China Is Restarting Its Reactor Pipeline, Westinghouse Isn't Invited (technologyreview.com) 146
"China hasn't launched a new nuclear reactor build for over two years, but Chinese press reports that this nuclear hiatus has broken," writes Slashdot reader carbonnation. "Approvals have reportedly been made for four Hualong One reactors -- a domestic "Generation III" design -- instead of U.S.-designed AP1000s." From a report via MIT Technology Review: China's Jiemian News started the chatter on Tuesday with an exclusive interview with senior leadership of the Hualong One design's owner, Hualong International Nuclear Power Technology, a collaboration of nuclear heavyweights China General Nuclear Power (CGN) and China National Nuclear Corp. (CNNC). According to the news site, the joint venture's leaders said that two dual-reactor projects had received provisional permission to begin pouring concrete. Other publications also picked up the story yesterday, including First Financial Journal, which claimed to have confirmed the approvals through "relevant authoritative channels." CNNC and CGN have not responded to the media reports.
The reactors are slated for two new sites along China's coast: CNNC's Zhangzhou power project in Fujian and CGN's Huizhou Taipingling project in Guangdong. Both projects had been planned and approved by Chinese authorities with Westinghouse's AP1000 reactor design, which promises safety advances such as passive cooling. That means it stores water above the reactor, leveraging gravity to keep the plant cool should the pumps fail. But Westinghouse's flagship AP1000 projects have been plagued by cost overruns and delays. Those troubles may have helped the Hualong One to catch up. CNNC started building the first Hualong One reactor in 2015 at its Fuqing power plant and expects to have it operating later this year.
The reactors are slated for two new sites along China's coast: CNNC's Zhangzhou power project in Fujian and CGN's Huizhou Taipingling project in Guangdong. Both projects had been planned and approved by Chinese authorities with Westinghouse's AP1000 reactor design, which promises safety advances such as passive cooling. That means it stores water above the reactor, leveraging gravity to keep the plant cool should the pumps fail. But Westinghouse's flagship AP1000 projects have been plagued by cost overruns and delays. Those troubles may have helped the Hualong One to catch up. CNNC started building the first Hualong One reactor in 2015 at its Fuqing power plant and expects to have it operating later this year.
Its Fuqing Power Plant (Score:2)
They should show more pride in their work
Fuqing Nuclear Power (Score:1)
Let's hope they have studied the the Fukupshima NPP and learned something.
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Let's hope they have studied the the Fukupshima NPP and learned something.
They are very protective of their citizenry https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
And I expect their nuclear hygiene will be at least as good as their oceanic plastic dumping. So I predict a perfect track record - never an accident, never a problem. I'll be here munching on popcorn though.
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Let's hope they have studied the the Fukupshima NPP and learned something.
They are very protective of their citizenry https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
This is one reason why Communism terrifies me.
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Let's hope they have studied the the Fukupshima NPP and learned something.
They are very protective of their citizenry https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
This is one reason why Communism terrifies me.
n It is true. The individual is given the status of an ant. A disposable utility device.
The USA is quite popular to bash. But we've never had an ideology based famine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
That is really all you need to understand communism.
For the purists out there, all pure ism's are doomed to fail. They mutate into some nasty forms.
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In Fukushima, the chain of events was something like this - 1) earthquake leads to emergency reactor shutdown and switch to shutdown cooling. 2) tsunami causes flooding which destroys emergency diesel generators, 2ndry emergency diesel generators, AC electrical switchboards, DC batteries and UPS systems. 3) Reactor cooling is shutdown by loss of electrical power (unit 1), reactor cooling operates using thermo-hydraulic/mechanical system but with no control/monitoring and therefore degrad
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6) Containment building overheats due to loss of cooling
The containment building blew up due to released hydrogen gas and the lack of basic safety provisions present in most western reactors, such as catalytic recombiners and spark igniters which get rid of the explosive gas while concentrations are still small and not large enough to blow up the whole building.
