The price of electricity generated by nuclear power is expected to be higher than that from any other technology except for gas and diesel‚ two separate and independent analyses have found‚ the newspaper reported.

The government is pressing ahead with a politically driven plan to procure 9 600 MW of nuclear power‚ but has not revealed what it will cost or provided detailed information of the effect it can be expected to have on the electricity price path.

In the absence of official information‚ the expert analyses provide the first real evidence of the effect nuclear energy will have on the price consumers are likely to pay for electricity.

The analyses illustrate that nuclear electricity could be more expensive than that generated by new coal plants‚ solar photovoltaic panels or wind. The studies differ slightly but both project a long-run or levellised cost of electricity for each technology‚ inclusive of capital‚ finance‚ maintenance and fuel costs.

In the first‚ Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) energy centre manager Tobias Bischof-Niemz projects the levellised cost of electricity from nuclear power to be R1/kWh‚ from new coal R0.80/ kWh‚ solar photovoltaic R0.80/kWh and wind R0.60/kWh in today’s prices.