Relevance of Nuclear Energy for a De-carbon Energy Sector

Energy is one of the most critical requirements for the development of a nation. Of course, India, at present is one of the top producers and consumers of energy globally, however, our per capita energy consumption is still very low. We are a developing nation, with an ambitious GDP growth rate which would require significant demand in energy in domestic, transport, industries, infrastructure, etc for a growing population. Today, the country’s energy supply is primarily driven by carbon-based sources. The international pledge to reduce global warming due to the emission of carbon dioxide gases would require the replacement of carbon-based energy sources with clean and green energy sources very soon. 

This talk would focus on the energy demand of India by 2050, contributions from renewable and requirements of nuclear to meet the low carbon energy budget of India. Advanced small modular nuclear reactors are being developed globally as new frontiers in nuclear reactor technology for enhanced safety, economics, accelerated capacity building, and particularly their role in the replacement of retired coal plants. The relevance of these reactors to the Indian energy sector will be discussed. Apart from electricity production, the energy sector would require hydrogen and high-temperature carrying fluids for industry requirements. This talk would also present the role of these nuclear reactors for hydrogen production, high-temperature nuclear heat for industries and desalination.

About the Speaker:
Dr. Arun Kumar Nayak did his graduation in Mechanical Engineering from NIT Rourkela masters from NIT Warangal. He joined the Reactor Design and Development Group in BARC in 1990 after completing the 33rd batch of BARC Training School.  He did PhD in nuclear engineering from Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan in 2000 and worked as a Post-doc Fellow in the Interfaculty Reactor Institute, Technical University of Delft, The Netherlands during 2002-2003, and, in Nuclear Power Safety Division, Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden during 2003-04. He also worked in the Institute of Nuclear Energy, Stuttgart University, Germany under the DST-DAAD project during 2007-2009.  

He played a key role in the design of AHWR with several innovative ‘First-of-a-kind’ passive-safety systems and built many world-class experimental facilities to establish their design margins. He is internationally known for managing core melt accidents in nuclear reactors. The core catcher design of AHWR is one of his significant contributions both with regard to technology and science. Currently, he is working on the development of an innovative Small Modular Reactor (SMR) which is inherently safe, passive by design, factory built and shipped to the site for direct installation; and has the potential to build in vacated sites of coal-based thermal power plants. He was a consultant to IAEA for several years for resolving key design issues of passive systems deployed in advanced reactors.

He is Associate Editor of ASME Journal of Nuclear Engineering and Radiation Science, and Journal of Computational Thermal Science.  He is a recipient of the Homi Bhabha Science and Technology Award, DAE Scientific and Technical Excellence Award, DAE Scientific Research Council Outstanding Investigator Award, and Group Leader Awards for Scientific and Technical Excellence. He has written 4 books and published more than 500 research papers in academic journals and conferences. He is a Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering & Maharashtra Academy of Science.