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They likely have.
I'll go with evidence over conjecture.
In Fukushima, the chain of events was something like this -
You forgot -1) TEPCO didn't move the back-up generators from a flood prone area and 0) TEPCO colluded so they wouldn't have to set aside budget for sea wall improvements.
The HPR1000 design addresses several of the issues.
The core, fundamental design flaw with the AP1000 is multifaceted. It employs a passive cooling system which converts the containment building into a pressure vessel. A feature that has never been tested with reactor experience on a smaller reactor. It has several areas that are prone to corrosion an
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So long as we don't use a reactor from sixty years ago, yes.
It is possible to make new designs that are worse.
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Actually that is the major reason why the AP1000 projects were delayed in China. The construction work was stopped for a couple of years while the design was reviewed. There were problems in the supply chain for components as well but those were to a less degree than the problems Westinghouse had in the USA because the Chinese have actually build quite a few reactors over the past decades so their industry is more used to the work and supply chains are in place.
The article is fallacious. Four AP1000 reactor
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I hope they will be better quality than most of the stuff i'm forced to order from china.
The Chinese can build quality stuff just fine, as long as they're paid properly & those footing the bill know what to look for. The cheap crap they're known for, is just that: pay shit, get junk.
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I hope they will be better quality than most of the stuff i'm forced to order from china.
Maybe you should pay a decent price for proper stuff, then you'll find that even made in China can result in very decent quality.
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Such as your iPhone or pretty much every damn computer component you've bought and relied upon in the last 20 years? They're the masters of electronics design and manufacturing, not because they "stole" it, but because they're simply better than everyone else at it.
Some companies also manufacture cheap items at cheap prices, but using that as an excuse to say all Chinese goods are cheap quality is hilariously dishonest.
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The CPU in my computer was manufactured in Oregon, a short walk from my desk.
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Re:Its Fuqing Power Plant (Score:4, Insightful)
I hate to break it to you, but *all* your stuff comes from China. Well most of it. The good stuff, and the bad.
Which is why these trade wars are such an absurdity. That horse bolted the stable 20 years ago.
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My phone and TV is Japanese.
Laundry Sheets, United States.
Just because you don't buy local, doesn't mean everyone else is like you.
China Syndrome! Panic! (Score:3)
They will blow up, melt, and sink all the way to China!
hmm...
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Movie (Score:4, Funny)
Nuclear is less popular in China since the movie came out "Miguó zònghé zhèng" (The America Syndrome).
Re: Movie (Score:1, Interesting)
It doesn't matter what's popular. What the State wants, the State gets. There is only one China.
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Only one China? Wonder what the Dalai Lama or the Taiwanese think about that.
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They can think anything they want. As long as they don't talk about it in public, and don't act on it.
P.S. If you actually got your head out of the propaganda well and into observable reality, you'd know that ROC is 100% on board with "one China" policy. The only point of disagreement that they have with PRC is who is the legitimate leader of it.
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How's that in any way relevant to point I made?
Re: Movie (Score:4, Insightful)
Only one China? Wonder what the Dalai Lama
Who gives a shit what the Dalai Lama thinks? I suggest you do some research into what life was like under the 'Lama's' before China. For the average peasant it was a living hell. Don't buy that love and peace bullshit that shaved hippie is peddling. All he wants is his power base back so he can rule Tibet with an iron fist. Just like his predecessors did.
An no, I'm not to fond of Mother Teresa ether.
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Re: Movie (Score:4)
Asshole, well I believe we well established that a long time ago. Uneducated, hardly. Seems the real one that is uneducated here is you. Let your education begin here.
https://www.browardbeat.com/th... [browardbeat.com] https://rense.com//general81/f... [rense.com]
None of these are "authoritative" sources of course but they are steps on your road to the truth. I suggest you do a little bit more research on your own now.
Living under Chinese control isn't easy but for the typical Tibetan they are a world better off than under the dalai lama. Under Chinese rule the typical Tibetan has access to modern medicine, education, and the ability to advance in society. Under the dalai lama the peasant class had none of this.
