India's nuclear roadmap described a 100-GWe capacity target for 2047 and a goal of at least five indigenous small modular reactors by 2033 in an August 12, 2026 parliamentary reply. These ambitions combine electricity generation with work on different reactor designs.
Thorium is a separate, longer-term part of the technical picture. BARC explains that it cannot be used directly in the same way as a ready fissile fuel: it must be converted in a reactor into uranium-233. Mineral availability therefore does not remove the need for irradiation, fuel processing and suitable reactors.
This is not only a theoretical pathway. BARC records that thorium fuel rods irradiated in CIRUS were reprocessed and the recovered uranium-233 was made into fuel for the KAMINI research reactor.
Research-scale experience and commercial electricity supply nevertheless operate at different scales. BARC describes its 300-MWe Advanced Heavy Water Reactor as a technology-demonstration design, including the associated challenges of fuel fabrication, reprocessing and waste management.
The useful distinction is between resources, a demonstrated fuel-processing step and a fleet capable of supplying power. The August capacity targets describe the government's intended destination; BARC's technical account explains some of the engineering work that makes a thorium route more complex than simply mining a domestic resource.
