Nuclear security

China’s Got Nuclear Power Plans for its Fake Islands

China’s quest to fence off a big chunk of the South China Sea may have just gotten another, powerful boost: plans for a fleet of floating nuclear power plants that could provide huge amounts of electricity for the far-flung atolls and islets.

While floating nuclear power plants are hardly a novel idea, their use in the South China Sea — a typhoon-wracked hotbed of territorial disputes and increasing military rivalries — would be worrisome both for environmental and security reasons.

Chinese state media said Friday that Beijing plans to build as many as 20 floating nuclear power plants to supply power to remote locations. That could include offshore oil drilling rigs and the sparsely inhabited islands that China has spent the past two years building up and steadily turning into military outposts.

Floating nuclear plants have been around for decades. Most recently, Russia’s Rosatom started building floating nuclear plants for use in remote locations, such as the Arctic. Those plants are powered by the same, tiny nuclear reactors used in Russia’s biggest icebreakers. Indeed, China’s floating plants will be built by China Shipbuilding Industry Corp., the country’s biggest constructor of naval vessels, including nuclear submarines. CSIC is close to finishing Beijing’s first floating reactor.