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No conclusive evidence on the contamination has been

As it turns out nuclear engineers are masters of book-keeping especially when ageing of equipment is concerned and a more detailed check in the history of the plants revealed that in 2012 two tubes had been extracted from the Kakrapar plant as part of routine maintenance and had been safely stored in a safe warehouse.

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forthcoming and forensic analysis is still under way.

As it turns out nuclear engineers are masters of book-keeping especially when ageing of equipment is concerned and a more detailed check in the history of the plants revealed that in 2012 two tubes had been extracted from the Kakrapar plant as part of routine maintenance and had been safely stored in a safe warehouse.

When these were re-examined in 2017, the investigators were surprised that the "small pox" like corrosion on the exterior of the tube was not present. This now makes the investigators suspect that something went wrong after 2012.

Meanwhile, the AERB and the atomic energy establishment has also reached out to the vast global nuclear community to try and help resolve this mystery.

The global watchdog the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna and ten other global forums have been informed that a mysterious leak is dogging the Indian reactors at Kakrapar and if the global community could be of some help.

The international community is as much at a loss in explaining the failures as are the Indian teams.

India operates 18 PHWR reactors and over the years it has accumulated some 348 years of operating experience of these unique nuclear plants powered using natural uranium and in all these years, the Department of Atomic Energy asserts no radiation related death has taken place at any nuclear plant and no radiation has ever leaked out of the Indian PHWR's.

In addition to it, 29 PHWRs are today functional in Canada, Argentina, Romania, China, South Korea and Pakistan and none have reported any issue like the `small pox like corrosion' on any of its nuclear plants.

Bharadwaj says right now there are only hunches but teams at BARC are exposing the Zircalloy tubes to carbon dioxide spiked with various contaminants and they are being placed in a high radiation environment to accentuate the aging process to try and determine the exact cause of the two processes---"small pox like nodular corrosion and the development of cracks in the coolant tubes." These could be linked or independent, says Bhardwaj, who feels that in the next few months, the root cause will definitely be deciphered till then the reactors will remain shut.

India currently operates 22 nuclear reactors with an installed capacity of 6,780 MW and hopes to ramp up nuclear output to 32,000 MW by 2032.

Meanwhile, the continuing nuclear mystery is giving the vast Indian nuclear establishment and its atomic sleuths 'nuclear jitters'.

 

(This article has not been edited by DNA's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)

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