Chennai, Nov 2 (IANS): The start of fission process in the second atomic power unit at Kudankulam has been postponed to March 2015, the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL) said.

According to NPCIL, the first criticality - start of fission - is expected to be in March 2015.

Earlier, NPCIL said the unit would start fission process this month.

India's atomic power plant operator NPCIL is setting up two 1,000 MW Russian reactors at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district, 650 km from here. The total outlay for the project is over Rs.17,000 crore.

The first unit attained criticality July 2013, which is the beginning of the fission process. The unit has started power generation and has been connected to the southern grid.

However, the first unit has not been able to start commercial generation till date owing to some problems. The first unit's turbine was found to have developed some problem Sep 26 and its running was stopped.

According to the sources, some component inside the turbine turned loose and damaged the turbine blades.

The NPCIL has decided to restart the first unit's turbine taking out the needed components from the second unit's turbine.

The first unit is expected to start operating again sometime late next month.

On the other hand, the damaged components would be repaired and fitted in the second unit's turbine.