China is on a quest to reshape the world’s nuclear industry and play a big role in new projects globally. A trip inside the country’s oldest large-scale nuclear power station near the southern metropolis of Shenzhen reveals the great heights of its ambition.
China General Nuclear Power Group, one of the country’s biggest and fastest-growing nuclear providers, this week welcomed a coterie of foreign business leaders, diplomats and reporters inside its heavily fortified nuclear power station at Daya Bay.
The visit–ostensibly aimed by CGN at marketing its latest “Hualong One” reactor design to the world–illustrated just how much China’s nuclear industry has matured since first powering up three decades ago.
In short, CGN employees say, foreign influence is waning and China’s nuclear industry is increasingly set on transforming itself from buyer of foreign know-how into a seller of its own technology onto global markets.
Guo Yong, a decade-plus employee of CGN, remembers fondly the old days when so many visiting French nuclear experts lived at Daya Bay that the nuclear site included a French international school for children of foreign engineers. Another CGN official says the area was once one of the most densely foreigner-populated regions in China outside Beijing’s embassy district.
Even today, many senior members of the company’s management — including its current chairman – speak French,owing to close ties between CGN and France’s Areva SA. Younger employees say they prefer learning in English instead.
The “expatriate village” hotel — complete with an indoor swimming pool and squash courts — seems empty these days. And rather than French engineers, foreigners spotted on the nuclear campus are far more likely to be members of African or Central Asian trade groups negotiating to install a Chinese-made reactor of their own.
In many ways, Daya Bay is an odd cross between a military base and a Club Med. Miles of barbed wire fencing line the roadways around the site — which, with six nuclear reactors, is a major power source for Hong Kong and China’s manufacturing hub of Guangdong. Camouflage-clad armed police man numerous checkpoints.
Yet, employees including Mr. Guo say life in the shadow of a nuclear reactor can be cushy. Meals are provided by CGN, for starters. And Daya Bay offers miles of sandy beaches, which employees say are great for a stroll. Just beyond the nuclear plant’s checkpoints, local villages tout themselves as seaside getaways for weekend visitors.
At times, CGN’s sales tactics were unusual. In discussing safety features of its new Hualong One reactor during a sales pitch Tuesday, a PowerPoint slide included a crude animation of a passenger jet nosediving into a nuclear power plant. The Hualong One can withstand terrorism, CGN said, although it wasn’t clear how rigorously the claim had been tested.
No doubt, there exists tremendous pride at Daya Bay, where workers seem to have bought into CGN’s company ethos of “Safety First, Quality First, Pursuit of Excellence.” The phrase is painted everywhere.
“Hu Jintao once rode on this elevator!” exclaimed a brimming tour guide on the way up to the control room of one of Daya Bay’s reactors. Mr. Hu, like other recent Chinese presidents, visited the facility in a nod to the leadership’s strong support of nuclear as a clean energy option for China.
In many ways the pride is understandable. When China built its first Daya Bay unit back in the 1990s, nearly all advanced components needed for the project had to be shipped in. New projects today target domestic procurement of 85% or slightly higher.The next step, executives say, is now selling that expertise to the wider world.http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2016/02/24/inside-chinas-nuclear-core/
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