A nuclear plant is seen in Yantai, Shandong province, Feb 2, 2023. [Photo/VCG]

Construction of a nuclear heat transmission pipe network started on Wednesday to further facilitate expansion of nuclear power-based heating projects to more areas nationwide, said its operator State Power Investment Corp.

As the support facility of the third phase of the 900-megawatt nuclear power-based district heating project in Shandong province, the pipeline will connect Shandong province's Yantai with Weihai with a 23-kilometer main transport pipe, it said.

Total investment in the project has reached up to 700 million yuan ($102 million). The project also includes a heat source distribution center that will apply intelligent scheduling management and a control platform for parameter monitoring, the company added.

An analyst said the application of nuclear power-based district heating will help reduce heating costs for consumers while improving the efficiency of the nuclear power plant.

Despite nuclear heating still being in the infancy stage of development, the project will provide valuable experience to further promote such heating modalities nationwide, said Lin Boqiang, head of the China Institute for Studies in Energy Policy at Xiamen University.

The efforts in nuclear heating illustrate China's ambitions at decarbonizing its energy-intensive heating sector, he said.

The Haiyang nuclear power plant in Shandong has a heating system connected to two traditional nuclear units, making it the first commercial attempt in China to supply heat from traditional nuclear power.

The system extracts nonradioactive steam from the secondary circuit of Haiyang unit 2, which is then fed through a multistage heat exchanger in an on-site heat exchange station.

State Power Investment Corp has been stepping up efforts to expand its nuclear power-based heating projects to more areas across the country in recent years.

The company started its first-phase of nuclear heating in 2019 in Shandong, which has provided 700,000 square meters of carbon-free heating, followed by the second phase that covered 5 million sq m in 2021.

The third phase of nuclear heating, the country's largest single-unit steam extraction heating project, is currently under construction and is expected to start providing clean heating during this year's heating season. It will cover 30 million sq m and is expected to meet heating demand of 1 million residents and carbon reduction is expected to increase several times over, SPIC said.

The company plans to expand the heating area to the entire Jiaodong peninsula, as nuclear-based heating alternatives are likely to be more widely embraced, thanks to the steadily accelerating development of nuclear power plants.