China plans to build university for nuclear power research
What's the story
China is planning to build a university dedicated to nuclear power research to meet the severe shortage of qualified people at its rapidly expanding atomic energy facilities at home and abroad.
China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC), the country's leading nuclear power developer and operator, signed a contract with the Tianjin municipality government to invest in a nuclear technology university.
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Details
University to be built as national-level institution
The university would be built as a national-level institution and would function as a base for skill-training, master's, Ph.D. programs, and core technology research and development.
"China has comparatively an integral nuclear industrial system. However, few nuclear-related fields differ widely from each other, and the existing nuclear-related majors...cannot satisfy the demand for talent," Wan Gang, Director of the China Institute of Atomic Energy said.
Expanding abroad
China has helped Pakistan in building several nuclear plants
Wan said only around 20% of 2,300 graduates who were hired by CNNC majored in nuclear-related courses. Universities could only satisfy less than half of the company's demand for talent for the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20).
China is also building nuclear-power plants abroad. It has helped Pakistan in establishing several nuclear-power plants and currently building two 1,100-MW reactors in Karachi with $6.5bn assistance.
Expansion in home
Currently, China is operating 31 nuclear power-plants; 23 under construction
At home, China is operating 31 nuclear power units as of June 2016 while 23 more are under construction. The China Electricity Council had said that year that the country would have the second-most nuclear power plants in the world.
Many Chinese universities are currently offering nuclear technology-related programs, including Tsinghua University, Peking University, and Xi'an Jiaotong University.