A Chinese state reactor developer will make it onto Singapore's first formal shortlist of nuclear vendors.

Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry signed a nuclear cooperation pact with China's Atomic Energy Authority, with assumptions that Western security concerns will ultimately prevail over this symbolic hedge. But Singapore, which sources LNG and grid technology from China, has never treated energy procurement as a bloc choice, and with Chinese small modular reactors cheaper and commercially further advanced than most Western rivals, exclusion looks less likely once supplier selection begins.