South Africa: SA will continue to use nuclear energy

Pretoria - South Africa will continue to use nuclear energy for the improvement of lives, Energy Minister Dipuo Peters said on Thursday.

"President Jacob Zuma has said that we need to use and will continue using nuclear energy for feeding, healing, energy and water provision," said Peters, who was speaking at the official launch of the South African National Energy Development Institute (Sanedi).

Sanedi has been established through the merger of two entities, namely the South African National Energy Research Institute (Saneri) and National Energy Efficiency Agency (NEEA). Research done by Sanedi will inform government policy and its strategic energy plan to help address the country's rising energy demands by accelerating green energy products in the country.

Peters said South Africa was going "to have serious challenges" of water in the next 10 years.
She expressed excitement at the use of nuclear for saving lives.

"Two days ago, I signed a letter at Steve Biko Hospital [whereby] with nuclear medicine, they could intervene in healing liver tumours and treating prostate cancer with nuclear technology. This shows the capability of South Africa," she said.

South Africa has converted its nuclear reactors from high enriched uranium to low enriched uranium, which is the one used for health applications.

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Russian, South African nuclear companies strengthen cooperation

By: Keith Campbell

Rusatom Overseas, the international arm of Russia’s State-owned nuclear energy group Rosatom, signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the South African Nuclear Energy Corporation (Necsa) in Moscow on Monday. The MoU lays the foundation for the development of joint business projects in, for example, the production and marketing of radioisotopes, the manufacture of nuclear fuel and the fabrication of power equipment. It also opens the way for future cooperation in other, mutually agreed, areas.
“The South African nuclear industry has a great potential for growth, not only in the business of isotope production where South Africa is already playing a major role but also in areas such as fuel fabrication and nuclear manufacturing,” highlighted Necsa acting CEO Don Robertson.

“Local provision of both nuclear and conventional power plant equipment for the envisaged [South African] NPPs [nuclear power plants] will be a good undertaking for Necsa,” he added. “Partnerships such as the one reinforced by this memorandum will ensure that Necsa is in a good position to participate in the execution of many South African initiatives falling within the scope of this agreement.”

“Signing the MoU with Necsa allows us to make practical the implementation of initiatives on those prospective cooperation areas, which have been intensely studied by the specialists of our countries during last year,” pointed out Rusatom Overseas director-general Alexey Kalinin. “We see great potential in such cooperation and are looking forward to witnessing the first significant results.”

Cooperation within the framework of the MoU is intended by both sides to assist the execution of South Africa’s Integrated Resource Plan 2010, which includes the construction of NPPs with a total capacity of 9.6 GW by 2030. Additionally, Necsa and Rusatom Overseas also plan to develop cooperation, including Rusatom’s parent group, in NPP construction projects in third countries.

The MoU was signed by Kalinin and by Necsa NTP executive director Ms Mapula Letsoalo in front of South African Energy Minister Dipuo Peters and Rosatom director-general Sergey Kirienko. The signing was one of the events at the Atomexpo 2012 exposition.

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South Africa - Energy minister pushes nuclear

Johannesburg - Nuclear energy would help Africa realise its energy security goals, the energy minister said in Johannesburg on Thursday.

"We cannot, because we are black, end up having a dark continent," Dipuo Peters said at a business breakfast hosted by The New Age.

South Africa was rich in uranium reserves that could be used to create an abundance of energy.

"God gave us these resources and we must use them," she said.

Africa needed to take a proactive role and would not be bystanders in the energy revolution.



Waste management institute

Earlier in the week, Greenpeace activists protested against the expansion of the nuclear energy on the continent and claimed Peters had not adequately responded to their concerns. Peters said she believed further engagement was needed, but felt the environmental group was not prepared to compromise.

"[Greenpeace] don't want nuclear, you don't want hydro, coal. It's important they understand we are an energy intense economy."