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Because those with the oldest UID have been on /. longer than some of you have been alive. They remember Katz and discussions of the Columbine tragedy and shit like that. They have seen more of life than certain little pricks who have never left their basement. They are entitled to be assholes..
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They are entitled to be assholes.
I thought entitlement was supposed to be a Millennial thing?
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No clue. It started doing that way about 2 years ago. I sent in some emails pointing out the issue. It didn't change. I figured if I just kept posting someone would see the issue and address it. It's been 2 years so I'm figuring its on purpose or they can't fix it. But I have no clue why it is that way.
Gen 3? Oi.. (Score:2)
So instead of building something safe by design, they're going to dick around with Rube Goldberg cooling and control systems.
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I think they want something that works now, not something that may some day work in the future.
Re:Gen 3? Oi.. (Score:5, Insightful)
So instead of building something safe by design, they're going to dick around with Rube Goldberg cooling and control systems.
What is safe by design? There are no Gen IV reactors on the market at present. All of these inherently safe reactors are still in the R&D phase. In the meanwhile Gen III reactors feature plenty of passive safety systems and inherently safer design than earlier versions, and that include's Westinghouse's baby the AP1000 which would have been Westinghouse's bid should they have been allowed to play.
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So instead of building something safe by design, they're going to dick around with Rube Goldberg cooling and control systems.
What is safe by design?
A safe.
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Wear your Troll points like a badge of honor on this one.
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Wear your Troll points like a badge of honor on this one.
The irony amused me.
Re:Gen 3? Oi.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Westinghouse were invited, but their design lost out long ago to a French one.
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... allowed to play ...
But Westinghouse's flagship AP1000 projects have been plagued by cost overruns and delays.
China is knocking King America off the hill. America wants to be off the hill: no immigrants, no climate collaboration, anti-science, Islamophobia, anti-globalism, return to 19th century pollution levels ...
Bye bye miss American pie ...
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And it's obvious that you have?
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Human nature.
It explains America's society.
The European Invasion pitted iron age peoples against a stone age civilization.
It's not the first invasion of all time.
It's China's turn to grab the brass ring.
Re: Gen 3? Oi.. (Score:2)
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I can tell you why.
There are three major political parties in the US: Democrats, Republicans, and Capitalists.
The Capitalists are running the country. Guess who those stealthy bastards (and bitches) are?
It's you and me. We're shareholders and, above all else; at the expense of all else, we want asymptotic sales in time increments of nanoseconds.
SCOTUS, via Citizens United, supports the Capitalist party. Democrats and Republicans support the Capitalist party as do state governors.
Hell, we want stocks to do w
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Since you are not the author of my post, your dissection is moot.
Your task is to either provide a valid refutation or ask me a question.
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The problem has been that it has proven very difficult to construct both in China and in the US, due to many fairly radical features requiring major changes in the construction process, and the need to develop a supply chain for some radically redesigned parts.
The HPR1000 design is based on the old French CP1/2 designs but with modifications to harden
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Exactly. Precisely this. But it is likely the Chinese will build AP1000 derivatives i.e. the CAP1400. To which the Chinese own the IP rights. In the future once that design gets a license.
The Huanlong One is indeed based on the French Generation II nuclear reactor designs. Which are themselves enlarged Westinghouse Generation II designs. The French's own Generation III reactor design, the EPR, also has entered operations in China. However it is too expensive, too many parts, so it is unlikely the Chinese wi
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Re :which would have been Westinghouse's bid should they have been allowed to play
You are saying this as if they were not allowed to participate for political reasons or something. Believe me, Westinghouse was considered and rejected purely due to economic reasons and all the technological issues that plagued Westinghouse's projects ever since they tried to implement their 3-D animations in real world.
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The IFR ran fine for a year before it got defunded. Thirty years ago.
