by Roger Lilley, editor of Energize magazine, EE Publishers

Hot on the heels of reports that the South African president and his minister of energy have signed memorandums of understanding with the Russian and French governments respectively for cooperation in the field of nuclear technology for the generation of electricity in South Africa, interested parties gathered to debate the desirability and affordability of the proposed nuclear new-build programme in South Africa.

Click here for the slide presentations and voting results at the debate

Surprisingly, despite the presence in the audience of a large number of delegates from NECSA, Eskom and engineering companies, the result of the voting on the motions at the debate was not simply in favour of proceeding with the nuclear new-build programme as soon as possible.

The debate, which was hosted by EE Publishers and The Daily Maverick, was held at the AxisWorkgroup Auditorium in Midrand on 30 October 2014. Approximately 230 people attended the event, and an additional 138 logged in to watch the live video feed online.

• Motion 1: "Nuclear energy is inappropriate for SA for safety and environmental reasons, and should be abandoned".
• Motion 2: "Nuclear energy should be carefully re-examined in respect of affordability, flexibility, safety and environmental considerations before any committed decisions are made for a nuclear new build programme in SA".
• Motion 3: "Nuclear energy is an important part of the energy mix in SA, and a transparent, competitive and cost effective procurement process should proceed as soon as possible".

On behalf of Eskom, you are cordially invited to two important technical seminars as follows:

You are invited to a seminar presenting new information about SA domestic customer load behaviour.

DATE: 12 November 2014
VENUE: John Maree Auditorium, Eskom Academy of Learning, Midrand
COST: R350 per person attending

Eskom and some municipalities have been co-operating via the NRS 034 Domestic Load Research Project in collecting loading data of domestic customers for the last 18 years. All this data is in a database linked to tariff and demographic, climatic and spatial information. The load data has been analysed and converted into user-friendly formats for users of load data. The analysis will be presented at the seminar and made available to attendees.

Click here for further information and seminar content 
Click here for registration form 

Alternatively, for further information and registration, contact Buhle Dhlamini buhle.dhlamini@eskom.co.za
DATE: 13 November 2014
VENUE: John Maree Auditorium, Eskom Academy of Learning, Midrand
COST: R350 per person attending

Planners and forecasters are under ever increasing pressure to deal with a more uncertain future, with larger and larger data sets having to be processed. Traditionally data sets are highly structured, but the growing trend is to mine value from unstructured data. While doing analysis, modelling and forecasting, it is imperative to access unstructured data (news articles and the like) from the core component of market Intelligence, combined with time series, spatial and other data (e.g. traditional data warehouse) to give more rich intelligence. Eskom RT&D is offering you the opportunity to get up to speed with these exciting developments.

Click here for further information and seminar content 
Click here for registration form

Alternatively, for further information and registration, contact Buhle Dhlamini buhle.dhlamini@eskom.co.za

 
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