Government: Nuclear reactors are safe

China’s government said that its current nuclear reactors are safe, following a round of inspections prompted by Japan’s nuclear scare, the Wall Street Journal reported. Li Ganjie, the country’s vice environment minister, said in a statement dated Tuesday that inspectors had found that all 13 currently operating plants are safe. Evaluations of 27 reactors still under construction will be due by the end of October. The nuclear crisis in Japan highlighted the importance of maintaining the safety and security of used fuel rods at nuclear reactors. While China’s nuclear program is still too small to have generated large amounts of nuclear waste, the volume is growing rapidly. Analysts say that other countries in the region, such as South Korea and Vietnam, will be looking at China to see how it plans to reprocess spent fuel on a commercial scale.