Antinuclear

“It’s just not safe,” said Liu Shimin, a farmer in her 20s, nursing a baby outside her home near the banks of the Yahe River. “We’ll always be wondering, ‘What if there’s a big accident, like that one in Japan?’ ”

Such fears are on the rise in China as the nation embarks on a new phase of nuclear power construction that could make it the world’s biggest producer of nuclear energy by 2030. To meet its goals, analysts say, China must add six to eight reactor units — a plant usually has several — every year over the coming decade, most likely including its first in inland provinces like Henan and neighboring Hubei.

China’s authoritarian government, adept at corralling public opinion to get its way, can ram through its plans over the objections of people like Ms. Liu. But opponents say its closed, secretive political system is ill equipped to manage a rapid expansion of nuclear power, pointing to its struggle to prevent industrial disasters such as the chemical explosions in Tianjin in August that killed 173 people.

“The Chinese are beginning to wrestle with the same issues that Western countries were dealing with, concerning fear of the technology, transparency in decision making and trust of the authorities,” said Mark Hibbs, an expert on nuclear issues at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who follows China……..

a corruption scandal in the nuclear sector in 2009 forced a pause, and after the Fukushima meltdown in 2011, Beijing suspended construction on all nuclear plants, introduced new safety rules and effectively froze plans for inland reactors until the end of 2015……..

Up to now, China has built its reactors close to the coast, where water needed for cooling systems is plentiful and there are big cities nearby hungry for power. But the next phase is almost certain to push inland, and that has become a chief focus for opponents of the nuclear program.

They argue that limited water supplies and poor radiation dispersal make the proposed inland sites more dangerous, and that the sites are more densely populated than places where reactors have been built away from the coast in countries like the United States. They worry especially about the risk of radiation leaking into China’s biggest river, the Yangtze.

“If there’s an accident, the environmental impact from an inland nuclear station will be far more serious than one on the coast,” said He Zuoxiu, aprominent retired physicist who is China’s most vocal opponent of nuclear energy. “Imagine if the Fukushima accident had happened on the course of the Yangtze River. Then how many people would have their food and water contaminated?”……..

Opponents of nuclear power in China maintain that the country can achieve its clean energy goals without a nuclear building spree, by investing heavily in improving solar and wind power and by upgrading the power grid so it can send electricity more efficiently across vast distances.

They point to the deadly explosions in Tianjin, where hazardous chemicals appear to have been stored improperly at a facility close to residential areas, as an example of how of lax regulation, graft and official obfuscation can undo the Chinese government’s promises to put safety first.

“Those searing lessons must never be played out in a nuclear reactor accident,” Wang Yinan, a researcher at a government think tank and influential critic of the nuclear plans, told the Chinese magazine Caixin last month. “For our political stability, economic development and social order, that would be a weight too heavy to bear.”…….

In July 2013, officials in southern China curtailed plans for a nuclear fuel fabrication plant after hundreds of residents protested in a nearby town. That episode “sent a shock wave” through China’s nuclear establishment, which had assumed its plans could be insulated from public opposition, said Rob Forrest, a physicist who studied China’s nuclear program while at Stanford University……..

villagers expressed a mix of resignation and worry. Residents in Nanyang, a city of 1.5 million about 20 miles to the south, have also voiced alarm on the Internet and called for the project to be scuttled.

“Here and around Nanyang, there’s opposition, but that’s futile,” said Li Chaoyong, 50, who builds and repairs homes around Hubin. “But if there are problems again like in Japan …” His voice trailed off, and he shook his head.http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/22/world/asia/chinas-nuclear-vision-collides-with-villagers-fears.html?_r=0