Pretoria - South Africa, plagued by chronic power shortages, plans to have the country's new nuclear power plant up and running by 2020, Energy Minister Dipuo Peters told a nuclear conference on Friday.
State-owned power utility Eskom, which operates Africa's sole nuclear power plant with a total capacity of 1 800 MW, cancelled plans to build a new facility at the end of last year, citing financial constraints.
The government has since taken the lead in developing the next power station, saying it wants to develop a local nuclear industry in partnership with a technology firm rather than adopt a commercial bidding process used by Eskom.
Peters said the new nuclear plant would produce about 20 000 megawatts. "It's a huge project, and in any project situation you plan with the end in sight, so we are looking at 2020," she said.
Delays
Peters said she was concerned by news of delays that could affect two of Eskom's coal-fired power stations, Kusile and Medupi, being built to help plug a power deficit in Africa's biggest economy, which suffered a near-collapse of its power grid in January last year, denting economic growth.
"We are not oblivious to the fact that should there be any delay in commissioning these two plants, consequences will be too ghastly to contemplate," she said.
Kusile and Medupi, both designed to generate 4 800 MW each, are Eskom's first new power plants in more than two decades.
News emerged on Thursday of delays in signing some contracts for Kusile power plant and the company said this would result in the station being commissioned later than the original 2013 start date.
Eskom also said the power system continued to be tight, but the utility did not foresee load shedding - a term used for blackouts - in 2010.
"We have reached a delicate situation, which requires us to take bold and decisive decisions about the type of the current and future energy requirements of our country," Peters said.
"We need to decide whether to build coal fired or nuclear power stations... Coal has clearly become a difficult option as carbon taxes could be imposed going forward."
Eskom has been rationing electricity since early last year after the national grid nearly collapsed forcing mines and smelters to shut for days and affecting industrial production, costing the economy billions of dollars.
Eskom has launched an ambitious expansion programme but still needs to raise parts of the R385bn required to supply fast-rising demand in the country.
- Reuters