The Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) will generate 8,800 Megawatts (MW) of electricity by the year 2030; some new power plants will be set up near the Karachi Nuclear Power Plant (KANUPP) for the purpose, and land has already been acquired for this, PAEC Chairman Dr Ansar Parvez said on Tuesday.
He was addressing the KANUPP Institute of Nuclear Power Engineering (KINPOE) Convocation-2009 at the Karachi Nuclear Power Complex. Graduates belonging to batches XIII and XIV of KINPOE were awarded Master of Engineering degrees in Nuclear Power by the NED University of Engineering & Technology.
Dr Parvez said the PAEC would achieve its target in different phases and by the year 2030 the task assigned to the commission by the federal government could be completed. He said that some of the new plants would be built near KANUPP. Around 585 acres were allotted to the PAEC for this purpose in April 2007 by the Sindh Board of Revenue.
The PAEC chairman said the cost of acquired land amounting to Rs 350 million had already been paid and the lease agreement was signed in August 2008. The mutation and demarcation of the land, however, have not been carried out despite our best efforts, said Dr Parvez adding that the PAEC had planned to install four nuclear plants at this land.
The PAEC chairman said that he had requested the authorities concerned for expediting the case of the land so that the PAEC can start development work at the site.
He said that since its early days the generation of electrical energy through nuclear power had been one of the primary objectives of the PAEC. For this purpose, he said, the PAEC had established nuclear power plants as well as a complex network of associated fuel cycle technology. It had been actively engaged in providing the benefits of sophisticated nuclear techniques in the medical and agriculture sector, said the PAEC chief.
He said that based on the experience gained through the Reverse Osmosis (RO) plant, the KANUPP now worked as a consultant for the 100,000 gallon per day capacity RO plant at Gwadar. The PAEC could also offer its technical assistance in setting up large size desalination plants.
The PAEC chairman revealed to the audience that the KANUPP is setting up a Nuclear Desalination Demonstration Plant with the capacity of 400,000 gallons water per day, which is indigenously built by the PAEC with some assistance from the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Earlier, Director, KINPOE, Dr Khalid Mahmood Bukhari, briefed the audience about contributions of the Institute from its genesis in 1970s as Karachi Nuclear Power Training Centre to its present day status of producing two-year Master’s Degree Programme in Nuclear Engineering in affiliation with the NED University. This was the last batch under the NED as the KINPOE Institute is now affiliated with the PAEC’s own university, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences (PIEAS), Islamabad.
Vice-Chancellor of the NED University, Abul Kalam, awarded degrees of Master of Engineering Degrees in Nuclear Power to 86 successful graduates of two batches of the institute along with merit certificates and the gold medals.
