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China Civilian Nuclear Industry, Technology, Exports and Supply Chain: News & Discussions

【海南昌江小堆示范项目正式开工建设】中国核电(601985)公告称,控股投资的中核海南核电有限公司旗下的海南昌江多用途模块式小型堆科技示范工程项目于2021年7月13日浇筑核岛第一罐混凝土(FCD),标志着机组正式开工建设。网页链接
Polaris Power Network
7-12 16:18 from Weibo

[Hainan Changjiang Small Reactor Demonstration Project officially started construction]

China Nuclear Power (601985) announced that the Hainan Changjiang Multi-Purpose Small Modular Reactor Technology Demonstration Project under the controlling interest of China Nuclear Power Hainan Nuclear Power Co., Ltd. will pour the first tank of nuclear island concrete (FCD) on July 13, 2021, officially marking the unit construction start.

来自 魅力核电超话​
10月24日,全球首个陆上商用模块化小堆玲龙一号钢制安全壳底封头提前吊装完成。这是中核海南昌江多用途模块式小型堆科技示范工程建设的重要里程碑,为后续反应堆厂房主体结构施工奠定坚实基础​

China Nuclear Power
10-24 16:18

On October 24, the world's first land-based commercial small modular reactor - Linglong-1 steel containment vessel bottom bulkhead was hoisted ahead of schedule. This is an important milestone in the construction of CNNC’s Hainan Changjiang multi-purpose small modular reactor technology demonstration project, laying a solid foundation for the subsequent construction of the main structure of the reactor plant

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来自 微博 weibo.com​
【全网#最硬核的国货购物车# 又添新品!国家科技重大专项高温气冷堆核电站示范工程双堆成功临界】11月11日凌晨1时20分,我国拥有自主知识产权的国家科技重大专项世界首座高温气冷堆核电站示范工程2号反应堆完成空气气氛下首次临界。 这是示范工程继今年完成双堆冷试、双堆热试、首次装料、1号反应堆于9月12日成功临界后取得的又一重大进展,标志着示范工程顺利完成双堆临界,向实现年内并网发电目标发起最后总攻!​

China National Nuclear Corporation
11-11 14:27 From Weibo

【High Temperature Gas-cooled Reactor Demonstration Project Double Reactor Successfully Critical】

At 1:20 am on November 11th, my country’s first major national science and technology project with independent intellectual property rights, the world’s first high-temperature gas-cooled reactor demonstration project No. 2 reactor reach first criticality under ambient air. This is another major progress made by the project after the completion of the dual-reactor cold test, the dual-reactor thermal test, and the first material loading this year, and the successful criticality of the No. 1 reactor on September 12, marking the successful completion of dual-reactor criticality. Launching the final push toward achieving the goal of grid-connected power generation within the year !

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An artist’s impression of the floating nuclear reactor, which is due to be completed next year. Image: CGN

China’s first floating nuclear reactor may withstand once-in-10,000-years weather event, engineers say
  • Testing at a simulation facility found it could endure hurricane force winds, but its mooring crane would need strengthening
  • The 60-megawatt station is being built to power oil rigs and islands off the east coast in the Bohai Sea
Stephen Chen
Stephen Chen
in Beijing
Published: 8:30am, 14 Dec, 2021

China’s first floating nuclear power station may be able to withstand an extreme, once-in-10,000-years weather event, according to testing by marine engineers.

But they said the ship-like facility’s mooring crane would need strengthening to avoid the entire plant breaking loose if it tried to ride out the storm at a dock.

The 60-megawatt floating reactor is being built to power oil rigs and islands off the east coast of China in the Bohai Sea, an inner sea where the waters are relatively calm.

At an extreme weather simulation facility in Hubei province, marine engineering scientist Kong Fanfu and a team with the Wuhan Second Ship Design and Research Institute put a scaled-down model of the nuclear plant through its paces.

They concluded that the power station should be able to continue producing electricity during winds of more than 37 metres per second – equivalent to hurricane force or the top level on the Beaufort scale.

A model of the floating reactor. It has many safety features but researchers warn that if it capsizes there could be dire consequences. Photo: CGN

A model of the floating reactor. It has many safety features but researchers warn that if it capsizes there could be dire consequences. Photo: CGN

The researchers ramped up the artificial wind speed by more than 50 per cent and added other storm conditions including extremely high waves and strong undercurrents, which rarely happen at the same time.

