Back on the front burner

EARLIER this month work began at a big construction site in Shandong province, south-east of Beijing. In a country overflowing with infrastructure projects, that seems unremarkable. Except the workers are restarting construction of a nuclear plant using a radical new design developed by Beijing’s Tsinghua University. This showcase of “indigenous innovation” is the clearest signal yet that China’s nuclear power is about to take off again.

Before 2011 China’s leaders were dead keen on it, hoping to raise nuclear’s share of the country’s electricity mix from less than 2%. They saw it as central to energy and climate strategy, and a future export platform. Official plans called for expanding from just 10 gigawatts of capacity in 2010 to as much as 200 gigawatts by 2030.