Koeberg Nuclear Power Station Gantry

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Project Data

Project Details

The Koeberg Nuclear Power Station is based on the West Coast of South Africa and is exposed to the very corrosive, atmospheric conditions of the Atlantic Ocean, thus requiring long-term corrosion prevention for steel structures.

The ideal solution to protect such structures came in the form of the Denso Covercoat^™ system (known as the Steelcoat™ System in the UK). It offers long-term corrosion prevention with minimal surface preparation to structures in severe, corrosive environments. This minimal maintenance also offers excellent value for money, due to the systems long-life guarantee.

The Denso Covercoat system applied by RJ Southey has been in service for over 25 years in a C5 Marine environment and continues to provide excellent corrosion prevention. An inspection was carried out five years ago and mechanical damage of only 5% of the structure was discovered. The structure was prepared to a St2 standard and tape wrapped with the Denso Structural Steel Tape (Covercoat System).

The steel structure was prepared to a St2 standard, then primed with Denso Hi-Tack^™ Primer. Denso Hi-Tack^™ Tape was applied to the primed steel and over-coated with base coat. A scrim was then saturated onto the base-coated tape and once cured, top coated with Densoflex^™ pure acrylic top coat. The detailed sections were profiled with Denso Profiling Mastic^™ and then wrapped with the tape base coat, scrim and Densoflex topcoat.

One difficulty faced was the constant salt sea air from the Atlantic Ocean depositing salt on the steel structure prior to the application of the Denso Covercoat system. This was removed by constant fresh water washing.

The Denso Covercoat system has been used extensively in the Republic in acid plants (AECI, Foskor) where you not only have extreme industrial fallout but also a severe marine environment. Both these plants have had structures protected by the Denso Covercoat system for an extended period of time.