Had Eskom’s much-needed extension of the Koeberg nuclear power station’s lifespan been completed on schedule by a French nuclear company, SA would not have been plunged into stage 6 load- shedding.
The 38-year-old Western Cape station was scheduled to have been overhauled by November 2018, with its six steam generators replaced. However, due to delays, including the manufacturing and installation of new generators by Paris-based company Framatome, the work will be undertaken only later this year.
The same company is responsible for maintenance work on Koeberg's unit 2 that has been offline since mid-January. It has been behind schedule for two months, denying SA 970MW of power, which is the equivalent of one stage of load-shedding. Eskom has confirmed it is paying Framatome R1bn to maintain the unit.
When asked about the causes of the delays in bringing the unit back in service, Eskom spokesperson Sikonathi Mantshantsha said in an email to the Sunday Times: “During the plant start-up and commissioning activities, a number of emergent defects have needed to be attended to which are directly affecting the plan. The unit is now expected to return to service in late July, and will require about 10 days to reach full power.”
This contributed to the country being plunged into stage 6 blackouts last month and stage 4 for most of the past week.
“During conditions where load-shedding is required, the unexpected unavailability of one Koeberg unit will require one stage higher load-shedding,” said Mantshantsha .
Eskom has twice implemented stage 6 load-shedding in as many weeks last month. On the second occasion, it blamed the blackouts on unprotected strikes over wage increases by members of the National Union of Mineworkers and the National Union of Metalworkers of SA.
The lifespan and operating licence of the Koeberg station, which produces about 1,940MW of power, comes to an end in 2024. Eskom awarded a R20bn tender to Areva NP (now Framatome) in August 2014 to replace and install six steam generators at Koeberg. This was supposed to have been completed by 2018.
Eskom told the Sunday Times this week that “initial delays were encountered during steam generator manufacturing in France, which pushed out the replacement from 2018 to 2021".
“Subsequent delays were due to readiness to install, pushing first installation to late 2022,” said Mantshantsha .
Asked if Eskom had imposed delay penalties on the contractor, the power utility said it had “leveraged contractual penalties on the contractor due to delays in completing work” but declined to give details.
Though Eskom has not been granted permission [by the NNR] to extend the lifespan [of the station], Eskom is doing preparatory work which is a bit interesting from a financial management point of view
Eskom also refused to divulge how much it has paid Framatome since work to overhaul the station and extend its lifespan had begun.
“Eskom is not at liberty to disclose the payment schedule on the Framatome contract, Eskom has compensated the contractor for completed activities to date within the approved contract value. The entire life extension project is budgeted at R20bn, and no funding challenges are envisaged,” Mantshantsha added.
Eskom plans to do the upgrades on unit 1 at the end of this year and unit 2 in the second half of 2023.
Efforts to obtain comment from Framatome on the delays and the prolonged outages of unit 2 were unsuccessful.
Framatome's predecessor, Areva, was embroiled in a legal battle with Westinghouse Electric which lost out on the tender with the matter ending up in the Constitutional Court in 2016.
Westinghouse argued it was not selected in spite of its bid being R140m cheaper than Areva's. It also argued that Areva would not meet the 2018 installation deadline.
Peter Becker, Koeberg Alert Alliance spokesperson and former board member of the National Nuclear Regulator (NNR), said maintenance work at the station’s unit 2 did not make sense as it was costing Eskom “a fortune” while it was yet to get approval from the NNR for the station’s lifespan to be extended.
“Though Eskom has not been granted permission [by the NNR] to extend the lifespan [of the station], Eskom is doing preparatory work which is a bit interesting from a financial management point of view,” Becker said.
He said that was equivalent to spending “billions on a new car when I am not sure if my driving licence is going to be renewed”.
“Maybe one needs to ensure that they pass their eye Test before spending billions on a new Ferrari but Eskom is spending billions on a steam generator replacement project.”
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