WESTINGHOUSE BACKS PEBBLE BED REACTOR WITH
PURCHASE OF SOUTH AFRICA’S ISTN . . .
South Africa’s ISTN, which is under contract to design
key systems for a Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR),
will be purchased by Westinghouse
Electric Company (Monroeville, PA)
after approval by the South Africa
Competition Commission. Terms were
not disclosed at this time.
Industrial Info Resources reports
that Nick Liparulo, VP Engineering
Services for Westinghouse, said ISTN
was a key participant in developing the
PBMR, that his company had long been
a proponent of this project, and that the
acquisition would allow Westinghouse
to become even more involved as the
PBMR moves towards commercializa-
tion. ISTN recently supplied the helium
test facility for the reactor and is working
on the design of systems for the demon-
stration unit to be built at Koeberg, on
the Cape Atlantic coast, by 2011.
Westinghouse is working with
South Africa’s power utility Eskom
(Johannesburg) and other U.S.-based
investors on the project. With Eskom
moving on a $21 billion expansion pro-
gram, Westinghouse looks to expand
ISTN’s scope to include servicing light
water reactors in the country, as 20
percent of new generating capacity is
targeted to be nuclear to diversify base
load generation away from coal-feed.
The market also holds prospects for the
company’s third generation AP1000 sys-
tems. ISTN, operating as Westinghouse
Electric South Africa, will be an impor-
tant growth hub for both the PBMR
and PWR business.
In August, the PBMR company
will hand a safety analysis report to
Eskom as the first commercial user. In
2008, the report will then be handed
to the National Nuclear Regulator for a
year-review period. Scheduling the first
multimodule plant of the high efficiency
and high safety reactor for commer-
cial installation in 2015, the company
has already appointed some suppliers:
Mitsubishi will manufacture the heavy
