Early this month, while briefing Parliament, Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe dropped a bombshell. He announced a commitment to develop a roadmap for a programme to build new nuclear power plants (NPPs) with a total capacity of 2 500 MW. But that wasn’t the bombshell. What was the bombshell was his statement that he was willing to look at innovative funding options for the new NPPs. In fact, he told MPs that any new NPPs could be built by the private sector, as was the case with the country’s renewable-energy power plants.

“If a company or a consortium wants to develop nuclear modular reactors, it must come and make a presentation,” he said. “We can partner with that company as the State; we may even give that company a right to develop a modular nuclear station on a ‘build, operate and transfer’ basis, which means there may be no immediate calls for funding from the State, but the build programme can continue. All we are highlighting in our plan is that we are going to explore all options and, if there is appetite for nuclear in the market, we will go ahead with it.”

Mantashe’s comments seemed focused on the potential of small modular reactors (SMRs) – reactors with a capacity of less than 300 MW. Moreover, because of their modular design, key SMR assemblies and subassemblies would be produced in a factory.

These two factors – their smallness and their modularity – would greatly reduce both their costs and the time needed to build an SMR NPP. In turn, the result would be to make private-sector funding for such units in South Africa a much more credible proposition. Mantashe’s readiness to look at both SMRs and at the possibility of private-sector funding and building them promises a revolution as well as a rejuvenation for the local nuclear industry.

Previously, the main focus on new NPPs in South Africa had been on large pressurised water reactor (PWR) NPPs (each of the reactors of which would have a capacity three to four times greater than that of a 300 MW SMR), with funding either entirely by the State and/or by the State-owned national electricity utility, Eskom. The burden and risk of payment, whether upfront or through the servicing and repayment of State-guaranteed debt, would have been borne (directly and/or indirectly) by the taxpayer. The SMR option promises to eliminate that burden.

SMR designs come in two main categories – Generation III+ and Generation IV. Generation III+ designs are miniaturised PWRs. Generation IV includes high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTRs). South Africa’s pebbled-bed modular reactor (PBMR), effectively halted a decade ago, was an HTR SMR. It is a bitter thought indeed that, a decade ago, South Africa was the world leader in SMRs in general and in HTR SMRs in particular. Now the country, with only minimal local research and development, lags badly behind other countries which are beginning to put serious money into the SMR concept.

Russia is currently the leader in the SMR field. Its State-owned nuclear group, Rosatom, has built a floating power station, the Akademik Lomonosov NPP, fitted with two reactors. This was commissioned at the remote Russian Arctic coastal town of Pevek in December. Its two reactors have a combined output of 64 MW. These are KLT-40S reactors, derived from the reactors developed to power Russia’s nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet, but using low-enriched uranium for their fuel.

But, if Russia was first in getting SMRs into operation, China seems to be in the lead regarding HTR SMRs. At Shidaowan, in Shandong province, a demonstration HTR SMR plant is scheduled to start operating this year. This plant comprises two reactor modules driving a single 210 MWe steam turbine. The reactor design is designated the HTR-PM and, a final point, it is the Chinese version of the PBMR.

Given that South Africa started work on its PBMR years before China commenced its project, it seems pretty safe to assert that, if the country had continued with its programme, a South African PBMR demonstrator plant would have been commissioned a few years ago, just in time for the global surge of interest in SMRs, and would have been the centre of global attention. It is likely there would have been foreign investments in, and overseas contracts for, the PBMR. Alas! It was not to be. I know it is no use crying over spilt milk, but please give me a couple of minutes to have a quiet cry.

Back to business. There are many other SMR projects out there, all over the world. The World Nuclear Association lists 14 SMRs of different designs under construction or in advanced stages of development (not counting the two already operating on the floating NPP in Russia).

For example, the lead US project is probably NuScale, a private-sector company that has benefited from US government funding (since 2013, 67% of NuScale’s funding has been from private investors, and 33% from the Federal government). It is developing a 60 MWe light (that is, normal) water reactor and its first SMR module is expected to be operational by late 2026 and the entire 12-module NPP operational before the end of 2027.

And, in the UK, Rolls-Royce heads a consortium of mainly British companies and research institutions developing an SMR design with a capacity of 440 MWe (large by SMR standards), with the first expected to come into operation in the early 2030s. Currently, the project is being funded 50:50 by the consortium and the UK government.

Adoption of both SMR technology and private-sector financing would revitalise the South African nuclear sector, but not bring the large-scale benefits a national PBMR programme would have. Decentralised projects, with decentralised funding, to meet differing needs, suggest that different consortia would adopt different SMR designs. While there would undoubtedly be some localisation, it would not be on the scale that the local PBMR programme would have provided. And, as for reactivating the PBMR, who has the money to do that?