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South Africa’s energy production industry is on track for a drastic overhaul, due to opening up to alternatives outside Eskom, according to Relationship.
A number of key changes, allowed through recent government decisions, indicate that Eskom’s monopoly on power generation is fading.
These events include:
- The acquisition of 2,000MW of emergency power from independent power producers (IPP).
- Approval to buy another 11,800MW of generation capacity from the IPPs starting in December or January.
- High-demand energy users, such as mines, have been allowed to generate their own electricity or buy directly from independent producers.
- Projects with a capacity of less than 1MW no longer require a power generation license.
- Municipalities can generate their own electricity or buy energy directly from independent suppliers.
Furthermore, Eskom’s ongoing split provides for the creation of a separate transmission company in 2021.
Eskom CEO André de Ruyter has previously explained The Independent Transmission and System Operator (ITSMO) will focus directly on the transmission system, including non-discriminatory third party access to the network.
This means that it would be easier for private entrances to the generation market to connect to the national electricity grid.
There is no other option for the government
Renewable energy expert Mike Levington told Rapport that the government no longer had a choice but to allow independent producers to enter the energy mix.
One of the main reasons was that Eskom was struggling to meet demand on its own and had to implement more load shedding in the first seven months of 2020 than in all of 2019.
Financiers have also increasingly pushed the use of renewable energy, such as wind and solar, rather than fossil fuels.
Levington said De Ruyter’s pragmatic approach has shown him positive steps to introduce more renewables.
Forecast of load shedding
On Thursday, Eskom provided an update on what South Africans can expect in terms of load reduction in the coming months.
Speaking at the utility’s system status briefing, De Ruyter said that several factors have led to a significant risk of loss of load in 2020.
He said significant maintenance is underway for a long time, and design flaws at Medupi and Kusile are being fixed, the results of which are promising.
“All of this will contribute to a radical change in the availability of our generation system by April next year,” said De Ruyter.
“But this is still not enough to completely eliminate the risk of loss of load.”
“There is more work to be done, but we anticipate that by September next year, we will have been able to significantly reduce, but not eliminate, the risk of cargo loss going forward.”
This means that the load outage will remain a threat for most of 2021, and any major disruption to the national power grid will likely result in the need to impose power outages in the country.
The load reduction forecast was summarized as follows:
- Now – April 2021 – Risk of loss of load
- April 2021 – Step change in generation capacity
- April 2021 – September 2021 – The risk of loss of load remains during the winter period
- September 2021 – Reduced risk of loss of load
Independent power producers will also play an important role in helping Eskom counter the loss of power generation capacity of 8,000 to 12,000 MW in the coming years due to the decommissioning of old power plants.
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