3rd of September 2010

On the First of September 2010, Cabinet held a “secret” session on the closure of the PMBR company. Earthlife Africa Jhb has learnt that all may not be as it seems, and that issues such as conflicts of interests, accounting for taxpayer money spent, and rehabilitation of PBMR staff are being swept under the carpet.

The PBMR company has bled the taxpayers of this country of a staggering R10bn. This money has come from the wages of workers, and represents R10bn not spent on social services. Furthermore, there has been nothing of substance to show for this expenditure, and the question must be asked what were the citizens of South Africa paying for? Is it for retrenchment packages for PBMR board members in excess of R2 million each?

While Earthlife Africa Jhb regards the closure of the PBMR company and the ending of the nuclear project to be the correct course of action—and has advocated for such for over ten years—it is extremely concerned that no proper accounting of this expenditure will take place. If R10bn of taxpayer funds has been spent on a project that failed, then an open, transparent audit should be undertaken. Citizens of South Africa have a right to know on what their money has been spent, and the appropriate vehicle for this is an open investigation in Parliament and an audit by the Auditor General.

The rumours of conflict of interests, poor governance and management, and improper use of funds within the PBMR Company can only be dispelled through an open and transparent investigation. The Department of Public Enterprise, Eskom and the PBMR Company must put their books out in the public domain for examination.

Further, the issue of PBMR staff has been largely ignored. South Africa needs to retain many of those staff members and use their skills to right South Africa’s social ills; rather than have nuclear scientists, engineers, clerks, etc. selling their skills to the highest bidder on the global market. While Earthlife Africa Jhb does not believe that nuclear power is an appropriate choice for South Africa, there are other, more socially friendly areas in which these skills can be applied. For example, the National Nuclear Regulator is currently struggling to deal, due to lack of capacity, with uranium being leached into South Africa’s waterways from gold mines. We also have to deal with the legacy of nuclear power in South Africa; Koeberg will need to be decommissioned (an expensive process that will likely take a 135 years to complete) and the high-level waste will need to be stored. At the moment, there are no concrete plans to deal with this waste anywhere in the world, let alone South Africa.

Secrecy within the nuclear sector is contrary to the public interest, and the closure of the PBMR is no exception. If this process is being kept away from the public gaze, what will the situation be if the government’s information and media bills (which Earthlife Africa Jhb is opposed to) are passed? Already, the energy sector is littered with secret agreements and confidential pricing arrangements, those misguided, regressive and reactionary pieces of legislation will only make an already bad situation even worse.

As Tristen Taylor, Project Coordinator for Earthlife Africa Jhb states, “There is only one honourable and democratic path open to the government; a full, complete, honest and transparent examination of what happened at the PBMR Company, who benefited from it, and how ten billion rand of our money was spent. Anything less will only raise suspicion for years to come and be festering sore within the energy sector.”

For more information, please contact:

Tristen Taylor
Project Coordinator
Earthlife Africa Jhb
Tel: +27 11 339 3662
Cell: +27 84 250 2434
Email: tristen@earthlife.org.za
Website: www.earthlife.org.za

The government has pulled the plug on its ambitious nuclear energy programme after pumping more than R9-billion into it over more than 11 years. There have been suggestions that this figure is far higher than declared and allegations that PBMR funding resulted in various slush funds. There are also suggestions that the PBMR project may continue to be funded in the US and may yet try to rear its ugly head in South Africa. What we want to know is what will happen with the PBMR “test” fuel factory established at Pelindaba and why were no environmental reports made public from the several years of pebbles experimentation that transpired in the hills of Hartbeespoortdam? And what ever became of the nuclear pebbles produced at Pelindaba that were shipped overseas for testing? – Comment from CANE

In a letter dated July 5, Public Enterprises Minister Barbara Hogan told the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM): “The minister of finance has clearly stated that there will be no further funding for the company, and I would like to reiterate that this position has not changed.

“It is clear that the remainder of the cash on hand is to be utilised solely for the winding down of the company as well as the preservation of the intellectual property.”

One objective was to design, license and build a prototype nuclear reactor plant, which, if successful, would have paved the way for building small power plants to help meet SA’s needs.

The company operates as an independent entity governed by an agreement between founding investors Eskom, the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) and US nuclear giant Westinghouse.

It has spent R5-billion on projects since 1994, including R2.7-billion on a demonstration power plant, which was to have been built at the Western Cape’s Koeberg nuclear power station, but was later scrapped. In the process, the company wasted R268-million on the manufacture of a major component of the demonstration power plant, a 2000-ton reactor pressure vessel.

The vessel, which is due to leave the Spanish port of Santander next Sunday, will be stored at Saldanha Bay for R10000 a month as the company can no longer afford the R1.4-million it will cost to transport it to Pretoria.

