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Kudankulam nuclear power project delayed

April 5, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

Chennai, April 4 (IANS) The delay in the arrival of components for the upcoming 2,000 MW nuclear reactor at Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu has led to the postponement of the commissioning of the first unit of the project by a few months, an official said.

Service providers for the project like the Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) are clueless about the possible date for the arrival of the components.

The Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) is building two 1,000 MW light water nuclear reactors in Kudankulam, about 600 km from here, in Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu with Russians supplying all the components of the plant, including the nuts and bolts.

‘Nearly 30 percent components on the piping side are yet to come from Russia, as far as our portion of the contract is concerned. We are not informed as to when they would arrive,’ BHEL executive director P.R. Shriram told reporters Saturday.

The target for the commissioning of the unit has been delayed frequently. As per the original plan, the first unit was to commence in December 2007. Then the date was fixed for mid-2010. And now the revised date is September this year.

Indian power equipment major BHEL has been contracted to erect the turbine generator supplied by Russia.

‘BHEL has put the first unit’s turbine generator on barring gear and is ready to run. The second unit’s turbine generator will be put on barring gear in three months’ time,’ Shriram said.

According to NPCIL, 95 percent of the physical work has been completed for the first nuclear reactor and for the second unit it is 87.3 percent.

NPCIL and Russia’s Atomstroy Export formally inked a deal for building two more civil nuclear reactors of 1,000 MW each at Kudankulam last month.

A total of 12 Russian nuclear power reactors are expected to come up in India of which six would be built between 2012 and 2017.

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: bhel, commissioning, generator, kudankulam, NPCIL

Toshiba Corporation set to enter Indian thermal power industry

July 8, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Tokyo, July 8 (ANI/Business Wire India): Toshiba Corporation announced that Toshiba JSW Turbine and Generator Pvt. Ltd., a joint venture with JSW that will manufacture and market steam turbines and generators in India, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the government of Tamil Nadu.

The MOU allows Toshiba JSW to lease land for the construction of manufacturing facilities on a site in Chennai.

Established in September last year, Toshiba JSW will manufacture and market mid- to large-sized steam turbines and generators, ranging in size from 500-megawatts (MW) to 1,000MW, for highly efficient super-critical thermal power plants in India.

Located about 18km north of downtown Chennai, the major gateway to south-east India, the site has a ground area of some 400,000 square meters, and Toshiba JSW expects to invest some US160 million dollars in plant and manufacturing equipment over five years from fiscal year 2009.

Facility construction is scheduled to start in this month, and manufacturing is expected to start in January 2011. Keihin Operations, Toshiba’s power equipment production facility in Yokohama, will support Toshiba JSW in ramping up manufacturing, and in working toward establishing an independent production scale of 3,000MW a year. Toshiba JSW anticipates sales of US$400 million by the end of fiscal year 2015.

Toshiba JSW will now begin to recruit staff, and expects to have 500 employees by 2014.

With support from the government of Tamil Nadu, Toshiba will build a state-of-the-art heavy equipment manufacturing facility in Chennai, and hopes to contribute to the further development of local industry and to help India in its efforts to promote stable electricity supply.

Strong Growth in the Indian market for thermal power generation equipment driven by strong economic growth, the Indian power generation equipment market is expected to see demand growth of 15,000-16,000 MW a year for the next decade, according to the Eleventh (2007-2012) and Twelfth (2012-2017) Five- Year National Electricity Plans published by the Indian government.

Coal-fired thermal power stations will account for over 60 percent of the capacity growth, far surpassing other energy sources, and 80 percent of those power stations will be highly efficient super-critical thermal power plants.

Consistent with its long-term growth strategy of enhancing its thermal power plant business in India, Toshiba India Private Ltd. will establish a new in-house company in Gurgaon, Haryana state in August, which will initially provide engineering capabilities for thermal power plants in India.

With time, the new company is expected to provide a full engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) functions for the thermal and hydro power plant business in India, and to support customers in Southeast Asia and the Middle East.

The new company will work closely with Toshiba JSW and with another Toshiba Group company in India, TPSC (India) Private Limited in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, a wholly owned subsidiary of Toshiba Plant Systems and Services Corporation that undertakes construction of power plants, and will be charged with channeling Toshiba’s comprehensive capabilities in thermal power plant toward meeting growing demand in India. (ANI)

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Three persons die cleaning a well in J-K

May 23, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Kanah (J-K) May 23 (ANI): Three persons lost their lives after falling into 100-feet well in remote village Kanah, in Jammu and Kashmir on Friday.

The men died cleaning the well in search of potable water.

According to the police, the death may have been due to suffocation resulting from the Carbon Monoxide (CO) fumes coming from a generator that the men had carried with them into the well.

A team of fire officials, villagers and rescue workers pulled out the victims from the well, who were then taken to nearby hospital for treatment.

