Russia’s Rosatom promotes its technologies in Cape Town

17th July 2015

By: Kim Cloete

Creamer Media Correspondent

  

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A large delegation from Russia’s nuclear giant Rosatom has showcased its technologies for thermal power engineering at the PowerGen Africa conference in Cape Town. The thermal technology could be used in coal-fired or gas projects in South Africa.

Russia is widely considered to be the frontrunner to win the right to build nuclear power plants in South Africa. But Rosatom, Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation, would not be drawn on questions about the nuclear bid.

However, Rosatom executives gave an overview of the State corporation, which had 250 000 employees in over 360 companies and boasted an order portfolio of $101.4-billion. It is the second largest nuclear energy corporation in the world according to installed nuclear capacity and makes up 17% of the world nuclear fuel market.

Besides its dominance in nuclear power stations, it had extensive experience in thermal power technologies, which it was keen to share with South Africa. Rosatom had a separate thermal power utility.

Rosatom international business director Nikolay Drozdov said the corporation’s integrated expertise in thermal power stretched from the manufacturing and supply of equipment such as boilers, cooling towers and pumps to engineering solutions, and finance and insurance. 

The entity had supplied power generation plants for thermal power to countries in Europe, as well as to China, India and Vietnam, besides other countries.

While the South African government aims to scale back on coal-fired power stations, with more funds being ploughed into renewable energy, nuclear, hydro and gas, there are still plans within the government’s energy plan to build another coal-fired power station.

Rosatom used the example of its South Ural TPP-2 thermal power project about 2 000 km from Moscow, to showcase its work in thermal power stations. The plant mainly uses gas to generate electricity and will provide 840 MW of installed capacity.

To deliver within budget and on schedule, Rosatom used innovative technology to ensure careful planning of the construction and an optimum workforce at its South Ural project. The construction team was, on a daily basis, sent a three-dimensional computerised model to work off every day. This allowed the team to visualise and plan construction and assembly and to work out daily tasks. The technology also allowed the company to see the actual time spent on the works by each employee.

This shortened the construction time span by 20%.

Russia’s Consul General in Cape Town Roman Ambarov said South Africa had become Russia’s major partner on the African continent.

“The power sector is of major importance to us. It is clear that we have exceptional opportunities for mutual beneficial cooperation in the energy sector.”

Rosatom had also been working with the University of the North-West, with 200 South African students studying in Russian technological institutes to get degrees in nuclear science.

The company had worked with several African countries and had plans to build nuclear power plants in Egypt.

Edited by Chanel de Bruyn
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor Online

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