- South Africa’s Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy, Mr Gwede Mantashe finally gazetted approval to add new electricity generation to the grid.
- The gazette approval took place last week.
- The move paves the way for REIPPP Round 5 to open but no time line for this is specified.
“Electricity produced from the new generation capacity shall be procured through one or more tendering procedures which are fair, equitable, transparent, competitive and cost -effective,” the gazette states.
Related news: South Africa’s risk mitigation 2000MW new generation procurement to be on line by June 2022.
The gazette paves the way for the fifth so-called bid window of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPP). Bids will also be received for wind, solar, gas, energy storage, as well as for coal and nuclear, but no clarification was given as to when bid window Round 5 will open.
Eskom is in the process of unbundling into three separate divisions namely; generation, transmission and distribution. The clarification and drawing up of the legal lines and framework between the three divisions are a critical function to the success of the unbundling. The new transmission company will sign the power purchase agreements (PPA’s) with independent power producers (IPP’s). Round 5 is only expected to be announced ‘open’ once the new transmission company is unbundled into an independent functioning entity. This is expected to happen in Q1, 2021.
The capacity allocations are outlined in the country’s Integrated Resource Plan (IRP). Provision has been made for the following new additional capacity by 2030:
- 1,500MW of coal;
- 2,500MW of hydro;
- 6,000MW of solar PV;
- 14,400MW of wind;
- 1,860MW of nuclear;
- 2,088MW for storage;
- 3,000MW of gas/diesel; and
- 4,000MW from other distributed generation, co-generation, biomass and landfill technologies.
Link to South Africa’s Integrated Resource Plan (IRP2019) HERE
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
