WesBank expands portfolio to include residential solar finance

WesBank has added residential solar finance to its portfolio, extending its product mix beyond vehicle and leisure finance products. The new addition gives personal clients in South Africa access to credit to finance the installation of home solar solutions.
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‘Necom 2.0’ to focus on system-wide constraints to electricity security and affordability

Amid waning loadshedding, government and business have agreed to begin “repurposing” the National Energy Crisis Committee (Necom) to shift focus from interventions aimed at arresting the operational crisis at Eskom’s coal stations to addressing system-wide pressures, including growing concern over electricity affordability. Speaking following the first meeting between members of the Cabinet and senior business leaders since the formation of the Government of National Unity, Energy Council of South Africa CEO James Mackay said there was agreement that it remained urgent to accelerate the market reforms initiated under the Energy Action Plan to facilitate the competition required for a least-cost system outcome.
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Rising prices are deepening the electricity divide in South Africa

Late last year, residents of Yeoville and Bellevue — crumbling inner city areas of Johannesburg — went without power for four weeks after a 63-year-old cable broke. For several months after, power to the electricity supply was rotated between the two areas in four-hour blocks. Then the cuts were reduced to two hours a day as the city’s ageing infrastructure grappled with overloading. And yet, on July 1 electricity costs for some of South Africa’s poorest people, including in Yeoville and Bellevue, went up as much as 60%.
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