[lbo-talk] S. Africa plans second nuclear power plant

Patrick Bond pbond at mail.ngo.za
Sat Mar 25 22:54:01 PST 2006


----- Original Message ----- From: <uvj at vsnl.com>
> South Africa plans to construct its second nuclear power station to ease
> the
> crisis of power supply which becomes increasingly serious due to rapid
> economic growth, the South African Press Association (SAPA) reported on
> Friday.

Growth is not 'rapid' (since 1994 it barely exceeded the population growth rate, itself decimated by AIDS); neoliberalism here meant virtually no investments/upgrading by parastatals or other state agencies. If anyone wants data, let me know.


> ... The damage to one of the generators at Koeberg nuclear power station,
> reportedly caused by a bolt, has brought about frequent shutdown of the
> power plant and outages of electricity in the Western Cape Province since
> December, causing huge economic losses.

Public enterprises minister (and former nominee for WTO secretary-general in both 2000 and 2005) Alec Erwin was quoted the day before our municipal elections (1 March) as saying someone had sabotaged Koeberg, a charge laughed at by all observers. As the trade union federation Cosatu explained, the problem wasn't a loose bolt put their by 'human instrumentality' (Erwin's term), but instead a few neoliberal nuts still lying around.


> Source: Xinhua

Trusty source...

A different view of SA's energy crisis:

*Trouble in the Air: Global Warming and the Privatised Atmosphere* (free download at http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs under Energy Advocacy),

What's wrong with our energy system?

There is perhaps no better way to interpret power relations in contemporary South Africa than by examining who has had access to energy in the past, who is getting it now and at what cost, and who will have it in the future. The argument below is that the larger players in the energy 'market' - i.e., transnational capital, accommodating neoliberal multilateral agencies and national governments, and the rich - are having a disproportionate effect on public policy, even in liberated South Africa.

Contradictions abound, of course. For Anton Eberhardt of the National Electricity Regulator, there is 'no simple transition from a state centred electricity supply industry to an idealised World Bank electricity supply industry model'.[2] The 'idealised World Bank model' has failed nearly everywhere, not just in electricity and energy and especially electricity, but across the board. Hence it is no surprise that, during the transition to energy neoliberalism, the core components of South Africa's energy system are beset by anti-social, anti-ecological practices. These include climate change caused by what has been termed the 'Minerals-Energy Complex'; the crisis of electricity access in view of disconnections associated with energy sector liberalisation; and the government's failure to promote renewable energy sources and instead waste scarce funds on a nuclear energy fantasy.

We can consider each in turn. The most important to flag at the outset, however, is the extraordinarily cheap supply of electricity that corporate users enjoy. (ETC ETC ETC)



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