China is actively employing its nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. The nuclear technology, which used to be thought of as very mystic in the past, is insensibly infiltrating into every field of the national economy and life of the people.
Since the Qinshan Nuclear Power Station, the first of its kind designed and constructed by China herself, began to generate electricity in 1991, China has up till now seen two more nuclear power stations well and safely in operation for several years on end. And still another four projects of such stations as started during the "Ninth Five Year Plan" (1996-2000) period were already under construction and will be put into operation one after another from 2002 to 2005. The Chashma Nuclear Power Station in Pakistan, the largest nuclear project exported from China since the reform and opening up, went through the provisional test on September 26, 2000 and has now been brought to its full power operation.
On entering the 1990s, with the application of isotope and radiation technology for commercial purposes, great achievements have been made in agriculture, industry, medicine and other fields. A batch of new varieties of agricultural produce, diagnostic and treatment instruments have come into being one in succession of the other and are now being applied in the daily life of the people. The direct benefit from suchlike industry has realized an annual efficiency of eight billion yuan.
In recent years, Tsinghua University together with some other units has successfully developed the large container detecting system by using the nuclear technology. The system is now being installed for customs. This high-tech product developed on the basis of nuclear technology has not only opened up an industry of a sizable and perspective market but also laid a cornerstone for China to build an anti-smuggling barrier.
Not long ago, the Chinese scientists also brought up a new idea for the desalination of seawater by using nuclear energy. Based on the idea, the cost for seawater desalination will be greatly reduced. This is another new path for peaceful use of nuclear energy.
(People's Daily 11/09/2000)
