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dam-l SAfrican tiny nukes/LS
>SMALL, SAFE NUCLEAR POWER STATIONS A PROMISING IDEA: ESKOM
>PRETORIA June 1 1998 Sapa
>
> Much work still had to be done to develop small and safe nuclear
> power stations for South Africa but the prospects looked
> promising, Eskom nuclear spokesman Tony Stott said on Monday.
>
> "We are still in the concept stage but there is a lot of merit in
> the idea of pocket-sized nuclear power stations. Things look quite
> good and promising," he said in Pretoria.
>
> Such power stations would be small enough to be placed on factory
> premises or in municipal areas. They would be
> environment-friendly, based on a technology different from that of
> present nuclear stations.
>
> A major advantage of nuclear-generated electricity was the
> elimination of air pollution caused by coal-fired stations.
>
> According to the designers, the new, smaller nuclear-power
> stations would be fail-safe because they could not melt down. They
> would store their own waste for 40 years. The plant could then be
> imploded and covered by a mound.
>
> Stott said there would be nothing new about the reactor used, but
> Eskom had developed unique technology to put together such a plant
> for generating electricity.
>
> Eskom was envisaging building the plant for South African use as
> well as export purposes.
>
> "We still have to finalise the design and complete environmental
> impact studies. The next step will be to acquire licences from the
> National Electricity Regulator and the Council for Nuclear
> Safety," Stott said.
>
> If everything went well, Eskom could start building the first
> prototype within the next three to four years.
>
> Stott said countries such as Germany, the United Kingdom and the
> United States had used similar models for limited periods. They
> finally opted for the conventional nuclear-power stations,
> concluding that larger utilities would be more viable.
>
> "The world is now looking at smaller output generators as they
> will bring more flexibility in utilities such as Eskom," Stott
> said.
>
> Producing one of the smaller plants would cost about R365 million.
> Their output would cost the same as electricity from conventional
> stations, but they would remove the need for expensive
> cross-country transmission lines.
>
> Stott said the money to build the new plants would largely be
> raised through international loans.
>
> "But we have had local and international companies expressing an
> interest in investing in the project. They are, of course,
> awaiting the final design to assess the commercial viability of
> the new plant," Stott said.
>
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Lori Pottinger, Director, Southern Africa Program,
and Editor, World Rivers Review
International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, California 94703, USA
Tel. (510) 848 1155 Fax (510) 848 1008
http://www.irn.org
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