Event
THE OUTLOOK FOR CHINA’S NUCLEAR POWER INDUSTRY: TECHNOLOGY AND SAFETY
SEMINAR| ABOUT China has the fastest growing fleet of nuclear power plants in the world. At the same time, its indigenous technological capacities are advancing, along with its ambitious to be an international supplier. These seminars examine the outlook for China’s nuclear power technology and the challenge of governing the safety of its domestic installations. | Date 5 December 2018, Wednesday Time
Admission is free but2:00 pm – 5.00 pm Venue Conference Room, Energy Studies Institute, 29 Heng Mui Keng Terrace Block A, #10-01 Singapore 119620 Enquiries Jan.lui@esi.nus.edu.sg Click here to register registration is required. |
| PROGRAMME
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| Seminar 1: The Future of the Nuclear Industry Development in China – An Historical Perspective The Chinese nuclear industry development has come a long way since 1st October 1949. Through technology transfer from the western world and strong domestic research and development support, China has risen up as the 3rd strongest East Asian country besides Japan and South Korea in nuclear energy developments. Contrasting the negative western experience of cost escalation, completion time overrun, and abrupt stop in new builds, China has never experienced major construction cost and completion time overrun even with the latest nuclear power technologies. Having steadily constructed almost all types of western light water reactors, the most dominant commercial nuclear power reactor technology since 1985, Hualong One emerged as the nationally standardized technology targeting both the domestic and overseas markets. Building upon a review of historical reactor technology and market development in China and worldwide, this session brings future perspectives of Chinese indigenous technologies in their domestic and foreign markets. Dr Victor Nian is a Research Fellow at the Energy Studies Institute of the National University of Singapore, and a participant in the project “Policy and Law for Nuclear safety and Security”. He has about 10 years’ experience in nuclear policy and strategy research. He is the Executive Director of a UNiLAB on Integrated Systems Analysis Tools under the “Research & Innovation without Borders” initiative of Applied Energy Journal. His research on nuclear energy covers almost all aspects including safety, security, and safeguards, policy and regulation, peaceful and strategic use of atomic energy, and technology and industry developments. |
| Seminar 2: Governing Nuclear Safety in China The safety of the China’s fleet of nuclear power plants is of concern not just to the country’s leadership and citizens, but also to the wider Asian region. However, the ability of China’s government to ensure the safety of its nuclear power plants has come under scrutiny both at home and abroad. These concerns have a number of grounds: the rapid growth of the country’s fleet of nuclear power plants; perceived inadequacies of the nuclear safety regulator; deficiencies in the legal framework; potential weaknesses in the safety culture; a lack of transparency in the industry; the potential for malfeasance and corruption; and the generally low standard of safety in other energy industries. This session examines the progress made in recent years and identifies the challenges that remain. Event Summary
On 5 December 2018, the Energy Studies Institute hosted two back-to-back seminars on China’s nuclear industry as part of the ESI-CIL Nuclear Governance Project. ESI Senior Fellow, Dr Victor Nian, presented on ‘The Future of Nuclear Industry Development in China – An Historical Perspective’. He drew attention to the longstanding involvement of China in nuclear technology for both military and civilian purposes, and showed that the government continues to support research into new options for nuclear power. ESI Senior Principal Fellow, Dr Philip Andrews-Speed, presented on ‘Governing Nuclear Safety in China’. Although China has suffered no serious nuclear accidents to date, he emphasised that the current rapid growth of the fleet of nuclear power plants may put strain on the system for regulating nuclear safety. |
