- Making significant progress in the US government commitment in support of JET-P, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) have awarded a $1.3 million technical assistance grant to Eskom Hld SOC Ltd
This grant aims to explore innovative technologies that can revolutionize power delivery to millions of South African to expand and strengthen South Africa’s constrained electricity transmission grid.
South Africa needs to add more than 1500 km of new transmission lines annually over the next ten years. This is to ensure transmission capacity to accommodate more than 50 GW of new generation power which will mainly come from intermittent renewable energy (wind and solar projects). Currently, Eskom’s transmission division is adding 300 km of new power lines annually. In the last ten years, only 4 347 km of new powerlines were added.
Another challenge is transformer capacity. More than 122 600 MVA transformation capacity would have to be added, representing 77% of Eskom’s current installed base of just over 160 000 MVA. In the last ten years, only 19 060 MVA has been added to the grid infrastructure.
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
