South African officials, faced with continued power outages that are hurting the country’s economy, are turning to nuclear power in an effort to support a more reliable supply of electricity.
The country has experienced intermittent blackouts, part of a process known as load shedding, since 2008. The outages, imposed by state-owned utility Eskom, have escalated to record levels this year as the power company cuts the electricity supply to keep the grid from collapsing, as demand for power outstrips supply. The outages usually last two to four hours, at times more than once each day. Some blackouts this year have gone as long as 10 hours.
