Gottschalk, Keith2014-01-202014-01-202013http://hdl.handle.net/10566/956Paper presented at the South African Association of Political Studies regional colloquium, Unisa, Pretoria, 4 October 2013.South Africa needs to both increase its electricity generation, and to incrementally transition from fossil fuels to renewable sources. The most cost-effective strategy would be a mix of imported hydropower, solar power, and imported gas, which is cleaner than burning local coal. A small but skilful atomic power lobby driven by a relatively few bureaucrats, engineers, and politicians has successfully dominated electricity decision-making over choice of generation options under both late apartheid and the first two decades of democracy. The Government’s tenacious determination to choose atomic power is price-inelastic, which indicates that political considerations, not economic, are the driver.enThis file may be freely used for educational uses, as long as it is not altered in any way. No commercial reproduction or distribution of this file is permitted without written permission of the authors.Atomic powerSouth AfricaElectricityPolicy choiceConference Paper