By Jeremy Gordon
Cape Town - The government should have made plans to sort out the power grid and generators from the early 2000s, and especially since 2009 when the load shedding began.
They failed to act in time and now the whole economy is threatened. What are they doing about it now?
We are spending fortunes on diesel and taking huge loans in euro which will be a massive burden on the country if the rand weakens.
What about trying to get a joint venture nuclear deal from Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy company, like they are doing in many other countries where they take a percentage of the revenue from the electricity generated as payment?
Small nuclear reactors in major centres are the logical solution.
We have the uranium needed to make the fuel in abundance and the new nuclear reactors are efficient and safe.
As a short-term solution surely we could do two or three year contracts with the Turkish power ships, or for as long as it takes for the nuclear generators to come into operation.
The solar and wind projects the government seems to be pinning its hopes on will not solve the crisis.
They are inefficient and expensive and the storage costs are prohibitive.
Cape Times
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