Page 6 - AfrElec Week 03 2022

AfrElec NUCLEAR AfrElec

Koeberg reactor closures

leaves Eskom exposed to more

loadshedding in 2022

SOUTH AFRICA SOUTH Africa’s state-owned power utility ensuring success of this project,” said Riedewaan
Eskom has warned the country’s citizens that its Bakardien, Eskom’s chief nuclear officer.
electricity grid may become constrained, leading “Nuclear safety is the paramount factor. We
to power outages, as it plans to take a nuclear unit will progress the outage work diligently, making
offline at its Koeberg Nuclear Power Station for sure nuclear safety and safety of plant, personnel
five months. and public is top of mind,” he said. Experts said
The electricity supply system in the country Koeberg off-line had raised the spectre of inten-
may come under additional strain because of this sive load-shedding, particularly over the winter
planned maintenance action, Eskom cautioned months.
in a statement on Saturday. Eskom said Koeberg was an important part
Eskom is set to spend ZAR49bn ($3.2bn) on of the Eskom generating fleet due to its reliable
its maintenance programme to extend the life operation, its low primary energy costs, its loca-
of the Koeberg Nuclear Power Station (NPP) by tion in the Western Cape – strategic for stabilis-
some 20 years. ing the national electricity grid – and the fact that
After more than 450 days of uninterrupted it is a clean source of energy.
operation, Unit 2 at Koeberg NPP was set to be Experts said this was also a time when the
taken offline for a regular refuelling and mainte- station would perform certain required inspec-
nance outage, scheduled to last for five months, tions on equipment and carry out more intrusive
Eskom said in the statement. This will be the maintenance that cannot be performed when the
25th refuelling outage for Unit 2 since its com- unit is online.
missioning and will also see the replacement of “When Koeberg Unit 2 shuts down, it will
the Unit’s three steam generators. have been online, safely generating electricity,
The reactor pressure vessel head, which for 452 days without any interruption since its
houses the nuclear fuel while the station is in last refuelling outage, which was completed in
operation, will also be replaced. “There are sev- October 2020.”
eral components that Eskom has confirmed it The closure is a “once-in-a-lifetime outage”
will not work on. The nuclear condensers are and will allow the most maintenance work one
among those. that Eskom has undertaken, said Chris Yel-
“In 2010 the budget to extend the life of land, energy analyst and managing director at
Koeberg was ZAR20bn; with inflation and the EE Business Intelligence, the Daily Maverick
exchange rate as well as added costs it is [now] reported.
about ZAR49bn. There are concerns about the https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/
safety of the nuclear plant if things are not done article/2022-01-18-koebergs-once-in-a-
by the book,” Peter Becker of the Koeberg Alert lifetime-outage-likely-to-put-extra-stress-on-
Alliance told Business Report. south-african-electricity-grid/
Eskom said over the weekend that an outage “This is not a regular refuelling maintenance
of similar duration for Koeberg Unit 1 will follow outage; actually, it’s a massive outage,” he said.
later in the year, during which this unit too will “It’s not an ordinary outage and it’s not a regular
have its steam generators replaced – its reactor outage timewise. It’s a highly unusual outage that
pressure vessel head having been replaced sev- has never been done before at Koeberg.”
eral years ago. While Unit 2’s shutdown was originally
Eskom said on Saturday that the Koeberg scheduled for 3 January, it was delayed by Koe-
units, at 920 MW each, were the largest gener- berg to finalise the travel arrangements of certain
ating units on the continent, and that the out- required international contractors during the
ages were planned at times of the year when the Covid-19 Omicron wave, according to Lewis
impact on the overall electricity supply was min- Phidza, stakeholder management manager at
imised as far as possible. Koeberg.
“This is going to be a long, but needed out- The outage allow for the replacement of the
age – the first of its kind for Koeberg. Our staff unit’s nuclear fuel, but also accommodate the
are prepared and committed to make history by replacement of certain components necessary

P6 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 03 20•January•2022