Peters said President Jacob Zuma had given her the mandate to "demystify" nuclear power to overcome public concerns. Aspects of nuclear technology were already used in hospitals, desalination plants, and in agriculture.

The government was also in the final stages of establishing a nuclear waste management institute, which would keep the public informed of measures to deal with nuclear by-products.

Concerns about fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, to extract shale gas reserves needed to be overcome through research and technology.

"We cannot allow a blessing to lie fallow... If shale gas is one of the blessings, we are going to go for it," Peters said.

It was essential, however, that the process was not rushed. The technology involved in fracking was established in other countries, such as Australia and the US, and similar to that used in processing gold. Means of extracting the shale gas safely would benefit the people of the Karoo, she said.

Asked about the tender processes associated with the expansion of the nuclear industry, Peters appeared amused at South Africa's preoccupation with tenders.

South Africa: It’s a done deal on fracking - Nuclear Power Will Proceed

South Africa is well on its way to embracing a nuclear and shale gas energy future with little likelihood that even if a vast reservoir of gas is found in the Karoo that the government will scale back plans to build new nuclear power plants.

This emerged during a briefing by Energy Minister Dipuo Peters and her director-general Nelisiwe Magubane ahead of the Department of Energy’s budget vote last week.

Pressed on her favourable stance towards hydraulic fracturing – which a Royal Dutch Shell survey indicated could produce R80 billion for the gross domestic product of the country even if the resource was found to be limited – Peters was asked whether the government would consider scaling back a nuclear build programme if the shale gas resource was found on a large scale. “If the extraction for shale gas is agreed to by cabinet, we don’t see it replacing (the nuclear option),” she said.

Her response was emphatic that a nuclear component to the energy requirements remained a deep-seated commitment of the government.

She also emphasised that any nuclear build programme should be carried out “in collaboration” with other countries and that the process should not be so localised that South Africa ended up using “technologies not used elsewhere”. It was clearly a reference to the failed – and recently scrapped – pebble bed nuclear reactor project.

However, nuclear power was part of the plan for South Africa, particularly when one considered the growing power needs of the country.

On shale gas extraction, which is done by injecting water and chemicals deep in to the earth under great pressure, she said this procedure had benefited the US tremendously at a time when petro-chemical costs had risen sharply.

Noting that a decision on a technical report would be presented to the cabinet on fracking in July, she said: “Those skills (in the oil and gas sector) would be lost if we do not exploit that which we have.”

During the debate Anton Alberts, the Freedom Front MP, said: “Let me warn the minister: fracking will be the ANC’s third suicide scandal, the first being the arms deal and the second the Gauteng e-toll system.

“We will be watching who positions themselves to get what tenders.

“And we will, with the rest of the world, oppose this ill-founded idea to make money out of nature.”

ID energy spokesman Lance Greyling said the current 20-year energy plan required all South Africans to shoulder the risk of massive investments.

If nuclear energy came on stream for a price that was not globally competitive, these companies could decide to expand their operations elsewhere, leaving us with the problem of “extremely expensive stranded assets”.

Asked if the government had held talks with nuclear energy companies like France’s Areva and the US-based Westinghouse, Peters said this would not be appropriate before any bidding process for the build programme was started.

South Africa’s nuclear tender attracts some of world’s energy giants

The nuclear tender, due to be announced later this year, is expected to cost an estimated R300bn, and is certainly going to be hotly contested

SISEKO NJOBENI

Published: 2012/05/03 07:24:48 AM

SA’s planned nuclear tender has some of the world’s biggest energy companies sniffing around.



Since the government made it known that nuclear energy would be part of the future energy mix, nuclear developers have kept SA on their radar screens.



The nuclear tender, due to be announced later this year, is expected to cost an estimated R300bn, and is certainly going to be hotly contested. The big players in nuclear energy have already set up operations in SA in anticipation of the project. Just last week, the Russian State Atomic Energy Corporation hosted a seminar in Johannesburg to showcase Russian nuclear technology.



