Nuclear Reactors 258 - Citizens of Samcheok China Are Demanding The Cancellation of Plans For the Construction of Two New Power Reactors
My last post was about the Chinese attempts to become involved in reactor financing and construction projects in the U.K. at the Hinkley Point nuclear power plant. The Chinese have embarked on a very ambitious domestic nuclear reactor construction program as well as efforts to sell their reactors to other nations. The Chinese public is not as excited about nuclear power as the central government and the Chinese nuclear companies.
The Chinese government recently released a draft of its Seventh Power Supply Plan which mandates that two new reactors be built at Samcheok in Gangwon Province by 2029. A few days ago, the Gangwon Province branch of the New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD) held a press conference in Samcheok to call for the national government to cancel the plan to build new nuclear reactors in Samcheok and to revoke its designation of the planned sites for the new reactors.
A speaker at the press conference said “In a popular referendum about building nuclear reactors that was carried out in October of last year, 85% of the citizens of Samcheok voted against the plan. A majority of Samcheok citizens are united in their position that building nuclear reactors poses an unacceptable threat to their lives and safety.” Shim Gi-jun, the director of the Gangwon Provice branch of the NPAD, said "The government means to push ahead with the construction of the nuclear reactors because of its stubborn insistence that nuclear power is the business of the state and is not subject to a popular referendum, but in the end no government can defeat its own people. We will join with the people of Samcheok to block the nuclear reactors."
Officials of the Samcheok city government met with the Second Vice Ministrer of Tradel, Industry and Energy to ask that the plan for the two new Samcheok reactors be removed from the Seventh Power Supply Plan before it is finalized at the end of June. The Committee Fighting against the Samcheok Nuclear Reactor also issued a statements demanding that that project be removed from the Seventh Power Supply Plan immediately.
There have be a number of public protests against government nuclear expansion plans in China. While the national government ostensibly has the power to order construction of nuclear facilities anywhere it wants, the truth is that the people of China can force the national government to abandon plans for specific facilities if there is sufficient public outcry.
Over a thousand people took to the streets of Jiangmen in a city in Guangdong Province in 2013 to demand the cancellation of plans to build a uranium processing facility in the city. The city government ultimately bowed to the will of the citizens and announced that the plan to build the facility would be cancelled.
It will be interesting to see if the public pushback against the two reactors planned for Samcheok forces the national government to cancel the project.
Samcheok;
