The Department of Mineral Resources & Energy plans to issue a request for proposals for 2 500MW worth of new nuclear energy projects.

A Business Day report says this will be in addition to the 1 800MW Eskom hopes to secure by extending the life of Koeberg nuclear power station by 20 years.

However, Chris Yelland, energy analyst and MD of EE Business Intelligence, said it was unlikely the request for proposals would be issued in 2023.

Despite criticism for the likes of the Presidential Climate Commission that the cost of building new nuclear power stations could not be justified compared to lower-cost options such as renewable energy and gas, the department’s Minister Gwede Mantashe confirmed the state still intended to move forward with the procurement of nuclear power.

He said that as SA proceeds to add variable generation capacity from renewable sources the country would also require ‘a reliable baseload source’ such as nuclear.

‘We are going to issue a request for proposals for nuclear power. It will not be for 9 600MW, but for 2 500MW to be developed at a rate that the country can afford,’ Mantashe said at the Minerals Council of SA’s AGM in Johannesburg yesterday.

Mantashe has issued a ministerial determination on the procurement of 2 500MW of new generation capacity from nuclear in 2021 which the National Energy Regulator of SA (Nersa) decided to concur with subject to certain suspensive conditions, says the Business Day report.

According to Yelland, these conditions said that the department would first have to establish the rationality behind 2 500MW capacity of nuclear power based on SA’s envisaged electricity landscape post-2030.

Nersa was basically saying, said Yelland, that the department needs to finalise the updated Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) before it could proceed with the procurement of new nuclear power.

‘My interpretation is that there needs to be an updated IRP before new nuclear power can be procured.’

Full Business Day report