“There were seven persons in the well. We pulled them out and afterwards took them to hospital. Of the rescued people, three died upon reaching the hospital.” said Ghan Shyam, Station House Officer (SHO), Hiranagar.

Acute water shortage in the region coupled with intense heat forced the villagers to undertake the cleaning operation. (ANI)

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‘Smart turbine blades’ to improve wind power

May 4, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, May 3 (ANI): In a new research, scientists have developed a technique that uses sensors and computational software to constantly monitor forces exerted on wind turbine blades, a step toward improving efficiency by adjusting for rapidly changing wind conditions.

The research, by engineers at Purdue University and Sandia National Laboratories, is part of an effort to develop a smarter wind turbine structure

“The ultimate goal is to feed information from sensors into an active control system that precisely adjusts components to optimize efficiency,” said Purdue doctoral student Jonathan White, who is leading the research with Douglas Adams, a professor of mechanical engineering and director of Purdue’s Center for Systems Integrity.

The system also could help improve wind turbine reliability by providing critical real-time information to the control system to prevent catastrophic wind turbine damage from high winds.

The engineers embedded sensors called uniaxial and triaxial accelerometers inside a wind turbine blade as the blade was being built.

The blade is now being tested on a research wind turbine at the US Department of Agriculture’s Agriculture Research Service laboratory in Bushland, Texas.

Such sensors could be instrumental in future turbine blades that have “control surfaces” and simple flaps like those on an airplane’s wings to change the aerodynamic characteristics of the blades for better control.

Because these flaps would be changed in real time to respond to changing winds, constant sensor data would be critical.

Research findings show that using a trio of sensors and “estimator model” software developed by White accurately reveals how much force is being exerted on the blades.

“You want to be able to control the generator or the pitch of the blades to optimize energy capture by reducing forces on the components in the wind turbine during excessively high winds and increase the loads during low winds. In addition to improving efficiency, this should help improve reliability,” said Adams.

“We envision smart systems being a potentially huge step forward for turbines,” said Sandia’s Rumsey.

“There is still a lot of work to be done, but we believe the payoff will be great. Our goal is to provide the electric utility industry with a reliable and efficient product. We are laying the groundwork for the wind turbine of the future,” he added.

Purdue and Sandia have applied for a provisional patent on the technique. (ANI)

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Lower prices may drag India’s rubber acreage

April 2, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

A sharp fall in domestic natural rubber prices is seen dashing hopes of new plantation, which may create scarcity and push up prices in coming years, farmers and officials say.

The most traded RSS-4 (ribbed smoked sheet) prices have fallen by 47 percent to 75 rupees per kg, since hitting an all-time high of 142 rupees on Aug. 28.

“There is an expected 20-30 percent fall this fiscal in the area under new plantation as farmers will turn away on poor returns,” Rubber Board chairman Sajen Peter told Reuters.

In 2007-08, total area under rubber plantation was 635,000 hectares and area under new plantation was 20,000 hectares.

“There will also be some effect on new plantations in the north east because of the price slump,” said J.K.Thomas, rubber committee member, United Planters Association of Southern India (UPASI). Re-plantations are also likely to take a hit.

In 2008/09, Indian farmers re-planted the crop on 8,500 hectares, but in 2009/10 that is bound to dip, Peter added.

“Five percent of the total acreage gets replanted every year and out of that about 1 percent will get affected as planters will either switch or just simply stop tapping and not go in at all for replantation,” UPASI’s Thomas said.

Low returns on rubber timber, a key income generator after the plant is cut, is also detrimental, industry players said.

The rubber plant generally takes seven years to be ready for tapping and has a life span of about 30 years, after which the yield starts reducing, making re-plantation necessary.

“Labour charges, cost of seedlings and cost of fertilisers shot up when rubber prices rose. And these are still the same or only marginally lower,” said Martin Kadakkuzha, a farmer in Kannur in Kerala, which accounts for 90 percent of the output.

In 2008, prices of many agri-commodities rallied, boosting demand for agriculture labourers and pushing up daily wages.

Labour issues may force a shift to coconut and cocoa, Thomas said. The situation may worsen as the industry sees a further dip in prices due to the economic slowdown, he said.

“Natural rubber prices are not expected to make much headway in the near future in the domestic and international markets… Prices are expected to fall to 65 rupees (per kg) in the first six months of FY10,” Peter added.

LONG-TERM IMPACT

Lower pace of new plantation and re-plantation will not have an impact in short term since major consumers, like tyre makers, are cutting output, but prices may firm up in the long term.

India is the world’s fourth largest rubber producer and consumer. Tyre makers consume about 60 percent of total output.

“In the short-term, prices may remain depressed mainly on lower demand, but demand has to increase with a revival in global economy. We may see a rise in demand from mid-2010,” Anand James, senior analyst at Geojit Comtrade Ltd, said.

