Regarding increasing South Africa’s electricity generating capacity in the immediate future, wind, solar photovoltaic (PV) and hybrid power systems were the “only game in town”, affirmed EE Business Intelligence MD Chris Yelland on Monday. He was addressing the Energy Indaba conference in Cape Town. He pointed out that national electricity utility Eskom had about 100 generators (of different types) and that their availability had been declining for 15 years. Their current availability was about 56% or 57%. President Cyril Ramaphosa‘s desire to significantly increase this over the next two years was “physically impossible”, especially as Eskom had no reserve generating capacity. The long-term maintenance needed to increase availability would require further capacity to be taken offline, thereby worsening availability over the next couple of years!
