Power Ministry seeks to oversee civil nuclear energy development

New Delhi: The power ministry has proposed that the development of nuclear projects be brought under its ambit. It has sent the proposal to the cabinet secretariat for amendment in allocation of Business Rules of the Ministry of Power for the same, said people familiar with the development.

The ministry had proposed to include development of nuclear power projects with reactors under the International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards in its business list.

The suggestions were made before the promulgation of the Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy for Transforming India (Shanti) Act in December 2025.

The Shanti Act enables limited private participation in the nuclear sector under regulatory oversight. At present, the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), under the Prime Minister's Office, is the administrative authority for nuclear power-related matters.

Queries emailed to the power ministry and the DAE remained unanswered till press time.

ET had last year reported that initial discussions were on for the power ministry to handle civil nuclear power generation.

The discussions later slowed down as the government focused on the finalisation of the bill, according to people familiar with the matter.

An industry executive said that strategic plants and major factors such as safety, regulatory and compliance should remain with the DAE. The Shanti Act strengthens the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board and also puts fuel and spent fuel within the domain of the DAE, apart from some other sensitive activities.

India's roadmap to achieve 100 GW of nuclear energy capacity by 2047 prescribes that nearly half of it be developed by the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd, which comes under the DAE. Of the rest, 30 GW is to come through NTPC Ltd, which falls under the power ministry.

The Shanti Act states that tariff calculations will remain with the central government. The earlier Atomic Energy Act, 1962, stipulated that the tariff would be governed by the DAE in consultation with the Central Electricity Authority, the planning body under the power ministry.

"Rules will give more clarity on tariff determination issues," said one of the persons cited earlier.

India's installed nuclear capacity is about 8.8 GW, accounting for less than 2% of the country's total electricity capacity. The Centre has set a target of scaling this up to about 21 GW by 2032 as part of its long-term energy transition strategy, which also includes 500 GW of non-fossil capacity by 2030 and the addition of firm baseload power to support increasing electricity demand.