Kaiga atomic plant becomes operational

• India's 20th nuclear power plant today became operational here taking the total installed atomic power capacity in the country to 4780 MW.
• The indigenously-developed 220 MW capacity Unit 4 of the Kaiga Atomic Power Station attained criticality at 8.07.22 a.m. making India the sixth country in the world to have 20 or more nuclear power plants in operation.
• The Kaiga-4 was built a few years ago but was unable to start power production for want of fuel.
• India's exemption from the Nuclear Suppliers' Group guidelines in 2008 that facilitated its return to global nuclear trade made the access to fuel possible.
• Presently, India produces 568 billion units of electricity and of that 23 per cent is from hydro—power, 64 per cent from thermal power, 10 per cent by non-conventional methods and only three per cent by the nuclear power.