Some industry officials said despite a sharp fall in prices, rubber is still the best choice for farmers in Kerala.

Prices in Indian markets are higher than international market and farmers are still making profits, M.F. Vohra, president of All India Rubber Industries Association said.

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Battlefield laser weapon can destroy rockets, mortars and artillery shells

April 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, April 1 (ANI): A US based company has developed a battlefield laser weapon that can fire a strong beam, which can destroy rockets, mortars and artillery shells.

“We’re doing our part to make gunpowder a 20th-century technology,” said Dan Wildt of Northrop Grumman, whose battlefield laser weapon passed another milestone last week.

In tests, it fired a 105-kilowatt beam – enough to destroy rockets, mortars and artillery shells – at a stationary target for 5 minutes.

Unlike weapons such as Boeing’s huge Airborne Laser, which burns chemical fuel, the solid-state laser consists of semiconductors that emit light when a voltage is applied.

This makes them much smaller, allowing them to fit on the back of a “ruggedised” truck.

They can also run on electricity from a diesel generator.

The laser weapon will ultimately pinpoint, track and destroy a rocket up to a couple of kilometers away, claims Northrop Grumman. (ANI)

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Malaysian Indian Congress says Little India is already a famous icon

March 19, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Kuala Lumpur, Mar 19 (ANI): A Malaysian Indian Congress leader has said there is no need to rebrand or rename Little India in Klang as it is already a well-known tourism icon.

Selangor Malaysian Indian Congress chairman G. Palanivel said on Wednesday that “the move to change its name will erase the area’s identity.”

He said the MIC is against the Klang Municipal Council’s plan to rename the area Medan Kelana, and appealed to Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah of Selangor to intervene.

Palanivel was commenting on reports that the Klang municipality would soon remove two signboards with the name ‘Little India’ and replace them with Medan Kelana.

Little India is a famous shopping enclave with 100 pre-war shops on either side of Jalan Tengku Kelana, The Star reported.

It draws shoppers by the thousands and is an important income generator for Klang.

The move to change the name to Medan Kelana has sparked a public outcry. Elected representatives, businessmen, tourists and even a state executive council member want the name Little India to be retained.

In Johor Baru, Malaysian Indian Business Association president P. Sivakumar said Little India had significant business value as a tourist attraction and should not be renamed.

He said the Government should also consider promoting other locations like “Little Sabah” and “Little Sarawak” in the peninsula, to promote various cultural and traditional businesses. (ANI)

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Now, shock absorbers that harness road bumps to generate electricity for vehicles

February 13, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, February 13 (ANI): Undergraduate students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have found a way to generate electricity by harnessing energy from small bumps in the road.

The researchers say that a shock absorber invented by them can make this possible, while smoothing the ride more effectively than conventional shocks.

The new system also has a fail-safe feature-if the electronics fail for any reason, the system simply acts like a regular shock absorber.

Having already courted the U.S. military and several truck manufacturers, the students are hoping to initially find customers among companies that operate large fleets of heavy vehicles.

Shakeel Avadhany and his colleagues claim that they can improve overall vehicle fuel efficiency by up to 10 percent by using the regenerative shock absorbers.

Not only would improved fuel efficiency be a big plus for the army by requiring less stockpiling and transportation of fuel into the war zone, but the better ride produced by the actively controlled shock absorbers make for safer handling, the students say.

“If it’s a smoother ride, you can go over the terrain faster,” says Zack Anderson, a senior team member.

They have even obtained a vehicle for testing purposes from the company that produces Humvees for the army, and is currently working on development of the next-generation version of the all-purpose vehicle.

Anderson has revealed that they undertook this project because “we wanted to figure out where energy is being wasted in a vehicle.”

Considering that some hybrid cars already do a good job of recovering the energy from braking, the researchers looked elsewhere, and quickly homed in on the suspension.

They began by renting a variety of different car models, outfitting the suspension with sensors to determine the energy potential, and driving around with a laptop computer recording the sensor data.

Anderson says that the team observed that “a significant amount of energy” was being wasted in conventional suspension systems, “especially for heavy vehicles.”

Upon realising the possibilities, he says, the team set about building a prototype system to harness the wasted power.

According to the research team, their prototype shock absorbers use a hydraulic system that forces fluid through a turbine attached to a generator.

An active electronic system, which optimises the damping, controls the system to provide a smoother ride than conventional shocks, while generating electricity to recharge the batteries or operate electrical equipment.

The students’ tests have thus far shown that in a 6-shock heavy truck, each shock absorber can generate up to an average of 1 kW on a standard road.

They say that this is enough power to completely displace the large alternator load in heavy trucks and military vehicles, and in some cases even run accessory devices like hybrid trailer refrigeration units.

They are currently carrying out tests with their converted Humvee to optimise the system’s efficiency.

An article on this project has appeared in MIT Tech Talk. (ANI)

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