Cape Town - After President Cyril Ramaphosa’s response to the energy crisis on Monday night, energy and environmental stakeholders welcomed the measures, particularly the decision to remove the arbitrary threshold for renewable energy generation and the removal of red tape to allow for the immediate start of numerous energy projects.
However, some remained sceptical about certain measures and the implementation of this energy security roadmap.
Ramaphosa said the government intended to accelerate the procurement of new generation capacity through numerous measures – such as ensuring that all projects from Bid Window 5 of the renewable energy programme started construction on schedule, and doubling the amount of new generation capacity procured through Bid Window 6 for wind and solar power from 2 600MW to 5 200MW.
The government would also enable and incentivise businesses and households to invest in rooftop solar to generate electricity.
These moves were massively supported by civil society and organisations, including the South African Wind Energy Association (Sawea).
Sawea CEO Niveshen Govender said that to deliver on the required generation capacity, as outlined, it was necessary to urgently address and prioritise the grid capacity challenges.
Premier Alan Winde and Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis were both cautiously optimistic about the president’s plan.
Winde said: “It is currently not clear whether the proposed streamlining of legislation and regulations includes processes for municipal independent power producer (IPP) procurement.
“This will need to be clarified. In the Western Cape, we are working closely with municipalities so they can develop the capacity to procure directly from IPPs, through our Municipal Energy Resilience Programme, and so this is important.”
Hill-Lewis said the City would continue with its plans to become independent of Eskom and ultimately end load shedding in Cape Town.
“I’m concerned that the president’s plan continues to double down on Eskom as the primary solution to the nation’s power crisis – when it is, in fact, the cause.
“The fundamental and systemic problems at Eskom will not be solved overnight,” he said.
After years of campaigning for more renewable energy generation, civil society groups supported the measures to increase renewable energy systems and to allow for households and businesses to feed power to the national power grid.