Business Times was told that the company decided to have the component shipped to SA as it would have been liable for R34-million in VAT had it remained in Spain. Nuclear experts were unanimous this week that the vessel would have to be scrapped as the PBMR company changed the original design of the demonstration power plant last year to 200MW from 400MW. The vessel can function in a 400MW power plant only.

Although the part is unfinished, as the contract for its construction was cancelled last year, PBMR was forced to pay the Spanish builder R268-million for the incomplete product. The original contract price was R317-million.

Payments to companies that made parts for the demonstration power plant include:

• R503.2-million to Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries for a helium turbine for the power plant;
• R256.8-million to German company SGL Carbon for manufacturing carbon reflector blocks; and
• R256-million for graphite for the demonstration power plant.

The company also spent millions of rands manufacturing coated uranium oxide particles encapsulated in graphite fuel spheres, which were sent to Russia for testing.

However, staff say the financial cut-off did not stop the company recently giving golden handshakes of R1.8-million each to some of its general managers.

Last year, the company’s 11 executives were paid a combined R18-million in salaries and other benefits. Other big payments since 1994 include:

• R2-billion to mostly overseas consultants;
• R115.9-million for building rental;
• R707.9-million for the construction of a pilot fuel plant; and
• R172-million for overheads.

Hogan recently turned down a rescue plan proposed by the NUM that included a request for a R262-million government bail-out until March next year. In a detailed submission to Hogan, the union called on the auditor-general’s office to conduct a forensic investigation into the company’s financial affairs.

The union also called on the government to suspend the company’s board and executive officers. It said some engineers and scientists were “inappropriately qualified” for nuclear reactor engineering applications.

“The actions of certain individuals can be treated as sabotage for changing the design almost every second year. It seemed as if they did not want to see the reactor built.”

Union general secretary Frans Baleni deplored the company’s “wasteful expenditure. The closure is marked by serious allegations of corruption and unethical conduct. We would be pleased if it can be investigated thoroughly,” he said.

A nuclear expert employed at PBMR blamed the board and executives for the company’s failure. “The technology in terms of electricity production was good, but the only problem was that it was not well managed. Nothing was ever achieved by the company. It was a waste of taxpayers’ money.”

Eskom said in a short statement that it was a minority investor, and referred queries to PBMR.

PBMR’s acting chief executive Alex Tsela declined to comment, referring all questions to the company’s corporate communications department, which could not be reached for comment.

The chairman, Alistair Ruiters, could not be reached for comment either.

• - govenderp@sundaytimes.co.za

Source: http://www.timeslive.co.za/business/article555632.ece/Government-pulls-plug-on-PBMR

GENERAL PRESS RELEASE

Immediate release

9 March 2010

“NUCLEAR 1”

DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT REPORT:

FATALLY FLAWED AND DESIGNED TO CONFUSE

The draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for a nuclear power station at the Bantamsklip site has been released for public comment, with a closing date set for 10 May 2010. Bantamsklip is situated near the Pearly Beach resort, 50 km east of Hermanus.

The Save Bantamsklip Campaign and its affiliates and associated organisations are happy to have been placed third on the list of priority sites, but the battle to have the Bantamsklip site removed entirely from the list is far from over. We assert that the Government has already confirmed their whole-hearted support for a “nuclear fleet” with all the ancillary nuclear fuel-chain components. Unless this commitment is opposed, we expect to see construction begin at Bantamsklip in ten year’s time, at the latest.

Like the Trojan House outside the gates of Troy, we believe that the wording of the Executive Summary of the draft EIR for “Nuclear-1″ has been designed deliberately to counter the highly visible and successful advance of the Save Bantamsklip Campaign. The idea behind the proponent’s propaganda is to sow discord and confusion in the ranks of the campaign by appearing to shift focus away to Thyspunt in the Eastern Cape as the first site.

Furthermore, the draft EIR suffers from a number of fatal flaws, such as the failure to specify the type of reactor envisaged for the site. How can we determine scientifically and accurately the environmental impact of a nuclear fission reactor when we don’t know what it is? It is rather like ordering a fleet of motor vehicles at an exorbitant cost, knowing absolutely nothing about the brand, its performance, nor its safety features!

We therefore call on all our supporters to redouble their efforts to defend and consolidate our position to have Bantamsklip and Groot Hagelkraal entirely removed from the list of potential sites.

We support and endorse the positive campaign of strengthening and deepening the drive for a World Heritage Site status and for the site to be taken away from Eskom and incorporated into the Agulhas National Park.

We ask all our supporters to study carefully the EIR and to register their objections to the report, available at www.savebantamsklip.org and to join us in a march in opposition to this proposal on Monday 26 April 2010. Further details will be released closer to the time.

John Williams

Chairman

Save Bantamsklip Association

082 923 1839

john @ savebantamsklip.org

www.savebantamsklip.org