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| President of the Argentinian Nucleoeléctrica, Jose Luis Antunez and the General Manger of China National Nuclear Corporation, Quian Zhimin - signing the agreement on 17th November 2015 (Financial Times 2015). |
The partnership will enable the energy capacity to double – providing additional potential to the 3 nuclear reactors that are already functioning in Argentina. Anderlini (2015) sees the project in the UK as being the catalyst for further Chinese investment opportunities – success at the centre of developed Europe will promote more countries to follow in the footsteps to obtain the Chinese support. Many areas are removed from international credit markets, such as Buenos Aires, the centre of the nuclear developments – or struggle to obtain global investment due to corruption or war for example. China in particular seen to finance areas that have such limitations (Anderlini 2015), the inability for alternate funding in such areas means that there will be a greater interest in the Chinese investment. An issue may be that the dependency on exterior funds may reduce the autonomy of the national energy sector.
The Minister of Economy, Axel Kicillof, stated that the investment in nuclear plants “will secure our energy supply in the future” (WNN 2015). The relatively cheap Chinese technology and the exponential investment levels are driving a Chinese nuclear influence on a global scale.
Hi Laurence, I think that raising awareness of China's investment and focus on nuclear power is very important. I think that despite the potential for nuclear to double China's energy capacity which will allow them to reduce their dependence on non-renewables such as coal, there is a big debate surrounding the security and predictability of nuclear power - Japan as an example of the dangers associated with it. I think that nuclear power has great potential but I don't know whether the world would be so quick to follow China's lead in this instance. I think your post was really interesting :)
ReplyDeletethanks Caitlin! I agree - something has to be done to reduce emissions but whether nuclear will gain the universal support to drive the zero-carbon future is another question. I think especially at this current time where national security is among the priorities, many nations are going to be cautious about letting outside investors into the heart of their nuclear sector! However, I think the Chinese investment is positive, it will allow a global expansion that would have otherwise been limited.
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