Author Archive for: Engineering News

The failure of the R536-million DCD Wind Towers facility, established in the Coega Special Economic Zone in 2013, has become the poster child for the damage inflicted when South Africa’s political infighting and intrigue gives way to policy uncertainty and stalled implementation. The investment made sense on several levels: it was aligned  with the global energy transition; it created 140 manufacturing jobs in an economy desperate to re-industrialise; it was established to produce a key component for a sector whose growth was underpinned by the country’s official electricity policy; it served a market growing in confidence in light of the international acclaim being showered on the procurement model facilitating its expansion; the activity was supported by an industrial policy that sought to unlock green manufacturing; and it had the financial backing of the State-owned Industrial Development Corporation and the province-owned Coega Development Corporation.

Energy project solutions provider UL has released a beta version of its Wind Resource Assessment Platform (WRAP) software, after the company began development on the wind energy yield assessment software last year. Released to market in June this year, UL renewable energy VP Michael Brower says WRAP ensures that the company is ideally equipped to support the local growing wind energy industry.

Environment, Fisheries and Forestry Minister Barbara Creecy has indicated that government is likely to integrate green-economy components into the country’s Covid-19 economic recovery strategy, details of which are yet to be released by President Cyril Ramaphosa. Speaking during a webinar on Thursday, Creecy said that there was a growing understanding within government that promoting a more sustainable economic trajectory, which supported greater climate resiliency, could open up new industries.

On Wednesday, Eskom celebrated the arrival of its long-awaited replacement steam generators at its Koeberg nuclear power station in the Western Cape. In a statement released by the power utility, it said its six new steam generators arrived at its power plant on Tuesday.

The steam generator replacement project, which is central to Eskom’s R20-billion programme to extend the 40-year design life of the Koeberg nuclear power station by a further 20 years, marked a major milestone this week with the arrival of the first units in Cape Town. The project, which was sanctioned by the Eskom board in 2010 and approved by the National Nuclear Regulator, involves the replacement of all six steam generators at Koeberg’s two units.