Fukushima Boosts China's Domestic Nuclear Reactor Industry

Because of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, China may free itself more quickly from reliance on imported nuclear-power technology, according to a Harvard scholar of global nuclear expansion.

The ill-fated Fukushima reactors were designed by General Electric, and China has announced plans to build more advanced reactors with Westinghouse—a subsidiary of Toshiba, Corp.—but the fleet of reactors in China’s ambitious nuclear future will likely be labeled “made in China.”


Since Fukushima, all three of China’s domestic reactor manufacturers have announced their own Gen III designs, according to Yun Zhou, a Chinese-educated scholar who observes the nuclear industry from Harvard University.

“It appears that the Fukushima disaster may lead China to adopt newer, third-generation (or Gen III) reactor designs created by Chinese firms,” Zhou writes in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, “allowing China to wean itself from purely foreign reactor technology much more quickly than was expected pre-Fukushima.”
Gen III reactors like the Westinghouse AP1000 incorporate safety features developed since the proliferation of Gen II reactors like those at Fukushima and like many in the U.S.

China still plans to increase its nuclear capacity from about 12 gigawatts before Fukushima to 70 gigawatts by 2020, Zhou says.

Although Chinese officials initially said they would not change the country’s nuclear plan in the wake of Fukushima, they halted reactor construction and adopted new safety standards.


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