Names that spring to mind are French energy giant Areva and US nuclear technology group Westinghouse. The two firms were competing for Eskom’s multibillion-rand Nuclear 1 project but the utility aborted procurement for a 3330MW nuclear plant in December 2008 when its board could not make an investment due to financial pressures.



While Eskom’s decision could not have gone down well with the nuclear vendors, the government dangled an even bigger carrot. Then Department of Public Enterprises director-general Portia Molefe said at the time that, instead of building one power station, the government was looking for a partner to help develop the country’s nuclear industry. This is the approach adopted by South Korea in the 1970s.



One of the advantages of embarking on a nuclear programme is that there is a greater chance of creating a local industry by building a fleet of nuclear reactors rather than creating capacity on a piecemeal basis.



In a paper on the development of nuclear power in South Korea published in 1999, the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology said the country had been successful in localising nuclear technology. A major turning point was the 1976 machinery localisation policy, which was meant to increase the local content ratio of plants and equipment, and to reduce the portion of turnkey plants built by foreign companies, the paper said.



"The Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco) adopted a non-turnkey approach such that each nuclear project was divided into various sub-projects, and made it a requirement for foreign suppliers to include domestic firms as participants to work on such sub-projects," it said. Kepco, which is responsible for 93% of Korea’s electricity generation, has been mentioned as a potential bidder for SA’s programme.



Areva, which built the nuclear facility in Koeberg, has expressed a desire to be part of the nuclear programme. It is said to be intending to submit a bid with China’s Guangdong Nuclear Power Group. "It is premature to speculate on potential commercial agreements, partnerships, technology specifications or costs for the South African nuclear tender. Areva is eagerly waiting for the South African government’s requests for proposals … Areva is in preliminary discussions with a number of players and will propose the best solution for SA after it has studied the tender requirements," said a spokesman.



The potential bidders and the rest of the country await the details of the nuclear programme. The integrated resource plan for electricity makes provision for 9600MW of nuclear power by 2030. But Energy Minister Dipuo Peters said no decision had been taken on the number of plants.

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South Africa’s power crunch means opportunity for global nuclear industry

JOHANNESBURG — Power-starved South Africa plans to increase its nuclear reactor capacity and energy companies from around the world are lining up to be involved.
The project has an estimated cost of 300 billion rand (more than $40 million), C said, but it is still unclear what contracts will be offered or how much of the business will be set aside for local companies.

