A surprise announcement was delivered to the pebble bed modular reactor (PMBR) project in South Africa’s 2010 budget – it would no longer obtain significant state funds. As a result the project had to dismiss 75 per cent of its staff. It had spent in the region of nine billion rands of state funds without having realised any of its plans. Furthermore, it had been unable to attract significant outside investment or potential clients.
Given the central importance of energy policy in South Africa, it is more important than ever that projects like the PBMR are evaluated for their necessity, viability, affordability, sustainability, and contribution to the country’s development path. While the government appears to have dropped the PBMR for the present, recent media rhetoric suggests that it is still committed to adding substantial amounts of nuclear power to its future energy mix. This effort seems to being made without first addressing problems relating to democratic governance, public policy making and promoting the special interests of lobby groups. This paper, by Dr David Fig, seeks to raise such issues within an appraisal of the country’s checkered nuclear history and its development aspirations.
It is not surprising therefore that the new paper titled: “Nuclear energy rethink? The rise and demise of South Africa’s Pebble Bed Modular Reactor, ISS Paper No 210, David Fig, April 2010″ is produced by the Institute for Security Studies’ “publications on corruption “.
It can be downloaded as a PDF (803KB) from http:///www.issafrica.org/uploads/210.pdf
Rainier says:
PBMR Ltd made orders for large components even before they were able to prepare a safety report. These components, like the huge reactor vessel, are now useless and will rot in Saldahana Bay. Such costly early orders are very obscure: probably they simply wanted to reach a point of no return for the project, but now it is an burden to the taxpayer…….
2nd August 2010 at 9:25 am