US Assessing Complaint of Leak in Chinese Nuclear Power Plant

BEIJING:
The US government is assessing a report of a leak at a Chinese nuclear power plant, after a French company that partly owns and helps to operate it warned of an “imminent radiological threat,” a media report said on Monday.

The warning included an accusation that the Chinese safety authority was raising the acceptable limits for radiation detection outside the Taishan Nuclear Power Plant in Guangdong province in order to avoid having to shut it down, the CNN quoted a letter from the French company to the US Department of Energy.

There is no reaction yet in Beijing by the Chinese government or officials on this report, it said.

The media report said despite the alarming notification from Framatome, the French company, the Biden administration believes the facility is not yet at a “crisis level.”

While US officials have deemed the situation does not currently pose a severe safety threat to workers at the plant or Chinese public, it is unusual that a foreign company would unilaterally reach out to the American government for help when its Chinese state-owned partner is yet to acknowledge a problem exists.

The scenario could put the US in a complicated situation should the leak continue or become more severe without being fixed, the report said.

However, concern was significant enough that the US National Security Council held multiple meetings to discuss the situation, it said.

The Biden administration has discussed the situation with the French government and their own experts at the Department of Energy, the report said, adding that the US has also been in contact with the Chinese government.

China’s nuclear power generation was in news last month as the Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin attended via virtual ground-breaking ceremony of the biggest nuclear energy project to build four nuclear power plants in China by Russia costing about USD 3 billion.

The ceremony was held to mark the first day of construction of power units No. 7 and 8 of the Tianwan Nuclear Power Plant, and No. 3 and 4 of the Xudapu Nuclear Power Plant.

The Tianwan Nuclear Power Plant is located in the city of Lianyungang in Jiangsu province. The Xudapu Nuclear Power plant is located in Xingcheng in Liaoning province.

As of June 2019, China had 47 nuclear power units in operation with a capacity of about 48.73GW and 11 nuclear power units under construction, with a capacity of 10.8GW.