South Africa is the only country in Africa with a nuclear power plant, the two-reactor Koeberg facility near Cape Town that has been operating since 1984. It is committed to building at least six more reactors at three or four sites by 2030 as part of a plan to decrease its dependence on electricity plants that run on greenhouse gas-emitting coal.
South Africa now depends on the coal plants for at least 90 percent of its energy needs, and Eskom, the state electricity utility, also is a major supplier to South Africa’s neighbors.
An energy crisis in 2008 blamed on poor planning led to frequent and widespread blackouts that hit output in mining and other key industries. The government fears energy supplies will be tight for the next few years, hobbling its efforts to expand the economy and create jobs in a country where a quarter of the work force is unemployed.
South Africa wants to build local skills and local business as it expands its nuclear capacity, Peters said.
“It is not just about building power plants, but how we build them,” she said at a nuclear seminar organized by a labor group. “We are not about to turn South Africans into mixers of concrete.”
Peters presented the plans for the reactors, along with those for wind and solar plants, just days after a quake and tsunami hit Japan in March 2011, sending three reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant into meltdown there. Germany permanently shut down one of its aging reactors because of what happened at Fukushima. But Peters said she was confident the new nuclear technology South Africa planned to import was safe. No serious incidents have been reported at Koeberg during its 28 years in operation.
South Africa’s nuclear program, though, has had setbacks, including a failed effort with America’s Westinghouse to develop next-generation reactors. The multibillion rand (dollar) project missed several deadlines before it was abandoned, and prospects for customers were uncertain.
South Africa is not alone in forging ahead with nuclear projects following Fukushima. Turkey went ahead with plans to build its first nuclear power plant after Fukushima. And even as Japanese engineers were fighting to cool reactors, officials from Russia and Belarus were signing a deal for a $9.4 billion nuclear plant in Belarus.
South Africa is “one of several significant prospects on the radar,” said Ian Hore-Lacy, spokesman for the London-based World Nuclear Association, which represents the industry.
American and French companies involved in building Koeberg may have an advantage when it comes to involvement in South Africa’s nuclear buildup because of their long-standing relationships, Hore-Lacy said in a telephone interview. But he said Russian, Chinese and other companies can’t be discounted in the race for nuclear business here.
Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation, known as Rosatom, has been among the most active in seeking South African business. Rosatom held a seminar in Johannesburg in early April to introduce itself to the South African government and business officials, and sent a vice president back later in April for more talks.
Alexey Kalinin, head of Rosatom’s foreign operations, said his company would get as much as 60 percent of supplies for projects in South Africa from South African companies. He said that could mean more than $15 billion in earnings for South African companies, $3.4 billion in tax revenues for the South African government, and 15,000 new jobs. He also said Rosatom was ready to draw South African companies into its global supply chain.
Rosatom’s Kalinin said his company was looking ahead to helping Nigeria develop a nuclear industry, and already was involved in uranium exploration and mining in Tanzania and Namibia.
South Africa “can be indeed regarded as a possible gateway to other African countries and a driver of nuclear energy development in the region,” Kalinin said.
Such expansion is just what Yves Marignac, a Paris-based energy expert and anti-nuclear campaigner, fears. He would rather see developing countries taking the lead in exploiting safe, clean renewable energy sources like wind and solar. South African officials say renewables alone can’t deliver enough energy.
Marignac, speaking in a telephone interview, also said he is concerned the nuclear energy industry may be pushing new markets to sign contracts before all the questions raised by the Japanese crisis are answered, and those answers turned into safer — and likely more expensive — technology.
“South Africa is probably one of the next big chances for the nuclear companies trying to sell reactors in the world,” said Marignac, who sees a race between “the ability of the companies to acquire new contracts ... and the ability of the international community to develop new standards.”
Peters, South Africa’s energy minister, said she won’t be rushed, and that safety is a top priority.
She also said South Africa is interested not just in building new reactors, but in developing an entire cycle, from mining more of its uranium resources to nuclear waste management. That presents a range of opportunities for foreign companies, as well as the possibility of South Africa one day exporting its own nuclear know-how.
Peters has faced challenges from South Africa’s powerful labor movement, concerned she is not choosing the energy options that will create the most jobs, and from a nascent South African anti-nuclear movement.
“We as South Africa are convinced that we need an energy mix,” Peters said. “We cannot discard any technology.”

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South Africa’s power crunch means opportunity for global nuclear industry

Schalk van Zuydam-File/Associated Press - In this photo taken Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2012, South Africa’s Koeberg nuclear power station is seen on the outskirts of Cape Town, South Africa. The countyr’s power-starved plans to to increase it’s nuclear reactor capacity are drawing attention from energy companies around the world.

JOHANNESBURG — Power-starved South Africa plans to increase its nuclear reactor capacity and energy companies from around the world are lining up to be involved.

The project has an estimated cost of 300 billion rand (more than $40 million), South African Energy Minister Dipuo Peters said, but it is still unclear what contracts will be offered or how much of the business will be set aside for local companies.

South Africa is the only country in Africa with a nuclear power plant, the two-reactor Koeberg facility near Cape Town that has been operating since 1984. It is committed to building at least six more reactors at three or four sites by 2030 as part of a plan to decrease its dependence on electricity plants that run on greenhouse gas-emitting coal.

South Africa now depends on the coal plants for at least 90 percent of its energy needs, and Eskom, the state electricity utility, also is a major supplier to South Africa’s neighbors.

