Koeberg latest: High risk of load shedding after Eskom ‘plant leak’

A steam generator at Eskom’s Koeberg Plant (near Cape Town) has been taken offline ‘in the interests of safety’ – after a significant leak was reported on Monday. Although there is no risk to the structure or workers on site, the move does mean that our chances of encountering more load shedding just increased.

Koeberg plant leak ‘heightens load shedding risk’

Koeberg Unit 1 will now be offline until May, and Eskom will be operating without a facility that contributes almost 1 000 MW to the national power grid. As we’ve seen recently, the margins are razor-thin when officials decide if they need to implement rolling power-cuts – and the long-term outage tips the scales massively out of our favour.

Chris Yelland, a leading energy analyst in South Africa, is adamant that these developments will have serious consequences for the energy supply over the next four months:

“An increasing leak rate on one of three steam generators at Koeberg Unit 1 has resulted in the 900 MW unit being taken out of service for repairs, other routine maintenance and refueling originally scheduled for February 2021. The unit will return to service in May 2021. This will somewhat increase the probability of load shedding.”

Chris Yelland talks about Koeberg’s impact on the load shedding schedule

Eskom to lose 900 MW of power

Eskom confirmed via a statement that they are still trying to establish what caused the leak at Koeberg. The silver lining to this grey cloud is that Unit 2 is still fully operational – but the threat of load shedding still looms large.

“Although the leak rate was well within the safety limits, a conservative decision was made to take Koeberg Unit 1 offline for repairs. During this period, the unit will also undergo routine maintenance, only returning to service during May 2021. The cause of the increased leak rate will be addressed. There is no risk to plant, personnel, or the environment.”

“The steam generator is a tubular heat exchanger, which mechanically dries the steam produced during the generation process. Shutting down the plant takes several hours, and once it’s done, fuel will be unloaded from the reactor core to enable maintenance activities to be conducted. Unit 2, however, continues to operate at full power.”

Eskom statement

#EskomMediaStatement

Koeberg Unit 1 taken offline for repairs, routine maintenance and refueling outage@News24 @SABCNews @NewzroomAfrika @eNCA @IOL pic.twitter.com/9wxzCD0Qdt

— Eskom Hld SOC Ltd (@Eskom_SA) January 4, 2021