Yesterday, a homeschool friend and I bundled the kids into the car and headed out to Duynefontein to visit Koeberg nuclear power stations visitor center which is situated about 35 minutes from Cape Town along the R27, West Coast Road.

About Koeberg nuclear plant
Koeberg nuclear power station is Africa’s first and only Nuclear power station owned by Eskom. Koeberg is efficient and safe and plays a vital role in ensuring a reliable supply of electricity to the national power grid.
Interestingly, Koeberg construction began in 1976 and has generated electricity since April 1984.
Koeberg’s two generators have an installed capacity of 1 940MWs (2 x 970MW).
Koeberg also boasts a pressurized water reactor design and the second-largest turbines in the Southern Hemisphere.
You can read more about Koeberg here

The visitor centre
The visitors centre invites learners, visitors, and educators to visit and enjoy an educational experience in the electricity production industry.
Greeted by a giant atom you enter an informative space with interactive exhibits, and a wealth of information displayed on posters and will enjoy an educational presentation to further understand both Koeberg and nuclear energy.
You will also get to understand the fission process, which is the way in which clean and safe power is generated.
Our visit
Hamish is only in Grade 1 and our group was a vast mix of homeschooled children aged 2 to 17, so the visit was tailored to allow us to freely interact with the exhibits and the amazing centre facilitator, Fifi then presented a highly informative presentation to try and accommodate her entire audience, no easy task at all.

Whilst Hamish shuffled in his seat a bit, the presentation was engaging and he walked away with quite a bit of new knowledge.
He was incredibly intrigued to discover that Koeberg uses Uranium as a fuel and eager to learn more about alternative fuels.
The presentation covers several science topics and is definitely well worth the visit.

I must admit I’m a little less worried about a nuclear mushroom cloud erupting after watching a jet crash into a reactive wall. Whilst the jet was atomized, the wall was still standing and the explosion was dramatically less than the nuclear explosive image I have in my mind. These walls are designed to absorb the blast and contain the bulk of the radioactivity.

The Koeberg reserve
Unfortunately, we weren’t able to visit the 3000ha reserve yesterday as it is currently closed to visitors and the winds were howling so our group chose not to go but, entry to the reserve is normally Free and you can enjoy one of two nature trails or the cycling trail.
Koeberg is home to a variety of fauna and flora, including 150 bird species, 9 amphibian species, 40 Reptile species, and more than a dozen small mammal species.
Read more about the reserve here
Contact details:
Thank you for sharing. I think outings like that inspire our kids.
Looks interesting! I wish they would build more of them…