An energy crisis in 2008 blamed on poor planning led to frequent and widespread blackouts that hit output in mining and other key industries. The government fears energy supplies will be tight for the next few years, hobbling its efforts to expand the economy and create jobs in a country where a quarter of the work force is unemployed.

South Africa wants to build local skills and local business as it expands its nuclear capacity, Peters said.
“It is not just about building power plants, but how we build them,” she said at a nuclear seminar organized by a labor group. “We are not about to turn South Africans into mixers of concrete.”


Peters presented the plans for the reactors, along with those for wind and solar plants, just days after a quake and tsunami hit Japan in March 2011, sending three reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant into meltdown there. Germany permanently shut down one of its aging reactors because of what happened at Fukushima. But Peters said she was confident the new nuclear technology South Africa planned to import was safe. No serious incidents have been reported at Koeberg during its 28 years in operation.

South Africa’s nuclear program, though, has had setbacks, including a failed effort with America’s Westinghouse to develop next-generation reactors. The multibillion rand (dollar) project missed several deadlines before it was abandoned, and prospects for customers were uncertain.

South Africa is not alone in forging ahead with nuclear projects following Fukushima. Turkey went ahead with plans to build its first nuclear power plant after Fukushima. And even as Japanese engineers were fighting to cool reactors, officials from Russia and Belarus were signing a deal for a $9.4 billion nuclear plant in Belarus.

South Africa is “one of several significant prospects on the radar,” said Ian Hore-Lacy, spokesman for the London-based World Nuclear Association, which represents the industry.

American and French companies involved in building Koeberg may have an advantage when it comes to involvement in South Africa’s nuclear buildup because of their long-standing relationships, Hore-Lacy said in a telephone interview. But he said Russian, Chinese and other companies can’t be discounted in the race for nuclear business here.

Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation, known as Rosatom, has been among the most active in seeking South African business. Rosatom held a seminar in Johannesburg in early April to introduce itself to the South African government and business officials, and sent a vice president back later in April for more talks.

Alexey Kalinin, head of Rosatom’s foreign operations, said his company would get as much as 60 percent of supplies for projects in South Africa from South African companies. He said that could mean more than $15 billion in earnings for South African companies, $3.4 billion in tax revenues for the South African government, and 15,000 new jobs. He also said Rosatom was ready to draw South African companies into its global supply chain.

Rosatom’s Kalinin said his company was looking ahead to helping Nigeria develop a nuclear industry, and already was involved in uranium exploration and mining in Tanzania and Namibia.

South Africa “can be indeed regarded as a possible gateway to other African countries and a driver of nuclear energy development in the region,” Kalinin said.

Such expansion is just what Yves Marignac, a Paris-based energy expert and anti-nuclear campaigner, fears. He would rather see developing countries taking the lead in exploiting safe, clean renewable energy sources like wind and solar. South African officials say renewables alone can’t deliver enough energy.

Marignac, speaking in a telephone interview, also said he is concerned the nuclear energy industry may be pushing new markets to sign contracts before all the questions raised by the Japanese crisis are answered, and those answers turned into safer — and likely more expensive — technology.

“South Africa is probably one of the next big chances for the nuclear companies trying to sell reactors in the world,” said Marignac, who sees a race between “the ability of the companies to acquire new contracts ... and the ability of the international community to develop new standards.”

Peters, South Africa’s energy minister, said she won’t be rushed, and that safety is a top priority.
She also said South Africa is interested not just in building new reactors, but in developing an entire cycle, from mining more of its uranium resources to nuclear waste management. That presents a range of opportunities for foreign companies, as well as the possibility of South Africa one day exporting its own nuclear know-how.

Peters has faced challenges from South Africa’s powerful labor movement, concerned she is not choosing the energy options that will create the most jobs, and from a nascent South African anti-nuclear movement.
“We as South Africa are convinced that we need an energy mix,” Peters said. “We cannot discard any technology.”

LINK