Africa-Press – South-Africa. As South Africa grapples with the question of whether floating gas power plants can curb load shedding, Russia’s state-owned atomic energy company has jumped into the fray with a proposal for a fleet of floating small nuclear reactors.
Ryan Collyer, the head of Rosatom Central and Southern Africa, told the National Press Club in Pretoria that he expected Russia’s small modular reactors – already in use on ice breakers – to be commercially available within the next six years or so.
Collyer, a South African who has worked at Rosatom for the past nine years, was speaking some six years after a landmark court ruling sunk a previous Rosatom plan to build a fleet of large nuclear power plants in South Africa.
Collyer said South Africa needed to plan for nuclear now, given that 75% of the country’s coal fleet was due to be decommissioned by 2050.
Rosatom’s proposal is similar to that of floating power ship company Karpowership SA, except that instead of gas-power generation units, the ships or barges would use Russian RITM-200 nuclear reactors, which each produce around 55MW. Like Karpowership’s proposal, the vessels would be moored at harbours.
Collyer said these reactors are already being used by Russia’s Project 22220 ice breakers. A floating nuclear power plant has been commissioned near the town in Pevek.
The reactors have not yet been used commercially outside of Russia.
‘We’re reliable’
Collyer gave no indication of what the small modular reactors might cost, only saying they would be “affordable”.
He said that sanctions imposed by the US against some of Rosatam’s subsidiaries had not impacted the company’s ability to find work overseas.
“We are a reliable partner,” he said, adding that only one Rosatom project had been put on hold due to sanctions.
South Africa’s blueprint for electricity includes an additional 2 500MW of nuclear power, roughly enough to cover two stages of load shedding.
However, the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy has not yet put out a request for proposal (RFP).
“We are following and hoping that a big-block RFP for nuclear comes out soon,” said Collyer.
If the country’s revived nuclear procurement programme does take off, new plants are only expected to be commissioned well after 2030.
An alliance of green advocacy groups and civil society organisations have already said they will try to block any new plants, saying nuclear power is too expensive and takes too long to build.
*This story has been corrected to reflect the correct name for Ryan Collyer and that another of Rosatom’s projects was not a land based plant, but rather a floating one in Pevek.
For More News And Analysis About South-Africa Follow Africa-Press
