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.
It goes the other way too. The Chinese government harshly punishes those who take dangerous shortcuts that undermine public safety and trust. The 2008 baby formula scandal comes to mind, which led to the execution of two executives for their crimes.
Anyway, nuclear power has proven to be very safe under all types of government. To say that it would somehow be less safe in China is maybe just a little bit sinophobic.
Right until Chernobyl almost kills all of Ukraine.
A roughly equivalent disaster also happened in the anti-communist free state of Japan. What’s your point?
That took an earthquake and a tsunami to happen. Chernobyl was a test to see if it the plant was built to spec, and it wasn’t.
In the case of the Chernobyl disaster, the test revealed a flaw in the design of the reactor, not a deviation from the specification. Likewise, in the Fukushima disaster, it was a tsunami that revealed a flaw in the design of the reactor cooling system and backup generators.
The flaw being graphite tips on the control rods which was not in the design.
The graphite ends were part of the RMBK design and the power surge behavior caused by them was observed previously at a reactor in Lithuania (but no accident occured). The design was not changed at that point because the particular circumstances that would lead to an accident (like what happened in the Chernobyl disaster) were determined to be too unlikely. A similar determination must have been made regarding the likelihood of a flood that would disable the emergency generators at Fukushima.
White man wonders if yellow man can do things white man can. News at 11.