Mumbai: A demand for high quality nuclear forgings worth $1 billion is likely in the country once the Indo-US nuclear deal is operationalized, a top British forgemaster said today.

Some 700-800 large nuclear forgings weighing 100,000 tonnes would be required in the probable expansion of civilian nuclear plants in the next 20 to 25 years in India, Peter Britles told an International symposium on ‘Energy Related Materials’ here.

To meet this demand of the nuclear industry, India must create at least one primary steel-based Forgemaster urgently, Britles, Chairman, International forgemasters Meeting and Group Director, Sheffield forgemasters International Ltd said.

In the nuclear industry, the reactor pressure vessels, for example, uses very large, high integrity steel forgings in their manufacture.

Speaking on ‘Nuclear forging—a global overview’, Britles said at today’s world prices, this quantity of forgings equates to a purchase cost of over $1 billion.

In China, where civilian nuclear industry is growing fast, there are already three large nuclear forging companies and two more expected to come up meet its internal demands.

“India also should be able to meet its own growing demands instead of going to world market,” he added.

Current world manufacturing capacity of nuclear forgings is less than half of the expected demand, he said.