How China became the king of new nuclear power, and how the U.S. is trying to stage a comeback
How China became the king of new nuclear power, and how the U.S. is trying to stage a comeback
China is the current king of new nuclear power construction. The US is attempting to launch a comeback, but its still unknown whether that will be successful.
China has 21 nuclear reactors under construction which will have a capacity for generating more than 21 gigawatts of electricity, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. That is two and a half times more nuclear reactors under construction than any other country.
I love that China is not planning to power all future demand with more coal and gas.
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China is ahead because of their advanced manufacturing economy. They literally build every single reactor component in house and don't have to really rely on any outside companies for basically anything.
They have mostly North American designed reactors, ranging from CANDUs to their version of the Westinghouse AP-1000. Westinghouse basically went bankrupt trying to make the AP-1000 a viable reactor and when they started slipping, China came in and bought the schematics, modified them, and that's their primary reactor design these days.
If you look at all the reactors worldwide that are being built, the majority of them in Europe are massively behind schedule for various reasons that probably get ignored by the Chinese. For example, one of the reactors in France is multiple billions above budget and about a decade behind due to the lack of precision of the builders, forcing them to re-assess and re-build key structural components multiple times over.
Western intelligence should organize Chinese labor.
It is important to keep in mind that, because they are copying the Westinghouse AP-1000 design several times, they can keep costs low as most construction issues have already been ironed out. They also get to build expertise by having a long program rather than just building a one off.
Well, all the reactors in Europe are supposed to be of a similar design -- they had a big push to make the EPR reactors, which are a pressurized heavy water system, which is a bit old fashioned and requires a decent amount of passive safety to be built into the system. One of the first of those series to function was actually the one built in China which saw very few cost overruns and was generally finished within the original timeframe.