What would you say if I told you that America's nuclear power plant regulators had hired the biggest defense contractor in China to design the safety protocols for American nuke plants?
Actually, it probably doesn't matter what you would say. This is a scenario that will happen exactly ... never. But the reverse isn't true. On Thursday, America's biggest pure-play defense contracting firm -- Lockheed Martin (LMT 0.20%) -- announced that it has won a contract to prototype, manufacture, and qualify the protection systems for China's Generation III nuclear power plant reactors.
Specifically, China's State Nuclear Power Automation System Engineering Company (SNPAS) has hired Lockheed to develop a nuclear safety instrumentation and control platform based on field programmable gate array, or FPGA, technology.
According to Lockheed, the FGPA-based platform "will specifically address safety and regulatory concerns related to software common-cause failures in digital nuclear safety systems. These systems will autonomously and reliably monitor and detect potential failures in the system, ensuring the safe operation and function of the facility. The platform may be applied both in new plant deployment and in safety system upgrades for existing power plants."
Financial terms were not disclosed.
