Officials in south China's Guangdong
Province are speeding up preparations for the construction of
the country's biggest nuclear power plant.
The facility will be located in Yangjiang, one of the province's
coastal cities.
Construction of the facility's nuclear reactor will begin before
2006, said Qian Zhimin, general manager of Guangdong Nuclear Power
Co Ltd.
Infrastructure construction at the site, in Shahuai Township in
Yangjiang's Yangdong County, is under way, Qian said on
Tuesday.
Foreign companies from the United States, Japan, Russia, Canada
and France are competing against domestic firms to design the
project, Qian said.
Yangjiang's nuclear power plant is expected to help stem the
chronic power shortages along the nation's prosperous Pearl River
Delta, which includes the Hong Kong and Macao special
administrative regions, Qian added.
Guangdong Province's demand for electricity has exceeded supply
for several years.
That has forced the province to purchase electricity from Hong
Kong. This year, the gap between supply and demand is expected to
reach 10 percent.
Qian said Yangjiang Nuclear Power Co Ltd was formed, by his
firm, to construct and operate the nuclear facility.
Hu Wenquan was appointed general manager of Yangjiang Nuclear
Power Co Ltd late last year.
The nuclear plant, located in western Guangdong, will have six
electricity generating units.
Each will have a production capacity of 1 million kilowatts.
The first two units will begin generating power by 2010. The
remaining units will be operational within 15 to 20 years.
The plant will be capable of generating more than 45 billion
kilowatt hours of electricity annually when all six units are
operational.
The plant, which will cover 472,485 square meters, will cost
more than US$8 billion to construct.
Guangdong Nuclear Power plans to begin constructing another
nuclear power plant in 2006.
It will be located in Shenzhen's Daya Bay and it will support
the Pearl River Delta area's rapid economic growth.
The Lingdong Nuclear Power Plant, also referred to as the second
phase of the Ling'ao Nuclear Power Plant, will have two generating
units. Each has an installed capacity of 1 million kilowatts.
When the two nuclear plants are operational, Guangdong will have
a nuclear power production capacity, or installed capacity, of more
than 12 million kilowatts.
Nuclear power plants will produce more than 20 percent of the
electricity generated in the province.
Qian said his company is considering building another nuclear
power plant. Construction could begin in 2010.
Initial plans for the Yaogu Nuclear Power Plant in Taishan,
another coastal city in western Guangdong, call for three units,
each with an installed capacity of 1 million kilowatts.
Qian, however, refused to provide further details about the
proposed plant.
Yangjiang's plant is very important to Guangdong's economic
growth, especially to the economic development of the Pearl River
Delta's western region, Qian said.
The plant will also reinforce Guangdong's status as China's
largest nuclear power production base.
China has another major nuclear power production base in
Qinshan, a city in east China's Zhejiang
Province.
Qinshan Nuclear Power Plant, China's first nuclear power plant,
began operations in 1991.
China by 2020 will have nuclear power capacity in excess of 36
million kilowatts.
Elsewhere, Sanmen, in Zhejiang Province, and Lianyungang, in Jiangsu
Province, plan to begin constructing nuclear power plants
within two years.
Guangdong at present has two nuclear plants in operation - Daya
Bay and Ling'ao. The plants combined have four units. Each has a
production capacity of 1 million kilowatts.
The two plants, situated in the eastern region of the Pearl
River Delta, began operations in 1994 and 1995, respectively.
Most of the equipment and technologies at the Daya Bay and
Ling'ao plants, including the reactors, were imported from France,
which is one of the world's leading nuclear power producers.
The US$4 billion Daya Bay plant is one of the largest
Sino-foreign joint ventures in the Chinese mainland.
Guangdong Province holds 75 percent of the Daya Bay plant while
its partner, Hong Kong Nuclear Power Investment Corp Ltd, holds the
remaining 25 percent.
(China Daily April 4, 2004)