Almost two-thirds of township businesses have been forced to shed jobs because of loadshedding, according to a new report. But business owners say the situation is even direr – they face closing if the power outages continue. According to the Nedbank Insights Report, conducted in partnership with the Township Entrepreneurs Alliance (TEA), 64% of small township businesses cease operations during loadshedding and almost 66% of business owners have cut jobs because of loadshedding.
Criminality was the likely cause of the collapse of seven pylons, which supported 132kV powerlines, on the N4 in Pretoria on Sunday night, according to City of Tshwane Mayor Cilliers Brink. “There are now clear indications that at least three of the pylons had been vandalised. So, indeed, there are strong indications that criminality played a role here,” he said in an update on Monday.
Spain is providing €2.1-billion ($2.3-billion) to help fund South Africa’s energy transition and water needs, even as some of the world’s richest nations struggle to push forward on a ground-breaking climate-finance initiative with the continent’s most-industrialized country. The Spanish funding is being provided through a mixture of financial instruments, with the country’s government working with its development finance institution, Cofides, and South Africa’s Industrial Development Corp., said Ambassador Raimundo Robredo Rubio.
Energy development company Siemens Energy on April 6 highlighted the benefits of its new solar thermal energy and storage solution, highlighting the potential it could have to “revolutionise” the way in which energy is produced and used to power society. Outlining the innovation, Siemens Energy project director Dr Ulrich Hueck said solar power exceeds all other energy reserves; therefore, there needs to be a means to make use of it at night, with it having the potential to power the world during the day.
Tax-leveraged investment specialist Anuva Investments has successfully deployed funds raised through the Anuva Green Energy partnership to conclude the purchase of 23 solar projects, equivalent to 11 MW of power from independent power producer Decentral Energy. The funds have been raised through a tax-leveraged structure and have allowed shareholders to benefit from the investment into Decentral’s solar projects by making use of the South African Revenue Services’ (Sars’) Section 12B tax incentive.
The Minister in the Presidency responsible for Electricity, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, intends presenting Cabinet with a list of options before the end of April that he says will outline ways to accelerate efforts to tackle growth- and confidence sapping loadshedding. If adopted these could result in changes to the timelines outlined in the Energy Action Plan (EAP), which has been widely consulted with stakeholders and which the Minister has been appointed to implement.
Polarium South Africa, the local subsidiary of Swedish energy storage group Polarium, plans to double the capacity of its Cape Town assembly plant by the end of this year. This was reported at a media briefing on Wednesday. The plant only started production last April and is the result of a $30-million investment in South Africa. The Polarium group has a policy of placing its plants in strategically chosen locations in its various market regions, to minimize transport costs and to minimize carbon emissions. Apart from Sweden and South Africa, it also has plants in Mexico and Vietnam. The South African plant has already assembled some 15 000 lithium-ion batteries, for energy storage applications across Africa.
The government has terminated, with immediate effect, the National State of Disaster declared by the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs on February 9. In a statement, the Department of Cooperative Government and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) says the State of Disaster was a necessary response to the impact of critical levels of load shedding on the economy and vulnerable sectors such as health and small businesses.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana told MPs on Wednesday that he has decided to withdraw the exemption of Eskom from the Public Finance Management Act “for now” to have further consultation with the auditor-general and Eskom’s auditors. A special government gazette issued by Godongwana on Friday exempted Eskom from reporting in its annual financial statements on wasteful and irregular expenditure that did not arise from corruption.
The Green Energy Africa Summit (GEAS) has announced the launch of the 2023 Energy Investment Village (EIV), a deal-pitching event for African clean-tech starts-ups and energy projects. The EIV is now open for entries from emerging African energy businesses and will culminate in a Lion’s Den-type pitching event during the GEAS to be held in Cape Town on October 11.
INDUSTRY NEWS
- DMRE to push for Cabinet approval of new-look IRP by end-March despite big revisionsNovember 26, 2024 - 6:04 pm
- NTCSA appoints EPC suppliers for transmission substationsNovember 25, 2024 - 5:05 pm
- Eskom finalises technical breakthrough enabling it to extend deadline for meter conversionsNovember 25, 2024 - 1:04 pm
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