JOHANNESBURG - The energy regulator has given government the green light to procure nuclear energy.
The state hopes the procurement will help the country meet envisaged demand.
Energy expert Mohamed Madhi warns it's too little too late.
He says renewable energy will be much cheaper than nuclear in the near future.
"In 2009 and 2010, i was the the CEO of the largest nuclear company in the world and at that time South Africa was contemplating going nuclear.
"That was 14 years ago, and had we done it, let me quickly paint this picture for you, had we done it at that point, today we would have a fleet of nuclear power plants producing close to 10 gigawatts of nuclear power and we would have had no load-shedding," he said.
"We would have been one of the few countries in the continent that would have has surplus electricity.
"Can you imagine a situation where we have no load-shedding?"