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Koeberg nuclear power plant

Koeberg nuclear power plant is a nuclear power station in South Africa with 2 operating units totalling 1,940 MW gross. The site has 2 units on record in total.

Operating1circle area ∝ site capacity Coastlines, borders and lakes: Natural Earth (1:10 million, public domain), which is generalised, so a coastal plant can sit a couple of kilometres off its true shoreline. Site positions: Global Nuclear Power Tracker.
Units on record
2
Operating
2
Operating capacity
1,940MW

Units

UnitStatusTypeModelGross MWOnline
Unit 1 Operating PWR CP1 970 1984
Unit 2 Operating PWR CP1 970 1985

Koeberg nuclear power plant in context

Koeberg nuclear power plant is the only operating nuclear site in South Africa on record, so it holds all of the country's operating capacity, and ranks 96th of 172 operating sites worldwide by gross capacity.

Its operating units started up between 1984 and 1985; the median unit is 41.5 years old.

The 2 units with both construction and grid dates on record took 7.8 to 9.1 years (median 8.4) from construction start to grid connection; the median across all reactors connected in the 1980s is 7.3 years.

No other nuclear site with an exact position in this dataset lies within 300 km.

2 operating units are rated differently now from their design net capacities: Unit 1 +0.3% and Unit 2 +1.0%.

The tracker lists a planned retirement year, a forecast and not a decision on record, for 1 operating unit: Unit 1 (2044).

Build time by unit

UnitConstruction startGrid connectionYearsFleet median, same decade
Unit 1197619847.87.3 (1980s)
Unit 2197619859.17.3 (1980s)

How these are worked out: ranks use gross operating capacity; ages count from the start-up year on record, as on the age page; build times run from construction start to grid connection, as on the build-times page; ratings are the tracker's net and design net capacity, as on the uprates page. Distances are straight-line between exact positions, so a site with only an approximate position gets none. A unit missing a date or a rating is left out of the figure that needs it.

Site detail
LocationWestern Cape, South Africa
Coordinates-33.6746, 18.4321
Elevationabout 15 mabove sea level
SettingOn the sea coast, 1.1 km from the water
RegionSub-Saharan Africa
Units by status
Operating: 2

Elevation is read at the listed coordinates from a 30 m terrain model (SRTM 30 m). Two independent models differ by a median of 6 m across our plants and by up to about 40 m on steep or coastal ground, and a point on a shoreline can read as sea level. Distance to the water is measured to a generalised 1:10 million coastline, so a few kilometres or less is not resolved. This is context, not a design-basis or flood-risk figure.

Owners & operators
Owners
Eskom
Operators
Eskom

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Sources

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