REIPPP must power up to boost an ailing economy crippled by rolling blackouts

Eleven years down the line, the first bid window opened — one can’t help but wonder what progress has actually been made as we sit with more blackouts than ever before.

According to the popular Eskom se Push app, as at 14 December, South Africa had 3,380 hours — 141 days — of rolling blackouts in 2022.

That translates to almost 40% (38.3%) of the year with no power — a massive increase from the 836 hours or 35 days of rolling blackouts in 2015.

The idea behind the REIPPP was ostensibly to push more power into the national grid using renewable energy resources. Qualifying technology includes onshore wind, solar PV, solar thermal, biomass solid, biogas, landfill gas and small hydro plants.

Winning bidders sign power purchase agreements (PPAs) that are guaranteed for 20 years.

The process took the form of a series of reverse auctions, starting with bid window one in December 2011, bid window two in May 2012, bid window three in October 2013, bid window four in April 2015 and bid window five in June 2015, followed by bid window six in April 2022.

Despite the bidding for bid window five having kicked off seven years ago, only 19 of 25 producers have signed PPAs, and 13 of these were signed only last week. The projects that have signed on are:

• Developer Scatec with Grootfontein PV1, PV2, PV3 in Touwsrivier;


• Developer Engie-Pele consortium with Grootspruit solar PV and Sannaspos solar PV in Allenridge and Botshabelo, Free State, as well as Graspan solar PV in Ritchie, Northern Cape;


• Developer Total Mulilo with Du Plessis Dam solar PV in De Aar, Northern Cape; and


• Developer Ikamva consortium with Kentani, Klipfontein 1 and 2, Leliehoek, Braklaagte, and Sonoblomo solar facilities all in Dealesville, Free State.

The total investment attracted from all 19 projects that have signed to date under bid window 5 is R34.3-billion — and the 19 signed projects are expected to create 7,701 job opportunities.

Bid window six received 56 submissions by October this year and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe last week announced five projects as preferred bidders, bringing a total of 860MW to the table.

The sixth bid window had called for new generation capacity of 4,200MW, made up of 3,200 MW wind energy resources and 1,000 MW solar photovoltaic energy resources.

Visit Daily Maverick’s home page for more news, analysis and investigations

The bid window six preferred bidders are Kutlwano, Boitumelo, Virginia, and Good Hope solar parks, as well as Doornhoek PV.

The five projects are based in the Free State and North West.

Due to increased input costs, these five projects have achieved a weighted average tariff of R490.48, which is up 8% from the tariffs (R454.23) achieved for projects in bid window 5.

The total investment attracted through the five projects is R12.1-billion, and they are expected to create 4,556 jobs during construction and operations.

The Department of Energy has flagged the point that, although it received onshore wind bid responses amounting to 4,116 MW in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape supply areas, it was unable to award any of the wind projects because Eskom has no grid capacity available to connect any proposed onshore wind projects in these areas.

Business Unity SA estimates that Stage 4 load shedding costs the economy R1-billion a day. While the REIPPP has added 1,909MW of energy to the grid to date, it is proving to be too little, too late. BM/DM