Funny that Mr. "I Have a Slideshow" led the effort to kill the IFR and has since made a billion dollars on global-warming fear mongering.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages... [pbs.org]
The Chinese will build these and then take all of our nuclear "waste" off our hands for billions to trillions of dollars since the West is killing itself with anxiety.
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The IFR ran fine for a year before it got defunded. Thirty years ago.
Indeed, a burner reactor with integrated fuel reprocessing. An awesome concept. A problem with adequate materials technology as sodium cooling a reactor has issues when it starts to leak and air gets in.
Funny that Mr. "I Have a Slideshow" led the effort to kill the IFR and has since made a billion dollars on global-warming fear mongering.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages... [pbs.org]
Well Mr "Wartimepresident" finished it of by funding its complete destruction in the 2005 US Energy Policy act, SEC. 625 if I recall correctly.
The Chinese will build these and then take all of our nuclear "waste" off our hands for billions to trillions of dollars since the West is killing itself with anxiety.
Not a chance. The lobbying effort on the part of the oil and coal industry was who was calling for its complete destruction. There is no way they are going to *e
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What is safe by design? There are no Gen IV reactors on the market at present.
And there will not be any Gen IV designs, at least in the USA, until the US NRC decides that they want them. They've been stuck in the 1970s on nuclear reactor regulation for so long that they don't even have a process to license anything other than a water cooled and solid fuel reactor. I've been told that the pages on the books for regulating anything else are simply left blank. They know these reactors exist, at least on paper, but they have nothing to go on to issue a license and while Democrats were
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You are ignoring that both W Bush and Obama funded the construction of Generation III nuclear reactors. The first nuclear reactors to be built after many decades. Now, neither of them funded Generation IV nuclear reactors, and Clinton did shut down the last one, I think. But Generation IV reactors aren't as easy as some people would like to make them to be. The safest Generation IV design is probably lead-cooled fast reactors. But even those have some practical issues.
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So instead of building something safe by design, they're going to dick around with Rube Goldberg cooling and control systems.
What is safe by design? There are no Gen IV reactors on the market at present. All of these inherently safe reactors are still in the R&D phase. In the meanwhile Gen III reactors feature plenty of passive safety systems and inherently safer design than earlier versions, and that include's Westinghouse's baby the AP1000 which would have been Westinghouse's bid should they have been allowed to play.
Safe by design means a reactor designed in such a way so if all the operators disappeared somehow all at once, the reactor would shutdown safely on its own, 100% of the time. That's called "walk away safe". We know how to build such designs. Instead we build incredibly complex reactors requiring large staffs of operators that can go wrong in several different ways. Reactors where the moderator and the coolant are the same material. Why is this bad? Well, in a nuclear reactor the moderator isn't the th
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Safe by design means
I know what it means. My comment was playing with the fact that the GP thinks we have existing Safe By design plans just laying around waiting to be built. We don't.
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Gen 3 is pretty much the safest thing in nuclear power today. Will be for a while, because of the idiotic political "safety rules" that have effectively blocked technological development in the sector.
USA also uninvited China for 5G and such (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:USA also uninvited China for 5G and such (Score:5, Informative)
so why should China invite others for their power plants, ..?
"We're going to win so much, you're going to be so sick and tired of wining!!!"
... piss off everybody with trade wars, insults, an inept foreign policy and asinine impulsive tweets and then the winning will start for real so just relax and enjoy the ride ;-)
-- Donald J Trump
See, it's all part of the stable genius plan
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This.
America wants to masturbate in public.
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And the news is?
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In this case, the boat sinks.
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I have a couple replies here...
First, I enjoy knowing that for once we have a POTUS that is willing to tell the rest of the world that they can't keep slacking off and expect the USA to pick it up. NATO nations have not been keeping up with their military spending and training and it's making Russia and other threats to the world very bold. So bold that things can turn into a shooting war very quickly. Germany can't keep their military pilots certified because few of their helicopters are fit to fly. Th
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I have a couple replies here...
