United States and France in 2008, for building nuclear power units designed in these countries to be set up in India. However, negotiations over more than a decade haven't borne any fruits so far. Mainly because of the unhealthy financial conditions of foreign nuclear power companies, such as Westinghouse of the United States and AREVA and EDF of France.

While Westinghouse has already filed for bankruptcy, AREVA lost a lot of money on its nuclear fuel business following the Fukushima accident in Japan. The French government allocated the nuclear reactor business to their national electric utility - Electricite' de France (EDF). Hence, a great deal of uncertainty prevails as far as civil nuclear cooperation with the United states and France is concerned.

Amidst all this, only recently, during French President Emmanuel Macron's India visit, the two sides reiterated the goal of commencing works at the Jaitapur nuclear power plant site by the end of 2018, and encouraged both Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) and EDF to accelerate the contractual discussions in that respect.

Once installed, the Jaitapur nuclear power project will be the largest in the world, with a total capacity of 9.6 gigawatts.

It will contribute, in addition to renewable energy, to achieving India's goal of 40-percent non-fossil energy by 2030. On the occasion, France also promised uninterrupted and continued access to guaranteed fuel supply for the lifetime of the Jaitapur nuclear power plants, collaboration on transfer of technology (ToT) and cost-effective localization efforts of manufacturing in India.

In the prevailing scenario of uncertainty, India aims to be self-reliant in nuclear power generation. Last year, India decided to build 10 indigenously-designed-and-developed 700 MW "Pressurized Heavy Water Reactors" (PHWRs).

Then, the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) scaled up the 540-megawatt units to 700-megawatt and started work at two plants at Kakrapara, in western state Gujarat, and two at Rajasthan.

Rajiv Nayan, a senior research associate at Delhi-based think tank Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), says India will emerge as a major nuclear power supplier country soon.

"Now we are about to finish two 700 MW reactors in Rajasthan. We are going to higher capacity, may be 1,100 MW or 1,500 MW. Except the French reactors, all others are in 1,000 MW to 1,100 MW capacity. Only Jaitapur is 1,650 MW. In Rajasthan, once we finish the first version, the second and third versions come almost immediately. India is not getting swayed away by any global trend because we ourselves have invested a lot in nuclear energy."

According to the expert, only because global companies are facing financial difficulties, it doesn't mean that India should also abandon its own nuclear power generation program.

"Now its construction will be cheaper, thanks to the 2008 exemptions, some critical goods and technology will be made available easily. And, India can exploit the situation. Once our fast breeder reactor is ready and India's nuclear basket will have more indigenous constructed reactors," Nayan said.

Kalpakkam is a 500-MW fast breeder reactor, and there will be four of them. Once it is done India will be well ahead of others because all others have abandoned fast breeder reactors. But India is continuing with it, said the Indian expert.

The way electricity situation has improved in the country, villages in states like Bihar are getting power supply for 22 to 24 hours. It's a big change in the country.