In order to meet the India’s growing needs, the GOI plans to set up nuclear power plants in in Bihar, Haryana and Punjab. The GOI aims to increase nuclear power generation capacity by three times in ten years.  With regard to nuclear power programme, Singh, the Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office, said the government is considering setting up new plants in areas not covered before. A site has been identified for a nuclear plant in Razauli in Bihar’s Nawada district in the last 18-19 months of the current government.

There has been a delay there due to water shortage since the current level of water available is not sufficient for the project. The Minister has also listed out places such as Patiala (Punjab), Dehradun (Uttarakhand) and Bulandshahr (Uttar Pradesh). In Patiala, there are issues related to Defence land, he said, adding that areas are also being explored in Haryana.

Did You Know?

• In 1905, Einstein discovered that mass could be changed into energy and vice versa. In 1918, Sir Ernest Rutherford showed that atoms could be split. By 1942, the world had its first nuclear reactor.
• While nuclear power plants themselves do not create carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, or nitrogen oxides, the mining, enrichment, and transportation of uranium generates harmful fossil fuel byproducts
• The world’s first nuclear power plant to create electricity for a power grid was USSR’s Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant, which opened on June 27, 1954.
• In the United States, the first commercial nuclear generator was the Shippingport Reactor in Pennsylvania, which opened in 1957.