From green field to superstructure – Kusile Auxiliary Cooling Tower project

Kusile power station is one of the new build power stations in the Eskom portfolio and will have an installed capacity of 4800 MW Once completed, Kusile will be the fourth largest coal fired power station in the world.  We were awarded the contract to supply the auxiliary cooling towers for the plant in 2011 and have been working on the project since.

Two, four-cell, concrete induced draught cooling towers have been built to reject all the heat from the various auxiliary processes that support the six power generating units. Each cooling tower cell is designed to reject 27.6 MW at a flow rate of 1106 L/s to provide sufficient cooling to the various end users on the power station. Each cooling tower cell is fitted with a 30-foot fibreglass fan that is electrically driven to establish the air flow through the cooling towers. These fans are driven with variable speed drives to provide considerable energy savings for the client.

Currently we are nearing final handover for the complete project with minor construction activities and commissioning remaining for the Eastern Plant. At completion of this project it will be rewarding to see how this green field project materialised to be a superstructure that overlooks the adjacent farmlands. IWC’s cooling towers can clearly be seen on either side of the plant. We look forward to seeing how the towers perform as soon as the commissioning activities take place on site.