Throughout hours of testing, the model platform remained upright, according to the team’s paper, published in the Chinese peer-reviewed Journal of Ordnance Equipment Engineering last month. They said the platform’s central area – where the reactor is located – experienced a lot less motion than other parts of the ship.

While such extreme weather events have not been recorded in the Bohai Sea, the possibilities must be considered because “the ship body must not capsize under any circumstance”, Kong and the team wrote.

The floating reactor has many safety mechanisms – including a cooling process driven by seawater in the event of a power outage – but if it capsizes these features may not work and there could be dire consequences like a meltdown, the researchers said.

The 30,000-tonne floating reactor is due to be completed next year and will be the first of a fleet that China plans to build in a vast area extending from its energy-hungry east coast to the disputed South China Sea.

CGN, a Guangdong-based nuclear company, launched the floating reactor project, known as ACPR50S, in 2016 as a solution to the energy shortages that have affected the scale and reach of China’s maritime activities.

The floating plant’s mooring crane is designed to withstand 600 tonnes of stress. But an extreme weather event could put it under 2,000 tonnes of stress, according to the researchers in Wuhan. The solution could be to make the crane bigger and stronger, but they said more testing was needed.

Nuclear scientists and engineers in China have pointed to safety management as the main concern for the floating nuclear reactor programme, with malpractice or negligence caused by inadequate training the biggest risk factor.

Industry experts also cited technical challenges, public acceptance, extreme weather and security threats as concerns for the plan, according to a survey last year by the University of South China in Hengyang, Hunan province. Nevertheless, they said the project was feasible.

Another floating power plant – more than twice the size of the Bohai Sea plant – is being built for use at Yantai, Shandong province, by weapons contractor China National Nuclear Cooperation.

It will house two reactors and is set to be the world’s most powerful floating nuclear station with 250 megawatts of output. It is expected to be finished in 2023 and will provide clean energy to an industrial park where some of China’s biggest chemical plants are based. It will also be able to leave the port and operate in international waters in the Yellow Sea, according to the company.

The world’s first floating nuclear plant was a 10-megawatt reactor built by the US for its military base at the Panama Canal in the 1960s. At present, Russia is the only country with an operating sea-based nuclear power platform, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
 
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Oops!! A correction:
Corrected: This article was corrected on 17 December to reflect that the HTR-PM plant had not yet actually been grid connected.
 
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This time is for real. World's 1st industrial-scale demonstration plant with a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor with a pebble-bed module, at Shidaowan Nuclear Power Plant, was connected to the national grid network.
 
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Hefei now home to major science and technology facilities
By Zhang Rui
December 24, 2020

The city of Hefei in eastern China's Anhui province is now home to several national big science facilities, including a new grand research facility for fusion technology that is currently under construction.

A concept image of the buildings and park of the Comprehensive Research Facility for Fusion Technology (CRAFT) located in Hefei, Anhui province. [Photo courtesy of the HFIPS]

China has made significant progress in magnetic confinement fusion over the past decade. With the successful operation of its nuclear fusion machine, the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) since 2006 and headway in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project, the country is achieving significant gains toward advanced steady-state operations and next steps in nuclear energy production.

The China Fusion Engineering Testing Reactor (CFETR), complementing the ITER facility, initially aims to achieve fusion energy production of up to 200 MW and eventually reach DEMO relevant power level which is over 1 GW. DEMO, short for the DEMOnstration power plant, will be the ITER's successor and bring fusion energy research to the threshold of prototype fusion reactor capabilities; the first step before the human race can build a true commercial nuclear fusion power plant.

Subsequently, the engineering design of CFETR, including the magnet system, vacuum system, tritium breeding blanket, diverter, remote handling, and maintenance system has been carried out within the CFETR national design team. Significant progress has been made but tremendous challenges remain, as outlined by a guide and staff member of the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HFIPS) during a tour by China.org.cn of the research facility's construction site.

The Comprehensive Research Facility for Fusion Technology (CRAF) is one of the country's biggest science facilities and a large scale R&D project for CFETR. Its objectives are to explore and master fusion DEMO-level key technologies; establish standard methodologies for manufacturing key material, components, and systems for CFETR; build key prototype systems and RAMI (Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, and Inspectability) for CFETR; test and validate the methods, technology, and systems for successful construction of CFETR; and train the next generation of fusion scientists, engineers, and managers.

