China pushes’floating nuclear power plant’ in the West Sea… 14·5 plan included

China has confirmed its policy to push for the construction of a floating nuclear power plant.

In particular, it is known that China is pursuing a plan to launch and test a nuclear power plant in the west sea near Shandong Province, which is only about 400 km away from Korea in a straight line.

On the 10th, Yonhap News analyzed the draft of the 14th Five-Year Plan (14·5 Plan) and the Long-Term Target Enforcement of 2035 (hereinafter referred to as the draft) of 140 pages recently released by the State Council of China. It included the content of promoting offshore nuclear power plants.

The State Council said, “We will promote advanced nuclear reactor pilot projects such as offshore floating nuclear power platforms” in the section explaining the direction of nuclear power plant operation in 2021-2025 when the 14·5 plan is applied.

The term’offshore floating nuclear power platform’ refers to a nuclear power plant operated on the sea by being loaded onto a barge or ship.

It can be seen that the contents of this content in the Chinese State Council’s mid- and long-term economic blueprint, the 14·5 plan, confirmed and promulgated the policy of the Chinese government to take full-scale trials of offshore nuclear power plants.

The Chinese Nuclear Industry Group (CNNC), which started research on offshore nuclear power plants in 2010, has already completed its development and has been waiting for the final approval of the Chinese government for installation.

In an interview with Chinese media in March 2019, Luoqi, director of the China Nuclear Power Research and Design Institute under the China Nuclear Industry Group (CNNC), said in an interview with the Chinese media, construction can be started immediately. It has been mentioned that it is off the coast of Xindai) City.

Shandong Province is the closest place to Korea from China. The straight line distance from Yantai to Incheon is only 400km.

Although the exact scale of the offshore nuclear power plant promoted by China is not yet known, it is expected to be relatively small, about a tenth of that of ordinary nuclear power plants built on the ground.

Offshore nuclear power plants are being developed mainly to supply electricity to remote areas or offshore oil drilling facilities as they can be moved freely.

Russia is the first country in the world to develop and use an offshore nuclear power plant.

Since December 2019, Russia has been operating the world’s first offshore nuclear power plant,’Academic Lomonosov,’ in the Far East, supplying power to remote areas.

However, many environmental groups, including Greenpeace, oppose offshore floating nuclear power plants by calling them “floating Chernobyl” and “nuclear titanic”. In the international community, there are many people who see offshore nuclear power plants, which have been promoted by Russia and China, as concerns. .

In the meantime, China also suggested a direction to actively expand nuclear power plants in the future.

Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang (李克强) emphasized, “We will actively develop nuclear power plants on the premise of securing safety,” in a government work report held at the opening ceremony of the annual plenary of the National People’s Congress (Non-in University) on the 5th.

Chinese media predicted that it was the first time that the highest-level leader of their country used the modifier “active” while referring to the development of nuclear power plants.

In the’Draft’, the Chinese government will actively promote the construction of high-tech 3G nuclear power plants in the southeastern coastal region of the country, and set a specific goal of increasing the capacity of nuclear power plants from 51GW (gigawatts) at the end of 2020 to 70GW by 2025. Presented.

According to the World Atomic Energy Association, nuclear power plants account for 4.9% of the total electricity production in China, which is still relatively low as of 2019.

However, this share increased by 3 percentage points from 1.9% in 2009 to 4.9% in 2019.

Based on the number of nuclear power plants in operation as of January this year, China is ranked third (47,498 ㎿) after the United States (96,553 ㎿) and France (61,370 ㎿).

Even based on the number of reactors in operation, China, which has 49 units, ranks third after the United States (94 units) and France (56 units).

However, while China is currently building or planning to build 55 new reactors, the US and France are building or planning to build only 5 reactors, respectively, and China will become the world’s No. 1 country in terms of nuclear power plant operation within a few years. It is expected to be.

It is also a concern for us that China’s nuclear power plant installation area is expanding to places close to the Korean Peninsula.

In the past, China intensively built nuclear power plants on the coast of southern Guangdong Province. Since then, the nuclear power plant complex in China is heading north to Shandong Province, which is the closest to Korea through Fujian and Zhejiang Province.

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