Tuesday, October 18 2005 15:30 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Chennai: The symbol of country's self reliance and ingenuity in advanced technology, the Fast Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR), located at the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR), Kalpakkam, about 75-kms from here, today (Oct 18, 2005) completed two decades of its existence.

FBTR, a sodium cooled reactor with 40MWt/13 M Wele capacity, conceived as a test bed for the irradiation of fuels and materials, is the training ground for mastering the challenges of sodium technology, IGCAR Reactor Operation and Maintenance Group Director P V Ramalingam, said here in a release today.

The first criticality of FBTR was achieved on October 18, 1985, signalled the start of the second phase of the country's Nuclear Energy programme and catapulted India with a select club of Nations with fast reactors - the USA, France, Russia, the UK and Japan, he said.

Though based on the design of the French reactor 'Rapsodie', FBTR was built with design changes to make it a mini power station by itself. The reactor, built indigenously, used a unique fuel in the form of high Plutonium Carbide, he said.

With the successful commissioning and 20 years of operation, FBTR's fuel has reached the burn-up of 1,50,000 MWd/t without any 'pin failure', he said.

Ramalingam said FBTR has so far completed for 36,000 hours, generating 2,45,000 MWh of thermal energy and five million units of electrical energy.

"The steam generators, which are critical for the success of fuel reactors, have operated for 20,000 hours without any leak, and each of the four sodium pumps has logged 1,25,000 hours of trouble free operation, circulating sodium without interruption for the past 20 years", he said.

The annual radioactivity release to environment was only a 'miniscule fraction' of the permitted release and exposure of occupational workers to radiation in the past 20 years "is practically negligible", he claimed. The power of FBTR would be progressively raised by enlarging the core. "For the next two decades, FBTR will be used for testing advanced fuels and materials being planned for future fast reactors in India", he said.

The successful construction, commissioning and operation of FBTR have provided the impetus and confidence to launch bigger Fast Reactor programme, he said.

The design for the 500MWt FBR was completed recently and its construction was launched at Kalpakkam last year by the Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh. The reactor would be commissioned by 2010, he said.

"When by the middle of this century, India's grid will be powered by energy from a chain of fast reactors, FBTR will be remembered as the mother of fast reactors in India and the harbinger of India's energy security and economic sovereignty", he added.