More power blackouts coming

Mortymoose said:
Surely they should have started building at least another 2 big power stations by now, as the two that are currently under construction will not allow for growth but merely sustain the current demand?
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Nope, no planning done at all.

That's why Zoomer wants to quick fix it with nuclear power. But the funny thing is that the construction of nuclear power plants normally runs years over the estimated completion dates, much longer than fossil fuel power plants.

Japan is still trying to contain and cover up the Fukushima disaster, and it just make you realise how dangerous nuclear power is - even in the hands of people who know what they are doing.

Heaven forbid that Russia should come here to build a few nuclear reactors, especially after the Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine (when it was still part of the USSR).
 
kingrob said:
Heaven forbid that Russia should come here to build a few nuclear reactors, especially after the Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine (when it was still part of the USSR).
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THESE ARE NOT CHERNOBYL REACTORS. THEY ARE STANDARD PWR REACTORS AND NEARLY 50 UNITS IN OPERATION FOR 30 YEARS HAVE NEVER GIVEN TROUBLE. SO STOP WITH THE CHERNOBYL SCARE TACTICS.
 
LaraC said:
If South Africa uses ±31000MW during peak time how much did we use during the low-demand holiday season?
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“At the moment we have about 27,000 megawatts available but the reason for that comes to part two, is that we are doing a lot of maintenance which will in large part be drawing to an end over the next few days, in anticipation of Monday.”

http://ewn.co.za/2015/01/03/Eskom-SA-can-prepare-for-more-rolling-blackouts

So from tomorrow it will most likely sky rocket to somewhere around 30000MW since most of the companies are opening again tomorrow. I am going back to work tomorrow and the company I work for use about R85 000 worth of electricity a month. So I think if everyone starts operating again from tomorrow the grid will be under severe pressure again....

If something goes wrong Eskom will use the open gas turbines to fill the gap but it does not last long so weekend loadshedding very likely I think. Will have to wait and see.
 
Thank you cavedog. I wanted to calculate how much power is required for businesses by subtracting what we used during the festive season.
 
So what happened to the war room

kingrob said:
Our economy will now be placed on hold until end of June 2015.

That is if we can believe anything Eskom says, because Lynn Brown already lied to us when she said Medupi would be online end of December. Well, that is the kind of thing you expect from the anc, so hardly comes as a surprise.

Let's hope not too many businesses will have to close down, and that government will give all businesses a free generator and all households six free solar panels.
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So what happened to the "War Room" - Answer, the leader of the war room (Cyril Rhamaposa) went on christmas holiday to Cuba and the wekkers went home for Christmas.

So in effect the whole cabinet war room announcement was a load of hot air.

In an emergency/crisis situation where you invoke a "war room", you work the problem on a 24/7/365 basis until the crisis has been resolved. You then conduct a post mortem and produce a lessons learnt report. If the war room is still in operation, I would like to see the lessons learnt report at the end of it seeing as my tax money is paying for this whole disaster.

Me thinks Cyril needs to go on a crisis management course seeing that Zoomster appears to be on extended leave while Cyril now runs the show.
 
bruce_the_loon said:
THESE ARE NOT CHERNOBYL REACTORS. THEY ARE STANDARD PWR REACTORS AND NEARLY 50 UNITS IN OPERATION FOR 30 YEARS HAVE NEVER GIVEN TROUBLE. SO STOP WITH THE CHERNOBYL SCARE TACTICS.
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I doubt that kingrob referred to the type of nuclear technology that will be used.
It looks like he wanted to highlight the dangers when disaster strike or when something goes wrong. The impact of such disasters is catastrophic on the environment and there is no quick fix to solve it.
 
LaraC said:
I doubt that kingrob referred to the type of nuclear technology that will be used.
It looks like he wanted to highlight the dangers when disaster strike or when something goes wrong. The impact of such disasters is catastrophic on the environment and there is no quick fix to solve it.
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Exactly. It's not only about the technology, it's about the political context. SA has had a number of crises over the years in which a pattern has emerged as follows from the responsible minister: deny or underplay; wait and hope it will go away; media storm erupts; cut short leave to start dealing with the issue; cabinet makes promises; storm dies down but questions persist; commission of enquiry process for up to 20 years.

Just to compare with the US : Bush tried the above approach with the hurricane in Atlanta and it arguably catalysed his political demise. That's why Obama (and future presidents) respond immediately with a press release, acknowledge the gravity of the situation, start despatching resources and definitely cut short their leave immediately.

We can't afford such lax responses to happen with a nuclear incident - even if we did have the best technology. Who of us trusts the tender process to deliver the best technology or Eskom to deliver a quality project?
 
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LaraC said:
Thank you cavedog. I wanted to calculate how much power is required for businesses by subtracting what we used during the festive season.
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The last Eskom update was 22 Dec, which predicted a range from 24.2 - 28 GW on days during the week following.

The total capacity on 22 Dec was cited as 30.3 GW (i.e reserve of only 1.3 GW), with planned maintenance sitting at 5.5G W and unplanned at 7.6 GW.
 
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start blaming government!

In most countries all these fails to service delivery would have been blamed on government and as such that government's top structures would be replaced during that country's next elections when most citizens grasp the benefits to vote for another political party to be in power. Why don't we just do that in South Africa as well? :confused:
 
LaraC said:
I doubt that kingrob referred to the type of nuclear technology that will be used.
It looks like he wanted to highlight the dangers when disaster strike or when something goes wrong. The impact of such disasters is catastrophic on the environment and there is no quick fix to solve it.
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Furthermore, what guarantee do we have that they will obtain prpperly qualified and trained personnel?
 
You guys do realise Koeberg has been running for 30 years?
 
bruce_the_loon said:
THESE ARE NOT CHERNOBYL REACTORS. THEY ARE STANDARD PWR REACTORS AND NEARLY 50 UNITS IN OPERATION FOR 30 YEARS HAVE NEVER GIVEN TROUBLE. SO STOP WITH THE CHERNOBYL SCARE TACTICS.
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...now we know why his' name is Bruce the Loon...
 
For sale, one nuclear reactor for cheap cheap. Need a little work on its top, bottom and insides. Buyers will need to arrange for transport from Chernobyl.
 
Thank you Chris_Geerdts. If residential users consume up to 28MW it makes sense why they are targeted for load shedding. I assumed incorrectly that businesses took a bigger chunk of the available capacity.
 
LaraC said:
Thank you Chris_Geerdts. If residential users consume up to 28MW it makes sense why they are targeted for load shedding. I assumed incorrectly that businesses took a bigger chunk of the available capacity.
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No ways. Each aluminium smelter uses several gw on its own. If capacity is only 28gw then residential is using no more than 15 to 20
 
The problem with the new reactors they want to build, there is not one operational version of it anywhere in the world. There are maybe 3 being built currently, all are above double the budgeted price and all are over time. I do not think we can do better than a first world country, therefore we should not even attempt it. We should rather award contracts to private companies to build solar/wind and/or fossil fuels. Nuclear just isn't worth it due to time/costs (do not forget decommissioning costs, wonder what those will be for Koeberg).
 
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