China Is Home to First Small Modular Nuclear Reactor

China has announced initial operation of the world's first small modular reactor, a HTR-PM [1] gas cooled reactor at Shidao Bay [2] [3].

This is the original announcement in Chinese:

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/SRFkRR7iKyPseU68SLmDOQ

The key part of the announcement, translated:

On December 20, the No. 1 reactor of the demonstration project of the National Science and Technology Major Project Shidao Bay High-temperature Gas-cooled Reactor Nuclear Power Plant completed the initial load operation test evaluation of the generator and was successfully connected to the grid for the first time. This marks the world's first spherical-bed modular high-temperature gas-cooled reactor with the characteristics of the fourth generation of advanced nuclear energy systems.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTR-PM

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shidao_Bay_Nuclear_Power_Plant

[3] https://pris.iaea.org/PRIS/CountryStatistics/ReactorDetails....

Man, if it wasn't obvious before that the Chinese society is ascendant, stories like this one and the breakthrough in fusion (discussed today on the front page) really show it. It's a shame that we don't push the edge like we used to in North America, for whatever numerous reasons there are.