The Strategist

China Aims to Build a Hybrid Reactor Working on Nuclear Waste



07/17/2015 - 19:13



Chinese scientists have begun work on the creation of a hybrid thermonuclear reactor of fusion-fission method to burn nuclear waste.



pixabay.com
pixabay.com
The project is implemented within the walls of a secret research center of engineering and physical academy in Sichuan Province, specializing in the creation of nuclear weapons. It is expected that the hybrid reactor can also use the spent nuclear fuel of conventional nuclear power plants. The station the facility planned to build by 2030.
 
Several physicists look skeptical at this perspective, pointing out that until now it was not possible to establish an industrial fusion reactor, not to mention the hybrid. Although, it was the Chinese scientists that in 2007 carried out the first in the world break-even fusion on EAST tokamak.
 
The development of the reactor is carried out in a campaign to reduce environmental pollution. Currently China has 26 nuclear reactors, another 24 are under construction. The essential problem is the availability of enriched uranium needed to make nuclear fuel: mostly, Chinese deposits possess uranium ore of a poor quality, and the current fuel reserves will be scarcely enough for about 100 years, considering current pace of the nuclear power plants construction. Creation of hybrid reactor would allow China not to be depend on nuclear fuel import for thousands of years.

source: scmp.com