The first high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) in China completed two years of trials and began exporting electricity to the grid last month. The 10MWe plant, developed at a cost of around $30 million, is 40km from Beijing.

The development programme was headed by professor Wu Zongxin of the Institute of Nuclear Energy Technology at Tshinghua University. He said that all the key components of the reactor were designed and developed by Chinese scientists.