Pelindaba

Pelindaba is South Africa or Valindaba main nuclear research center near the Hartbeespoort Dam, about 33 km (22 miles) west of Pretoria. It has been operated since 1999 by the state-owned enterprises Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa ( NECSA ) and the place was developed at the South African nuclear bombs in the 1970s, built and were then placed in storage. According to the U.S. State Department in September 1979 to South Africa a nuclear test ( Vela Incident ) have carried out from its coast with an explosive force from 2.5 to 3 kilotons.

Currently, radiation research and nuclear waste disposal, the main areas of work. The research center operates a reactor with 20 MW capacity and a particle accelerator with a 4- megavolt Van de Graaff generator.

The research reactor was designed in 1960 as part of a peaceful nuclear program Atoms for Peace, was named SAFARI -1 (1st South African Fundamental Atomic Research Installation) and ran from 1965 with an initial capacity of 6.75 MW. The power was limited by the cooling system. In 1968, the power was increased to 20 MW after the capacity of the cooling system had been expanded. As a fissile material initially highly enriched uranium from the United States was used. In 1970, the state-controlled Uranium Enrichment Corporation ( UCOR ) was established with the goal, called an enrichment plant, Y is planning to build in Velindaba. Balthazar Johannes Vorster Prime Minister sat in the same year the Parliament on notice that the Atomic Energy Authority of South Africa (South African Atomic Energy Board ) has driven an unprecedented concept of uranium enrichment on the basis of the gas -jet technology. The construction of the experimental uranium enrichment plant was started in 1971. It was operational from March 1977 and delivered in January 1978 fissionable material. In mid-2006 was converted to low-enriched uranium. In September 1989 President Frederik Willem de Klerk gave orders to end the nuclear weapons program. Currently, uranium is used from the disused South African nuclear weapons.

According to some sources, believes South Africa became the technology of uranium enrichment plant in Velindaba ( Pelindaba East or Y -plant ) through a cooperation with German companies and scientists. Fissile material was delivered from here to the operation of the nuclear power station Koeberg. The German Government confirmed at the time that there was a collaboration between the South African ESCOM and the private Institute of Nuclear Safety, which was stopped in 1976 on their notice of opposition. In the course of this cooperation, it came to aspects of site selection as well as design issues and it was South Africans have been allowed to work in West German nuclear research facilities.