China's Next Big Export Will Be Nuclear Reactors

How do you get power to the largest population on Earth? Well, first you burn a lung-scorching amount of coal. But the sooty stuff's death grip on China is showing signs of at least loosening a bit: Beijing has announced it will tax carbon across the country, which will hopefully be a step towards cleaning that city's notoriously-hazardous air. To replace it, China is diving deeper into the nuclear power game. What's more, China is now reportedly near signing deals to export its self-developed reactor.

Unlike the US, where nuclear reactors are way past their expiration dates and where development and construction of new-generation plant designs has pretty much stalled, China's making a big push into nuclear. While China currently only has 16 reactors up and running, another 29 are under construction, and 51 more are in planning stages.

China's most recent home-built reactor design is called the CAP1400, which features passive cooling and produces 1400 megawatts. (For comparison, Indian Point in New York has two Westinghouse reactors that produce about 1,025 megawatts each.) A test and demonstration was opened last year, and the first full-use CAP1400 reactor is scheduled to come online in early 2014.

Assuming construction of a full-capability CAP1400 begins this year, China will ink deals with undisclosed nations to export reactors at some point in the future, according to a report in China Daily. Sun Qin, the chairman of China National Nuclear Corporation, said the only other hurdle is approval from China's State Council, as the country's security inspector has already signed off on the design.

While Sun did not disclose who was thinking about picking up Chinese reactors, he did tell China Daily that CNNC's unconditional credit conditions makes the nuclear option attractive to developing nations, who need efficient sources of energy but don't have nuclear technology–or, in many cases, a whole lot of fossil fuels.

The CNNC isn't stopping there. The next generation of reactor designs, known as Gen IV or 4G, is hoped to be online sometime shortly after 2030, a goal generally aimed for by the international nuclear community. In his interview, Sun said that he thought the CNNC, with the help of Bill Gates, would have commercial 4G reactors ready by at least 2030, which may be exaggerated considering it's in his interest to make his agency look on top of its game, but is still indicative of China's push to become a nuclear power leader.

To sum things up, let's compare China and the US. Here in the States, we led the world in nuclear power until politics and monopolies allowed us to squander that lead, we remain heavily reliant on fossil fuels, and fracking and "clean coal" are considered environmental breakthroughs.

Now, there's no denying that the environment is worse off in China, where environmental regulation is practically unheard of, and enforced even less. But look at the future: China has figured out how to make a ton of money off of solar power, and now it's likely to make another bundle off of the developing world with its shiny new reactor development. The US is keeping up with solar, and is doing well with renewables in general, but when it comes to carbon-free nuclear, China is positioning itself to be a world leader, and to get paid while doing it.