CRAFT, led by the HFIPS under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), consists of 20 different facilities that address most of the key technologies and systems of CFETR. The construction of CRAFT started on Sep. 20, 2019, and will last for approximately five years and eight months with joint funds from the central and local governments. In addition, the construction of CRAFT's ancillary park began in early December 2018 and will be completed in August 2021.

The project is one of the country's major mega-science facilities and was listed in the country's 13th Five-Year Plan for science and technology development.

"We told people that we are building a 'man-made sun,' but that is just a vivid metaphor for the general public to understand what we are doing — scientists don't call it that. What we are actually creating is something that can forever resolve human's energy problem," the guide explained. However, he added, the construction of CFETR is a huge project, and still far from completion. In order to realize it, they disassembled the 19 key system problems in CFETR to study them separately. This research facility is now what is known as CRAFT.

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This photo shows the construction site of the ancillary park of the Comprehensive Research Facility for Fusion Technology (CRAFT) in Hefei, Anhui province, Dec. 18, 2020. [Photo/China.org.cn]

Currently, there are more than 300 scientists and engineers working together on the CRAFT project. CRAFT will not only use the technologies from ITER but also those which will need to be developed in future and likely pose significant challenges and efforts. Once completed, it will become a comprehensive research platform in the field of fusion with DEMO-relevant technologies. It will also provide a useful facility for related fusion technology to be used industry-wide.

Together with CFETR engineering design and EAST experiments, CRAFT will provide a solid technical base for the successful construction of CFETR in the future. Upon completion of the facility, it will provide a technical foundation for the development and construction of the core components for fusion reactors. It will therefore be of great significance for ensuring the advancement, safety, and reliability of China's fusion reactors and will greatly accelerate the actual application of fusion energy in the country. It will also provide research platforms for cutting-edge, cross-disciplinary fields like energy, information, health, and the environment for China and the world.

The HFIPS, located on a peninsula near Shushan Lake in the western suburbs of Hefei, capital of Anhui province, was founded in 2001 and is a large-scale integrative research base within the CAS. It has 10 scientific research units, including the Anhui Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, the Institute of Plasma Physics, the Institute of Solid State Physics, and the Hefei Institute of Intelligent Machines. Research spans scientific fields such as energy, environment, biology, material, and information development, with a focus on research of and technology needed for magnetic confinement fusion, advanced nuclear energy and nuclear safety, atmospheric environmental monitoring and detecting technology, the science and technology of magnetic fields, the effects of extreme environments on advanced materials, robotic and intelligent devices, modern agricultural technology, medical physics, and high technology.

The HFIPS currently has over 2,700 employees, of which more than 2,000 are scientific researchers and technicians, including over 300 high-level talents. A further 2,000 are master's or doctoral students.

Hefei is now home to more than 20 well-equipped national, provincial, and CAS key laboratories or research centers as well as over 10 technical physics experimental platforms. These include other major science facilities, namely, the EAST tokamak device and auxiliary heating systems and the Steady High Magnet Field Facility. Through years of hard work, the HFIPS has become a China-based world leader in nuclear fusion research.

Hosting major science and technology facilities is part of the city's rise. In recent years, Hefei has excelled in scientific and technological innovation and talent attraction. In the latest Nature Index 2020 Science Cities ranking published in September, Hefei ranked 20th among global cities. Since 2017, Hefei has also ranked in the top six "Amazing China: Most Attractive Chinese Cities for Foreigners" — a survey conducted by the Information and Research Center of the Foreign Talents of the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs — for three consecutive years. The city is also home to numerous high-tech companies, including iFlytek and BOE Technology Group as well as China Speech Valley, the first national industrial park to focus on artificial intelligence and intelligent speech.
1月12日,在合肥庐阳区三十岗乡大科学装置建设工地,合肥聚变堆项目正在如火如荼建设中。该项目规划总用地面积约2140亩,共分为三期。目前,一期主体建筑已完工,二期桩基施工已近尾声。  (记者 温沁 摄)
On January 12, the Hefei Fusion Reactor Project was in full swing at the construction site of the large-scale scientific installation in Sanshigang Township, Luyang District, Hefei. The total planned land area of the project is about 2,140 mu, divided into three phases. At present, the main building of the first phase has been completed and the construction of the second phase pile foundation is nearing completion.    (photographed by reporter Wen Qin)
 
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