Tuesday, April 18 2006 17:50 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: President APJ Abdul Kalam today (Apr18, 2006) asked Indian scientists to prepare a plan to generate 50,000 MW of nuclear power in the country by 2030.

As per present plan Bhabha Atomic Research Centre expects the nuclear generating capacity to be 24,000 MW by 2020.

"There is a need to plan right from now to increase this capacity to 50,000 MW by 2030," Kalam said after inaugaurating the South Asian Conference on Renewable Energy here.

To meet the increased needs of nuclear power generation, Kalam said technology development has to be accelerated for Thorium based reactors raw materials as Thorium was abundantly available in India.

"To maximise Thorium utilisation the development of Fast Breedor Reactor has been rightly taken up," he said.

Kalam said India would have to step its power generating capacities to 400,000 MW by 2030, more than three times the present capacity of 130,000 MW.

"This can be achieved through three different sources namely hydel capacity, nuclear power and non-conventional energy sources primarily through solar energy," Kalam said.

He also said power generation from renewable sources of energy has to be stepped up to 25 per cent of the total energy requirement from the present 5 per cent.

"India has nearly 60 million hectares of wasteland, of which 30 million hectares can be made available for energy plantations like 'Jatropha' or any other bio-fuel plant through which the country can produce nearly 60 million tones of bio-fuel annually", he said adding it can significantly contribute towards realising the goal of energy independance.