Pakistan has called for a review of its nuclear power plants in Karachi and Chashma, in the wake of Japan's nuclear crisis.
The Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority said this week it would continue to study the situation at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant and was following the response to the disaster, reports Dawn, the country's English-language newspaper.
The review, PNRA said, was to include site studies, safety systems, operators' training, emergency power systems and off-site emergency preparedness plans.
Last month, several days after Japan's earthquake and tsunami and the unfolding nuclear disaster, Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission released a statement saying the country's nuclear power plants were safe against the effects of natural disasters. Their safety, it said, had been assessed by experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency and the World Association of Nuclear Operators "over the years."
Pakistan generates nearly 3 percent of its electricity from nuclear power. Aside from the two plants, a third, to be supplied by China, is under construction.
The government aims for 0.9 gigawatts of new nuclear capacity by 2015 and an additional 7.5 gigawatts by 2030.
China's state-run China National Nuclear Corp. has assisted Pakistan in building the facility at Chashma in Punjab province and is completing a second reactor there and has contracts to build two more 300-megawatt reactors, The Wall Street Journal reports.
While China last month said it would suspend approvals for new nuclear power plants domestically to review safety standards, it said it would continue with nuclear energy cooperation with Pakistan, Voice of America reports.
But there are concerns that the nuclear technology China is exporting to Pakistan is outdated.
Mark Hibbs, an atomic energy expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said that so far, "most of the reactors that the Chinese themselves have built on the basis of their own know-how reflect a technology which was available in the West and in advanced nuclear countries outside of China about 30 years ago," the broadcaster reports.
"This is the technology which China has been exporting to Pakistan. I don't believe right now that there is a major world market outside of Pakistan which is very interested in this technology," Hibbs said.
When asked about the possibility of outdated technology, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said the nuclear cooperation between the two countries has been under the supervision of the IAEA.
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