With the global spotlight firmly back on the safety of nuclear power, following Japan's Tsunami and the problems at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, China is looking at spearheading efforts to make the industry safer, much safer.
The Chinese are investing millions in research into reactors powered by the element, Thorium - a metal, proponents say, as common as lead, and one, which, despite some concerns, would lead to power plants with fewer safety issues as well as other benefits...
SOUNDBITE: Wang Kan, Tsinghua University Thorium Research Team, (speaking Chinese):
"Thorium-based reactors certainly have advantages. The energy release from Thorium is greater than from Uranium, the by-products from using Thorium are less toxic than from Uranium, and it's much harder to make weapons from those by-products."
Public outcry, following the problems at the Fukushima plant, led to Beijing putting a freeze on approvals for all new nuclear power stations, and safety checks at all 25, currently under construction...
However, with Chinese electricity consumption growing at more than 5% a year, and its current reliance on fossil fuels to generate that, unsustainable, it's unlikely the crisis in Japan will dampen China's thirst for nuclear power...
SOUNDBITE : Dong Xiu Cheng, Professor, China University of Petroleum, (speaking Chinese):
"It's impossible for China to give up nuclear energy. China needs to make changes to its energy structure, which is closely linked to the need to reduce pollution, carbon emissions, and the overall direction of Chinese development. Other, new energies, have no advantage in either techniques or resources."
No-one in China is under any illusions that the country desperately needs to find alternative, clean ways, to generate electricity... The current reliance on coal, which provides some 80% of Chinese energy needs, costs the economy more than 200 billion dollars a year through air pollution alone...
And while Beijing is investing heavily in other, alternative, energy supplies, nuclear power is seen, as the best bet, by the Chinese government.
PTC:
"The problem facing authorities though is convincing a sometimes, jittery, population that nuclear power is a safe alternative... So, they are pouring millions of dollars in to Thorium research, like this, hoping to put those fears to rest... In so doing, they may also be showing the rest of the World, a new path, to clean energy."
FreeVideo.RT.com
