Breaking News
- South Africa’s President, Cyril Ramaphosa, has announced sweeping measures aimed to ramp up much needed energy generation capacity in the country that will bring an end to loadshedding.
- In a special television address earlier this evening, Ramaphosa outlined a range of measures that include removing regulatory requirements and the 100MW threshold limit for embedded generation projects, doubling capacity procurement in REIPPPP Bid Window 6, accelerating procurement of gas power and battery storage plus improve Eskom’s generation capacity through restaffing and procurement reforms.
Appealing to the entire nation, Ramaphosa said “Our overriding priority is to improve Eskom’s plant performance and add as much new capacity to the grid as possible, as quickly as possible. This requires removing barriers to investment in new capacity and unlocking energy from many different sources – including Eskom, independent private power producers (IPPs), businesses and households – as part of a collective, national effort.”
The main takeaways for IPP’s, EPC’s and solar installers are:
Give Eskom permission to procure excess energy from existing IPPs and allow it to buy energy from entities that produce their own power – like mines or industrial operations.
The IPP Procurement Programme
The president announced that government also wants to ensure that its existing procurement programmes through the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Programme (REIPPPP) are speedliy expidited. Bid window 5 of the programme which is experiencing financial close delays will be assisted to ensure that all projects close by adopting a pragmatic approach to local content requirements.
The president said that Bid Window 6, which is still open and aims to procure 2600MW, will be doubled to 5200MW. Further bid windows will be exbidited on an adhoc basis.
Embedded generation threshold removed completely
The president said that the 100MW threshold for embedded generation capacity will be removed completely. Options are also being considered to enable private generation at a massive scale by reducing red tape, waiving regulatory requirements as far as possible and exploring new legislation. Commercial enterprises and households will be incentivised to install rooftop solar by developing a feed-in tariff to can sell power to Eskom.
Link to Ramaphosa’s full speech HERE
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
