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China’s Yangjiang-1 Begins Commercial Operation

By Lubomir Mitev
27 March 2014

China’s Yangjiang-1 Begins Commercial Operation
Yangjiang nuclear power station (Source: IAEA)

27 Mar (NucNet): Unit 1 of the Yangjiang nuclear power station in the province of Guangdong in southern China has entered commercial operation, the China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group (CGN) said.

CGN said the unit completed 168 hours of test operation on 25 March and officially entered commercial operation on 26 March.

The overall safety record of the Yangjiang nuclear power station project is good, with no major incidents, CGN also said.

CGN said it is preparing for hot tests at Yangjiang-2. Yangjiang-3 has entered the equipment installation and commissioning phase, and Units 4, 5 and 6 are in the civil engineering and construction phase.

Construction of Unit 2 began in June 2009 and commercial operation is expected to start later this year. Construction of Units 3 and 4 began in 2010 and 2012 with commercial operation scheduled for 2015 and 2017 respectively.

Yanjiang-1 is a CPR-1000 Chinese-designed pressurised water reactor (PWR). Construction started in December 2008 and the unit entered first criticality in December 2013.

The Yangjiang nuclear power station will have six commercial nuclear units. Units 1 through 4 are of the CPR-1000 design and Units 5 and 6 are of the ACPR-1000 advanced Chinese design.

Safety features of the ACPR include an extra emergency heat removal system through containment spraying and in-vessel retention of a damaged core in a severe accident by external reactor vessel cooling.

Construction works on Units 5 and 6 began in 2013 and they are expected to come into operation in 2018.

Total investment in the Yangjiang nuclear power project is estimated at 73.2 billion yuan (about 11.9 billion US dollars, 8.56 billion euros).

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, after the launch of Yanjiang-1 there will be 21 commercial nuclear reactors in operation in China and 28 under construction.

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