China faces civic protests over new nuclear power plants
PTI Feb 17, 2012
The Economic Times
BEIJING: China is experiencing civic protest over its ambitious plans to build massive nuclear power plants following the disaster in a Japanese atomic reactor.
An inter-provincial squabble over a nuclear power plant being built near the southern bank of the Yangtze River, has raised questions about China's ambitious expansion of its nuclear power programme, state media reported today.
The plant in the centre of the brewing controversy is located in Pengze county in Jiangxi. Across the river the government of Wangjiang county in Anhui wants the project shelved, saying they don't want the nuke plant so close to their backyard.
A report submitted by Wangjiang officials accuses its neighbour of lying about the population density in the area.
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They claim more than 150,000 people from Wangjiang alone live within a 10-kilometre radius of the plant. State regulations require that no more than 100,000 people should be living within a 10-kilometre radius of a planned nuclear power plant.
The Wangjiang report also claims the proposed plant is in or near an earthquake zone.
They point to a 2011 quake that shook the city of Jiujiang about 80 kilometres away which measured 4.6 on the Richter scale, and another in 2005 that measured 5.7, state run Global Times reported today.
Just two years ago China announced an ambitious plan to up the percentage of electricity supplied by nuclear power to five percent of total power by 2020.
This would see the country's nuclear generating capacity increase more than seven times to over 80 gigawatts.
China currently has 13 nuclear power plants with varied capacities and constructing 27 others, mostly with 1000mw capacity, made with US, French and Japanese technologies.
Work in all these plants was stopped for safety review after the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear reactors.
Jiangxi country officials argue that planned nuclear power plant with six reactors with installed capacity of 8000 mw is expected to work wonders for its economy.
The first reactor is expected to be operational by 2015. At a total cost of 100 billion yuan (USD 15.87 billion), even the construction of the plant will give the local economy "an enormous kick". But across the river Wangjiang country officials worry their agricultural-based economy is being threatened by the plant.
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China faces civic protests over new nuclear power plants
FRIDAY, 17 FEBRUARY 2012
PTI | BEIJING
dailypioneer
China is experiencing civic protest over its ambitious plans to build massive nuclear power plants following the disaster in a Japanese atomic reactor.
An inter-provincial squabble over a nuclear power plant being built near the southern bank of the Yangtze River, has raised questions about China’s ambitious expansion of its nuclear power programme, state media reported ton Friday.
The plant in the centre of the brewing controversy is located in Pengze county in Jiangxi. Across the river the Government of Wangjiang county in Anhui wants the project shelved, saying they don’t want the nuke plant so close to their backyard.
A report submitted by Wangjiang officials accuses its neighbour of lying about the population density in the area.
They claim more than 150,000 people from Wangjiang alone live within a 10-kilometre radius of the plant. State regulations require that no more than 100,000 people should be living within a 10-kilometre radius of a planned nuclear power plant.
The Wangjiang report also claims the proposed plant is in or near an earthquake zone.
They point to a 2011 quake that shook the city of Jiujiang about 80 kilometres away which measured 4.6 on the Richter scale, and another in 2005 that measured 5.7, state run Global Times reported on Friday.
Just two years ago China announced an ambitious plan to up the percentage of electricity supplied by nuclear power to five percent of total power by 2020.
This would see the country’s nuclear generating capacity increase more than seven times to over 80 gigawatts.
China currently has 13 nuclear power plants with varied capacities and constructing 27 others, mostly with 1000mw capacity, made with US, French and Japanese technologies.
Work in all these plants was stopped for safety review after the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear reactors.
Jiangxi country officials argue that planned nuclear power plant with six reactors with installed capacity of 8000 mw is expected to work wonders for its economy.
The first reactor is expected to be operational by 2015.
At a total cost of 100 billion yuan (USD 15.87 billion), even the construction of the plant will give the local economy “an enormous kick”. But across the river Wangjiang country officials worry their agricultural-based economy is being threatened by the plant.
“We worry about two things: So many people are living close by and the potential for earthquakes. What if something happens? What are they going to do about it?” Yu Zehong, director of the development and reform commission for Wangjiang county asked.
Hu Bin, director of the nuclear project office in Pengze, said he has no idea what’s caused the sudden objections from the neighbours a few kilometres downstream. He told the Oriental Morning Post that Jiangxi officials have strictly followed regulations and communicated with the local governments in Anhui.
Yu counters Hu’s assertions, saying Anhui has never been fully consulted and was only informed the project was going ahead last year. Some residents in Wangjiang contacted by the Global Times said they haven’t heard about the project.
One woman in Mopan village, less than five km from the proposed plant, said she had no idea what a nuclear power plant actually does, nor had she heard of the accident in Japan last year.
Some residents in Madang township near where the plant will be built said they knew about the big project but hadn’t been told of any potential dangers.
While the tit-for-tat war of words between the counties in the two provinces isn’t likely to abate soon, experts on the national stage are firing up a larger debate about China’s nuclear power strategy, the Times report said.
He Zuoxiu, a leading theoretical physicist, isn’t only concerned about one nuclear plant near the banks of the Yangtze. “China shouldn’t build any nuclear power plant in the inland regions,” said He, 85, who worked on China’s first nuclear bomb.
“People have failed to consider the potential for accidents like an earthquake or terrorist attacks, or asteroid hit,” He said.
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