Indian Railways likely to fund nuclear energy expansion and this will make sense

India’s nuclear energy expansion programme could very soon be funded by Indian Railways and companies in the energy sector like ONGC, IOCL and NTPCL.

Talks have already been initiated between state-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) and cash-rich public sector undertakings in energy sector and the national transported so as to come up with a joint ventures for setting up nuclear power plants throughout the country.

"We are in active dialogue with many public sector undertakings. The amended Atomic Energy Act allows NPCIL to collaborate with Indian PSUs,” NPCIL director-projects Rohit Banerjee told ET.

NPCIL is aiming towards increasing the power generation in the country to 63 GW from the country installed capacity of 6,780 MW and hence is looking forward at leveraging equity from cash-rich PSUs in line.

Many projects are under construction and NPCIL is hoping to set up another 6,700 MW through these projects. It is facing issues regarding land availability, technology sharing issues and low-cost financing. The company currently executes nuclear reactors through a mix of debt and equity, budgetary support and debt financing from the technology sourcing country.

For the expansion of the definition of a government company providing for creation of joint ventures that are majorly owned by NPCIL, the Atomic Energy Act 1962 was amended this January. At present only two PSUs - NPCIL and Bharatiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Ltd, under the administrative control of the Department of Atomic Energy are authorized to set up nuclear power plants in the country.

Earlier joint ventures by NPCIL had been floated with NTPC, IOC and Nalco to set up nuclear power plants but it could work as the law prohibits such joint ventures.
(image:indiatimes)