Unit 1 of Koeberg Nuclear Power Station in Cape Town has been synchronised to the grid and came back on stream on Saturday, according to an Eskom statement.
This followed the replacement of the three steam generators as part of the power utility’s application for a licence to operate the facility for another 20 years.
Koeberg was designed to operate for 40 years, and its current licence from the national nuclear regulator expires in July 2024 after it went into service in 1984 when Unit 1 was linked to the grid.
Unit 1 was taken offline in December last year and work was supposed to take six months.
The project – put out to tender in 2010 – is therefore a long way behind the original schedule.
The plan is now to take Unit 2 offline to have its steam generators replaced.
Eskom said the Unit 2 outage effects would be similar to those experienced with the shutdown of Unit 1, but the lessons from the Unit 1 installation should minimise installation time.
Each unit generates 920MWs, which is one load-shedding stage.
