A January Cape High Court ruling on the demonstration pebble bed modular reactor nuclear project at Koeberg won’t affect Eskom’s proposed nuclear sites in the Eastern Cape.

The electricity utility owns land at Thuyspunt in Oyster Bay near St Francis.

The site was on a short list for the pebble bed demo plant before Koeberg was chosen. The Coega industrial development zone has also more recently been suggested as a nuclear plant site.

Pebble bed communications manager Tom Ferreira said the Cape Town court ruling had not been about the merits of the project or nuclear power in general.

“It was solely about a technical point in the environmental impact assessment process. The judge thought the (national environmental affairs and tourism) department should have afforded (environmental activist NGO) Earthlife the opportunity to make submissions after the submission of the final EIA.

“He ruled that the department is obliged to give Earthlife and others the opportunity to make those submissions.”

In terms of the EIA process, having given the public time to comment on the issue, the department must also apply its mind to that comment, before issuing a final decision on whether it should be allowed to go ahead or not. The submissions that will now be allowed focus on the economic feasibility of the project at Koeberg and the onus it places on the taxpayer.

Earthlife brought the case specifically against the director-general of the department, Dr Chippy Olver. The court found that the director-general made his ruling on the final EIA while he had only allowed comment on the draft EIA, which was substantially different.

Olver, responding smartly to the court ruling against him, said the department has announced it will be challenging the ruling.

Ferreira said his understanding was that the criticism of the Koeberg proposal was not about the site but about pebble bed reactors and nuclear technology generally.

“The point is it will not make any sense for Eskom to start looking away from Koeberg. It is not about the site.”

It is understood the corporation backed away from Thuyspunt as a possible site because of the strong opposition from the St Francis community.

But Eskom spokesman Fani Zulu said yesterday that Koeberg had been chosen because it made sense to extend the existing nuclear operation.

Once the environment department appeal has been heard and the matter finalised, Eskom will have a better idea if it can meet its 2007 deadline for the construction of the demo pebble bed reactor at Koeberg, he said.