China-France to increase nuclear fuel recycling
Xinhua, September 23, 2015 Adjust font size:
The China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) said on Wednesday that it is choosing a site for a Sino-France nuclear power project featuring mass nuclear fuel recycling.
The construction by the CNNC and the France-based Areva is expected to start in 2020 and finish in 2030.
Nuclear recycling refers reprocessing materials which has already been used and recovering unused uranium and plutonium.
The project will reprocess 800 tonnes of materials from domestic nuclear power stations.
The project will also store the spent fuel, manage nuclear power station discharges and solidify liquid waste via vitrification to make safe, clean nuclear power.
It is estimated that spent fuel produced by China's pressurized water reactors will add up to 23,500 tonnes by 2030.
Yang Changli, vice general manager of the CNNC, said that the project will ease the pressure of storing spent fuel around 2030, improve safety of spent fuel administration and speed up reactor development. Endi