Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (Company)
| PBMR (Pty) Ltd. | |
|---|---|
| legal form | Ltd. |
| founding | 1999 |
| Seat | Centurion , South Africa |
| management | Alex Tsela (CEO) |
| Number of employees | 2010: approx. 900,
later about 10 |
| Branch | Nuclear technology |
| Website | pbmr.com |
Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR Ltd.) is a semi-public South African company based in Centurion , which had set itself the goal of building a nuclear pebble bed reactor with helium turbine in Koeberg near Cape Town on the basis of German licenses and with the support of the Jülich Research Center .
history
In Germany work on pebble bed reactors had been going on since the late 1950s. ABB and Siemens Interatom also developed modular concepts, such as the HTR module with 200 MW th based on the AVR Jülich .
These developments were largely stopped after the failure of the prototype thorium high-temperature reactor (THTR) in the late 1980s. In 1988 Johan Slabber, later the Technical Director (CTO) of the “Pebble Bed Modular Reactor”, met with Rudolf Schulten and Kurt Kugeler . Here the idea for the production of a South African pebble bed reactor was born, which was to be manufactured by the local industry. Slabber was a leading developer of the atomic bombs of the then South African apartheid government . The first South African efforts to use PBMR technology were in reality aimed at military use, namely as a drive for nuclear submarines , since classic nuclear technology was no longer available due to the international embargo against apartheid. It was only after the end of apartheid in 1994 that a civilian nuclear project emerged.
From 1998 to 2008 PBMR Ltd. expanded. to almost 1000 employees and approx. 1500 external workers. PBMR Ltd. among the world's largest nuclear technology providers. Due to escalating costs and schedules, safety and technical problems and a lack of customers for the planned reactor, the South African government decided in September 2010 to largely dissolve the company and leave only around 10 employees to manage the level of knowledge that had been developed. This decision was implemented by the end of 2010. Rainer Moormann's revelations on hidden problems of pebble bed reactors are cited as the impetus for the failure of the PBMR reactor and the decline of the company . Moormann received the 2011 Whistleblower Prize for this .
Web links
- The end is near for the PBMR. on nirs.org (PDF, English)
- Annual Report 2010. (PDF, English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c History - How did PBMR begin? on pbmr.com, accessed February 22, 2014.
- ^ International Conference: The Historical Dimensions of South Africa's Nuclear Weapons Program. accessed on February 22, 2014.
- ^ Address by the minister of public enterprises, Barbara Hogan, to the National assembly, on the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor. ( Memento of the original from May 12, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Department Public Enterprises South Africa, September 16, 2010, accessed February 2, 2014.
