Eskom was considering building nuclear power plants in the Witbank area to use existing infrastructure as it phased out 34,000 megawatt (MW) of old coal-fired power over the next decades, the electricity utility’s chief nuclear officer, Dave Nicholls, said on Wednesday.The Department of Energy has delegated the task of nuclear procurement to Eskom, which will be the owner and operator of the new nuclear power stations. Under the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) 2010, SA plans to procure 9,600MW of new nuclear power. Under the updated IRP 2016, under discussion, the plan is to add 20,385MW of nuclear power by 2050, equivalent to about one-third of the total generation mix.Nicholls told the Nuclear Africa conference in Centurion the first four units of the new nuclear build programme would be at Thyspunt. Another unit was likely to be placed at Duynefontein in the Western Cape where Koeberg power station is located.The next priority area for nuclear, as old coal-fired power was taken of...
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