The photo is sourced from news.cgtn.com
By August 2024, China has ranked third in terms of the installed nuclear power capacity, only coming after the United States and France (54.2 GW vs. 61.4 GW and 97.0 GW, respectively, according to IAEA data). However, the role of nuclear power in the three countries differs significantly. In France, nuclear power plants were the key source of electricity supply in 2023, providing 65% of national generation. The French power system is highly dependent on the situation with repairs at NPPs: for example, in 2022, the country became a net importer of electricity for the first time in several decades due to the unscheduled repairs at power units.
In turn, in the US, NPPs are the largest source of low-carbon energy: the share of nuclear reactors in the power generation mix in 2023 was 18%, while the share of hydroelectric power plants was 6% and the total share of wind and solar generators was 16%. At the same time, however, the commissioning rate of new reactors has slowed significantly in recent decades. After 2000, only three reactors were commissioned in the US: the second unit of the 1.2 GW Watts Bar NPP in Tennessee, and the third and the fourth units of the Vogtle NPP with 2.2 GW total capacity in Georgia. New projects in the U.S. nuclear power industry are implemented mainly with a focus on new technologies: for example, the TerraPower Company plans to build a 345 MW reactor in the state of Wyoming, with liquid metal sodium to be used as a coolant instead of water. This solution will increase the reactor capacity to 500 MW during peak load hours.
The NPP share in the power generation mix in China in 2023 amounted to 5%. Most of the operating nuclear reactors are used in urbanized coastal areas in the south and in the east of the country. Among others, the ban on construction of NPPs in areas remote from the coast, which was established after the accident at the Japanese Fukushima-1 NPP, has an effect: the regulators found it expedient due to the need for having an access to water in case of possible emergencies at nuclear reactors. The reactors under construction are also located in the coastal regions of China: commissioning of 27 power units with a total capacity of 28.5 GW will allow China to reach the second worldwide place in the installed capacity of NPPs.
However, the spread of energy storage technologies would influence the implementation of the planned but not yet in the investment phase projects. According to the Energy Institute, the installed capacity of storage in China’s power sector tripled to 27.1 GW in 2023 (7.8 GW in 2022). Further deployment of storage units will hedge the risk of power supply during windless and cloudy hours, without the usage of any other low-carbon energy sources.
