Third Qinshan Nuclear Power Plant (TQNPC) has been conducting research on cobalt for medical use. The company has been the first to use cobalt regulating control rods used for medical treatment.
SNERDI, CNNO, CNNC China Isotope &Radiation Corporation, and CNNC Chengdu Gaotong Isotope Co., Ltd etc. witnessed recently the rod assembly.
The cobalt control rods are temporarily stored in the composing room and are scheduled for irradiation in the reactor core after the outage of the reactors in April.
Heavy water reactors rely on the regulating rods to produce the Cobalt-60. And the radioactive source of the Cobalt-60 has two applications—one for industry and the other one for medical treatment. China started first the research and development of the industrial Cobalt-60 at the beginning of the 2000 and put it into production by the end of 2008.
By the end of 2016, the output of the industrial cobalt-60 has reached around 50 million Curie.
However, in order to meet the increasing demand of the medical market, Qinshan changed part of the industrial cobalt rods into those that adapt to the medical market, which increase the producing capability of the medical cobalt-60 from the heavy reactors.