First, I enjoy knowing that for once we have a POTUS that is willing to tell the rest of the world that they can't keep slacking off and expect the USA to pick it up. NATO nations have not been keeping up with their military spending and training and it's making Russia and other threats to the world very bold. So bold that things can turn into a shooting war very quickly. Germany can't keep their military pilots certified because few of their helicopters are fit to fly. Their Navy is a bunch of barely afloat wrecks, and their tank crews are getting "trained" in mini-vans because they can't keep their tanks running either. The rest of NATO is barely any better. If they want peace then they must prepare for war.
Second, I also enjoy that Trump is living rent free in the minds of those posting here. Throw all the fits you like, my grin only gets bigger.
Oh, so much winning I can hardly stand it!
So, I hear Mexico is going to pay for that border wall, not the US taxpayer, how is that going?
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Nuclear power is a core component of US technology?
Considering the US was the first to develop almost everything in the nuclear space yes. We are just doing a shit job of commercializing it due to politics. And anytime anyone has nuclear technology, its a core component of their technology. Its just too important to not be. Even if you don't think so, I bet your grand-kids will agree (while cursing us if we don't develop it).
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But Westinghouse's flagship AP1000 projects have been plagued by cost overruns and delays.
Would YOU buy that shit?
Re:USA also uninvited China for 5G and such (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:USA also uninvited China for 5G and such (Score:5, Insightful)
so why should China invite others for their power plants, ..?
They do invite others to bid on projects. And they insist on having detailed engineering documentation as part of the bid. Then they decline the bid and use a "design" of their own, which is remarkably like the one they rejected.
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so why should China invite others for their power plants, ..?
They already stole the US designs now they need others for comparison and to "innovate"
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so why should China invite others for their power plants, ..?
They already stole the US designs now they need others for comparison and to "innovate"
Stole? We put them on the the Internet for anyone to download. That's how sad the US's nuclear power research is now, we upload advanced nuclear designs to the Internet with the hope that someone, anyone will build it because we know our political shitshow won't allow us.
Westinghouse (Score:2, Insightful)
They screwed the pooch at every opportunity with AP600/1000 and now they're out of customers. These hidebound Western companies (yes I know it was owned by Toshiba for a time; the mentality of Westinghouse wasn't improved through that change) have thoroughly purged the decision making process of any meaningful engineering contribution. Designs are driven by fantastical cost and efficiently promises that look great on paper, but no manufacturer is seriously consulted about whether building any of it is rea
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Perhaps this is best left to the Chinese. They probably have a few decades to go before their processes are subsumed by the same bullshit that ruins the West.
Thanks for the information.
I don't think that's going to happen. I think they are going to go ahead with a Nuclear Program the way the Nuclear Narcissists here have always wanted in the west and simply crush any resistance.
Let's face it, the capital and corruptions in western economics is what has destroyed Nuclear power. If the oil and coal industry hadn't destroyed every avenue to develop Nuclear Power properly and everyone banded together to design it properly, it may have had a chance. Then agai
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Anyone want to guess what will happen when they have an accident?
Assuming we still have spysats, we'll detect some issues at the reactor sites like hydrogen kabooms, then a lot of denial that there is a problem, then radiation detectors will start going off around the world. They'll refuse to acknowlege ther is any problem for weeks after they turn their shorline site into an uninhabitble mess, and we'll have more dead heros
Then SlashDot nook-ya-ler apologists will start another round of "no true reactor" comments and call anyone who doesn't agree with them, idiots.
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Assuming we still have spysats, we'll detect some issues at the reactor sites like hydrogen kabooms, then a lot of denial that there is a problem, then radiation detectors will start going off around the world. They'll refuse to acknowlege ther is any problem for weeks after they turn their shorline site into an uninhabitble mess, and we'll have more dead heros
so exactly like fukushima
Sadly, probably eaxctly what will happen. The stations are along the shoreline, and there is a learning curve when dealing with that energy genie that want's out of it's bottle. These will be their own reactors, with their own problems, and their own technicians, so I'm calling no less then two kaboom events.
