There will be no overlap between the outages of the two units of Koeberg implemented in order to have steam generators replaced — meaning that the grid will not be deprived of the entire 1,840MW produced by the nuclear facility.
This was the assurance given by Eskom chief nuclear officer Keith Featherstone in an interview after a media engagement involving Western Cape premier Alan Winde on Thursday.
There have been grave fears, including on the part of Winde, that the delay in the installation of three steam generators in unit 1 would entail an overlap between the maintenance outages of units 1 and 2.
The Western Cape would be particularly vulnerable to such an eventuality.
Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, the electricity minister, has also expressed disquiet over the delays in Koeberg’s refurbishment, saying they could lead to prolonged and increased stages of load-shedding until 2024.
Featherstone said the steam generator replacement at unit 1 is complete and he is confident the unit will be commercially available in early November at the latest and probably well before then. This will ensure there is no overlap with the outage of unit 2, which is planned to start on November 7.
He said Eskom had been too optimistic about installing the steam generators at unit 1. “We overestimated how well we could perform. It has taken us a lot longer than we wanted.”
Eskom will apply the lessons learnt to unit 2, “and we believe we will be able to do it a lot smarter”. He said a lot of time will be given for the unit 2 project but no date for its completion has been finalised yet.
Featherstone said replacement of the steam generators is the only real issue that has to be tackled for Koeberg to obtain its licence to continue operations beyond July 2024. He was adamant the installation of the new steam generator at unit 2 will be completed before then.
However, energy analyst and MD of EE Business Intelligence Chris Yelland expressed scepticism over these “overly optimistic” projections as past experience shows that Eskom is unable to meet its envisaged finalisation dates. It is possible Eskom could run into problems as it brings unit 1 back into commercial operation.
Featherstone “cannot give a categoric assurance that there will not be an overlap” of outages, Yelland said.
He noted that the shutdown of unit 1, which started in December 2022, would have taken 10-and-a-half months by the time of its projected commercialisation on November 3, compared with the initially planned five months. It is realistic to assume that the shutdown of unit 2 will take a similar time — to end-September 2024.
He said unit 1 will again be shut down in July 2024 for up to 200 days for the leak test of the reactor containment building.
“With the unit 2 steam generator replacement outage likely until end-September 2024, and the scheduled unit 1 outage for 6.5 months starting July 21 2024, this means that both Koeberg unit 1 and unit 2 may be down simultaneously for about four months, unless the Koeberg operating licence for unit 2 can be extended,” Yelland said.
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