/ world today news/ Although Rosatom lost a potential order in the Czech Republic, it is starting a really big project in China – the construction of new reactors for two nuclear power plants at the same time. Russia has every chance to get even more orders for nuclear power plants in the region and take away the advantage of Western competitors who have established themselves too firmly in the Chinese market. What will help us win the Chinese market from the Americans and Europeans?
While the Czech Republic intends to ban Rosatom from participating in the tender for the construction of Dukovany NPP, Russia is starting to build new units at Tianwan NPP and Sudapu NPP in China. The ceremony will be held in the form of a video conference. It will be attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin together with President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China.
This is an important event for Russia, albeit an expected one. Russia and China agreed to build new reactors as early as the summer of 2018. Rosatom will design the Sudapu nuclear island in China and supply key equipment for four nuclear reactors – two for Sudapu and two for Tianwan.
When Rosatom began entering the Chinese market in the early 2000s, it clearly hoped to take a leading position. However, the situation began to develop in a different scenario. “The Chinese began to prefer Western technology. Because Western companies willingly agreed to transfer some of their technology. Including scientific know-how and localization of production in China,” says Sergey Kondratiev, senior expert at the Institute of Energy and Finance.
As a result, now in China nuclear power plants are most often built with reactors from the American “Westinghouse”, which is trying to replace Russian fuel in the Soviet reactors in Ukraine, as well as the European “Orana” (until 2018 – “Areva” ). In contrast, Rosatom is more conservative and is in no hurry to share its technologies with the PRC. This explains Russia’s more modest involvement in China’s nuclear energy development.
Translation: VS
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