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Nuclear Power is a dumb way to boil water.
Coal for the win! MAGA!
I don't support coal either.
Stolen IP. No need for YOU! (Score:1)
Since China steals the IP there is no need to have them come back. Western companies either give away their tech. or have it stolen by the chinks so there is no need for the rest of the world. Within the next 10 years you can expect to serve the Communist parties regardless of your job and country. Fools.
Plus.... (Score:2)
...word on the street is China already stole the plans so there will be some heavy-duty plagiarizing going on.
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The West never learned what Communism in China was all about and kept on giving very advanced tech to China.
A lower cost turn key design from France?
A rector project made in China?
More tech imported from the USA and Japan?
China has it all now.
There is no zero-carbon economy without nuclear... (Score:5, Insightful)
We can achieve a "zero carbon" economy in one of two ways. The first is to revert to near stone age technology. Given the discoveries in science and technology I'm sure that our lives would not be nearly as poverty stricken, brutal, nasty, and short but we'd lose access to many luxuries we have today. Airplanes would be right out. People would need to resort to travel long distances by water, rail, or maybe lighter than air vessels.
If you want a modern economy that is "zero carbon" then the only solution must include nuclear power. That does not mean we cannot also include sun, wind, and hydro power, in fact ruling them out is not anything I have seen nuclear power advocates call for. What we need to do though is not shoehorn these technologies into places where they do not make economic sense. Doing that leads to poverty, and the brutal and short lives that come with it.
China could leapfrog the rest of the world on achieving a modern and "zero carbon" economy because they are investing in nuclear power while the rest of the world is not. Right now the USA gets 20% of it's electricity from nuclear power and powers many vessels in its navy by nuclear power. To remove nuclear power means replacing those nuclear reactors with something that, barring some leap in technology, will be less safe, higher CO2 emissions, and less reliable.
We cannot have both a modern economy and a "zero carbon" economy without nuclear power. I put "zero carbon" in scare quotes because I know someone will point out that nuclear power is not truly zero carbon, and they'd be right. What they ignore, or chose to remain ignorant of, is that nuclear power produces less carbon per energy produced that wind, solar, and perhaps even hydroelectric energy. What these anti-nuclear types also ignore, or chose to remain willfully ignorant of, is the long safety record of nuclear power. Even though many died from Chernobyl, and dozens died in the poorly managed (and likely unnecessary) evacuations from Fukushima, nuclear power is still far safer than any other energy source we have. Don't believe me? Look it up!
Here's one source to prove my point: http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2... [blogspot.com]
If you dispute my source then I'm happy to provide others so long as there is a source cited that shows otherwise. Best I've seen so far is speculation on how many could die if we deployed the same 1950s technology that was used at Chernobyl or an explanation of the dangers of nuclear power with no comparisons to what might replace it. Yes, nuclear power is dangerous. Much like a republican form of government is the worst except all the others we tried we know that nuclear power is the worst except all the others we tried.
Our choices are nuclear power, keep burning coal, or reverting to near stone age in living standards. You can claim that future technology will bring another option and I can agree but for now, as of today, we have only those three choices. Until technology advances to give another option we must choose from those three. I suggest we choose nuclear power, just as China has.
Re:There is no zero-carbon economy without nuclear (Score:4, Insightful)
We can achieve a "zero carbon" economy in one of two ways. The first is to revert to near stone age technology. Given the discoveries in science and technology I'm sure that our lives would not be nearly as poverty stricken, brutal, nasty, and short but we'd lose access to many luxuries we have today. Airplanes would be right out. People would need to resort to travel long distances by water, rail, or maybe lighter than air vessels.
You forgot the fact that without carbon/industrialization we can't feed most of the people on the planet. That will lead to lots of happy outcomes I'm sure. Other than that, spot on post. Mod parent up...without nuclear in the long run, we are done...all of us...