Chennai, June 24 (IANS): The first 1,000 MW unit at Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KNPP) will be shut down on Wednesday for annual maintenance and refuelling activities, said Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL).

R.S. Sundar, site director of KNPP, said in a statement that the first unit will be shut down for a period of 60 days for annual maintenance and refuelling.

He said the unit will resume generation of 1,000 MW after these activities.

According to atomic energy officials, a third of the fuel pins have to be changed every year.

As to the status of second unit at the KNPP, Sundar said test reports of the hot run have been submitted to the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) for review.

The NPCIL has set up two 1,000 MW nuclear power plants at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district in Tamil Nadu which is around 650 km from here.

Both the units are supplied by Russian company Rosatom.

The first unit was connected to the southern grid in December 2014 and is now operating at around 60 percent capacity.

According to NPCIL, the second unit at Kudankulam has achieved a physical progress of 98.23 percent as on May 2015.