LSF confident in building economic case for VRFB manufacturing in South Africa

After commissioning energy consultancy Customised Energy Solution (CES) to determine the potential for a commercial vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) value chain in South Africa, the Localisation Support Fund (LSF) is confident that this technology offers significant advantages and can cater for long-duration energy storage (LDES) demand.

South Africa holds vast vanadium resources with many deposits grading more than 1.5% vanadium pentoxide, which is considered high-grade by international standards.

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Seriti Green’s Ummbila Emoyeni RE project progressing, welcomed

Electricity and Energy Minister Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa in August visited Seriti Green’s flagship Ummbila Emoyeni renewable-energy project in Mpumalanga, welcoming progress being made and highlighting it as an exemplar for the country’s just energy transition.
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Record global renewable energy growth remains short of climate target, report says

A record amount of renewable energy capacity was added globally last year, but that still left countries short of targets towards meeting a UN climate goal to triple capacity by 2030, a report by global renewable groups showed on Tuesday. More than 100 countries at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai in 2023 agreed to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030 as part of efforts to meet global climate targets.
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Western Cape developing energy sustainability through renewables ahead of schedule

Western Cape Premier Alan Winde highlighted on Wednesday that South Africa still faces an energy crisis. Although loadshedding (scheduled rotating power cuts) has stopped, the country is still dependent on an ageing fleet of coal-fired power stations, he pointed out, while delivering the opening address for the Solar & Storage Live Cape Town 2025 conference and exhibition, being held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre. “My theme is – never, ever, waste a crisis!” he asserted, citing the example of Cape Town’s Day Zero water crisis, when, during the 2017-18 drought, the city came within 14 days, he reported, of completely running out of water. It didn’t, because Cape Townians changed their behaviour. Before the crisis, the city, then with a population of 4-million people, had used 1.2-billion litres of water a day (l/d). Today, with a population for 5-million (25% larger), the city used 800-million l/d of water.
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SANEA to host energy leadership symposium in November

The South African National Energy Association (SANEA) will host the 2025 edition of its SANEA Leadership Symposium in Johannesburg on November 12 and 13. The premier energy-sector event will bring together representatives from across the energy community, including government, business, finance, operators, researchers, and young professionals under the theme of ‘What will our energy legacy be?’.
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Court order confirming R54bn Nersa-Eskom settlement delayed following AfriForum intervention

The court order confirming the controversial R54-billion settlement between Eskom and the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) has been delayed after the High Court granted AfriForum’s request to intervene as a respondent in the matter. On August 27, Nersa announced that a settlement had been reached after agreeing that it had made calculation errors when adjudicating Eskom’s most recent allowable revenue application; one that gave rise to its approval of tariff increases of 12.74%, 5.36% and 6.19% for Eskom’s 2026, 2027 and 2028 financial years respectively.
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