Mr. Xolisa Mabhongo, Group Executive from South Africa Nuclear Energy Corporation (People's Daily Online/Huang Jin)
Recently, with South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa's visit to China, bidding on the country's biggest nuclear power project has become the focus of the attention. Two Chinese nuclear companies, State Power Investment Cooperation and Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, participate in the competition for the project.
South Africa is an important target market of Chinese nuclear power industry. The country plans to build three nuclear power plants with total capacity of 9.6 million kilowatts and an investment of $83 billion. It is the largest investment in nuclear power in the history of South Africa.
People's Daily Online interviewed Mr. Xolisa Mabhongo, Group Executive from South Africa Nuclear Energy Corporation (NESCA) Wednesday, who is a member of the delegation of South African Deputy President.
Talking about the biggest nuclear power project, he said: "The selecting process of the nuclear power plants has not been started. It will start between July and the end of the year. So no contractor has been chosen yet."
Currently some countries including China, France, Russia and the United states have shown interests in the nuclear power project in South Africa. China's State Power Investment Group and Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, which jointly bid for the project, are confident about their third-generation nuclear power technology to be competed in South Africa's market.
Mabhongo said: "We think China has been very strong in capability of manufactures. Some components of the nuclear plant in South Africa will be manufactured in China. Besides technical training and project management, we can learn a lot from China such as manufacturing and localization. We also want to build the nuclear industry in South Africa like China did."
