China Announces Plan for $7.5 billion Nuclear Power Plant

Posted by Bill Belew on October 27th, 2006 in All about China, China, Doing Business in China, chinese | No Comments

China’s total power consumption in the first quarter of this year grew by 12%. It may be more but the meter readers couldn’t see through the smoot caused by the burning coal.

China sees nuclear power as a clean alternative to its abundant but dirty coal resources. Did I say coal was dirty?

China’s state-owned China National Nuclear Corp. will be the builder for the new plant set for Yueyang, a city in Hunan province – a second for the province.

The city, Taohuajiang, about 100km (62mi) from Yueyang and also in Hunan announced a plan to build a nuclear power plant earlier this year.

The difference – Taohuajiang will be built using Chinese technology.

The Yueyang plant will be taking bids from U.S., European, Russian and Japanese suitors.

I firmly believe that if and it’s a big IF nuclear power plants are managed properly, they are indeed a reasonable alternative to burning fossil fuels.

China apparently thinks so, too.

What do you think?

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  1. Chris says

    14/11/2006

    Big IF indeed. Considering China’s record on environmental management, nuclear energy means huge risks and lots of things that need to go right. I keep thinking about the disasters that have resulted from local officials cutting corners on regulations and clean-ups. While it’s bad when a town drowns in sludge, I’d rather not picture a Chinese Chernobyl.