{"id":23839,"date":"2025-07-23T14:33:36","date_gmt":"2025-07-23T12:33:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.necsa.co.za\/?p=23839"},"modified":"2025-07-23T14:33:36","modified_gmt":"2025-07-23T12:33:36","slug":"south-africa-will-reactivate-the-pbmr-small-modular-reactor-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/south-africa-will-reactivate-the-pbmr-small-modular-reactor-project\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa will reactivate the PBMR small modular reactor project"},"content":{"rendered":"

Web Link<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

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20th May 2025<\/p>\n

By: Rebecca Campbell <\/a><\/p>\n

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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South Africa<\/a> is lifting<\/a> its Pebble Bed Modular<\/a> Reactor (PBMR) out of care and maintenance<\/a>, Electricity and Energy<\/a> Minister Dr Kgosienstsho Ramokgopa <\/strong>confirmed, almost in passing, on Tuesday. He was delivering the keynote address at the Enlit Africa<\/a> 2025 conference, at the Cape Town International Convention Centre.<\/p>\n

The PBMR is a small modular<\/a> nuclear<\/a> reactor (SMR). It was being developed by South Africa<\/a> from 1994 (although the preliminary work predated that year) to 2009, when it was effectively terminated, through being reduced to a care-and-maintenance<\/a> status. The scientists and engineers who had worked on the project<\/a> scattered to the winds, with anecdotal reports indicating that at least some of them emigrated, to work on other countries\u2019 nuclear<\/a> projects<\/a>, although others did remain in South Africa<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In November, Ramokgopa had revealed that he was going to recommend to Cabinet that the PBMR project<\/a> be revived. When the project<\/a> was reduced to care and maintenance<\/a>, South Africa<\/a> was probably the world leader in SMR development. That position was lost, years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course, we are lagging behind,\u201d he acknowledged. But he assured that the country could catch up, by cooperating with one or other of the major nuclear<\/a> energy<\/a> powers. The government was considering its options for future nuclear<\/a> cooperation partners.<\/p>\n

He pointed out that SMRs would be more rapidly deployable than traditional, large, nuclear<\/a> power<\/a> plants (NPPs). This was because they would be at least partly modular<\/a> in construction<\/a> (and assembled on site from components<\/a> manufactured in factories).<\/p>\n

He reaffirmed South Africa<\/a>\u2019s overall commitment to nuclear<\/a> energy<\/a>. He pointed to the country\u2019s NPP at Koeberg, near Cape Town, which was Africa<\/a>\u2019s only operational NPP. (He did note that Egypt was busy constructing the continent\u2019s second NPP.) He alluded to the fact that Koeberg Unit 1 had had its operational life extended (until 2044, although he did not mention the date) and that he expected the same result with Unit 2.<\/p>\n

Ramokgopa also highlighted that those countries that had significantly decarbonised their energy<\/a> systems<\/a> had done so using one or other (or both) of just two forms of electricity generation<\/a>. These were nuclear<\/a> and hydro.<\/p>\n

Nuclear<\/a> could provide clean baseload power<\/a>. Nearly all the world\u2019s major economies now recognised nuclear<\/a> power<\/a> as clean power<\/a>, he pointed out.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Web Link 20th May 2025 By: Rebecca Campbell Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor South Africa is lifting its Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) out of care and maintenance, Electricity and Energy Minister Dr Kgosienstsho Ramokgopa confirmed, almost in passing, on Tuesday. He was delivering the keynote address at the Enlit Africa 2025 conference, at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23840,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rs_blank_template":"","rs_page_bg_color":"","slide_template_v7":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-necsa-in-the-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23839\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.godirect.co.za\/powerlegal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}