Chinese labor is cheaper. If I know that Chinese solar farms or hydroelectric dams cost only $M per megawatt, I can't assume that the West should also be able to build those for about $M per megawatt.
It is difficult to search primary sources if you aren't fluent in Chinese. I personally can only search English-language information about China, the availability of which is influenced by the interests of the bilingual people who understand and translate primary sources.
China doesn't have anything like the press freedom or government transparency of the US. In the US we know when a nuclear project goes over budget because the press and government watchdogs both sound the alarm [1]. In China that may not be possible.
We do have some proxy measures relevant to the Chinese nuclear industry. The number of operating reactors is known and the time between construction start and initial operation is known. We also know the electrical output of each reactor. But turning those numbers into cost numbers requires a lot of guessing or assuming about unknown quantities.
You can also compare Japan or France both of which built out a lot of nuclear power. When you say "Chinese labor is cheaper" it sounds like an assumption based on comparing wages in the US with wages in China which is not how you would figure the cost for a Chinese business to build a reactor in China and sell the power to Chinese citizens and Chinese industry because all of those entities are within the same economy.
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It's difficult to use China for a comparison.
Chinese labor is cheaper. If I know that Chinese solar farms or hydroelectric dams cost only $M per megawatt, I can't assume that the West should also be able to build those for about $M per megawatt.
It is difficult to search primary sources if you aren't fluent in Chinese. I personally can only search English-language information about China, the availability of which is influenced by the interests of the bilingual people who understand and translate primary sources.
China doesn't have anything like the press freedom or government transparency of the US. In the US we know when a nuclear project goes over budget because the press and government watchdogs both sound the alarm [1]. In China that may not be possible.
We do have some proxy measures relevant to the Chinese nuclear industry. The number of operating reactors is known and the time between construction start and initial operation is known. We also know the electrical output of each reactor. But turning those numbers into cost numbers requires a lot of guessing or assuming about unknown quantities.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nukegate_scandal
You can also compare Japan or France both of which built out a lot of nuclear power. When you say "Chinese labor is cheaper" it sounds like an assumption based on comparing wages in the US with wages in China which is not how you would figure the cost for a Chinese business to build a reactor in China and sell the power to Chinese citizens and Chinese industry because all of those entities are within the same economy.