Eskom has announced that there will not be any Stage 5 loadshedding for the week, as previously communicated; however, Stage 4 will continue until further notice.  This is due to the return of generating units at Kriel, Majuba and Matimba power stations. 
For South Africa to take full advantage of the opportunities presented by the growing global demand for green hydrogen, management consulting firm McKinsey managing partner of South Africa Kannan Lakmeeharan believes swift action is needed to move from feasibility to investment decisions. Speaking to Engineering News on March 7 at a McKinsey-hosted event focusing on green hydrogen, which ran alongside the African Energy Indaba, in Cape Town, he said that derisking green hydrogen projects by securing some form of uptake was crucial.
The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) tells Engineering News that Minister Barbara Creecy has received a letter from Eskom requesting her to issue directions in terms of the disaster management regulations to exclude the construction of the temporary stacks at Kusile from environmental requirements. The state of disaster regulations issued on February 28, include Regulation 5(1)(i) which empowers Creecy to issue directions “excluding upgrades, refurbishments, adjustments and repairs of existing energy infrastructure and existing generation, transmission and distribution facilities” from environmental legislation.
Karpowership, the Turkish company seeking to supply 1 220 MW of electricity to South Africa, had one of three appeals against adverse environmental rulings rejected, a person with knowledge of the matter said, potentially delaying a solution to the country’s power crisis. The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment rejected the appeal to moor a ship-mounted power plant capable of generating about 450 MW at the Coega harbor in the Eastern Cape province, the person said. Decisions on plants planned at the Saldanha and Richards Bay harbors have yet to be communicated to the company, the person said, asking not be identified because the government hasn’t made the information public.