One year on, Koeberg Unit 1 returns to grid
Unit 1 at the Koeberg Power Station outside Cape Town was successfully synchronised to the grid on Saturday after being out of commission for almost a year.
It was the longest outage in the history of South Africa’s only nuclear power station, during which three new steam generators successfully replaced the original three steam generators.
"This is a huge milestone in the generation operational recovery plan and Eskom’s strategic objectives," says the power utility's spokesperson, Daphne Mokwena.
"For the duration of the Unit1 outage, Unit 2 has been safely generating electricity to the grid and will continue to do so until the start of its next outage, which will include the replacement of its original three steam generators.
"The outage on Unit 2 will start once Unit 1 is stable and all the required commissioning tests are complete.
"Although Unit 2's outage will be similar in terms of the scope, the lessons learnt from Unit 1's outage will enable the duration to be reduced.
"However, as was the case during the Unit 1 outage, nuclear safety will not be compromised.
The replacement of steam generators was identified as a prerequisite for the extension of the operating licence for Koeberg beyond its original design life of 40 years.
"Eskom has already submitted a licence application to the National Nuclear Regulator for Koeberg’s operating life extension by an additional 20 years, which is being assessed by the NNR," says Mokwena.
Koeberg has a total capacity of 1860 MW, approximately 5% of electricity generated by Eskom.
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