Rapid advancement in quality testing for large PV plants
The latest method of electroluminescence (EL) testing of solar photovoltaic (PV) panels for large plants is a game-changer for business and industry in South Africa, Heather Dugmore writes.
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Eskom mulls integration of Vgbe report recommendations into revised recovery plan but hints at …
Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa says Eskom’s new CEO, Dan Marokane, will offer a comprehensive outline of a revised generation recovery plan that will seek to integrate recommendations arising from various expert reports into the state of the coal power stations, including the hard-hitting Vgbe report commissioned by the National Treasury. However, Eskom Generation’s Eric Shunmagum also reported “some inaccuracies” with the report’s findings, which required further engagement with the National Treasury before the recommendations could be integrated.
WBHO’s head office goes green in R20m project
Construction group Wilson Bayly Holmes-Ovcon (WBHO) is installing large-scale solar panel arrays on the rooftops of three buildings of its headquarters in Johannesburg. The first of the three buildings will be fully operational this month, with the other two to follow between the end of April and the beginning of May.
Metair’s shares rise on expectation of higher earnings
The share price of JSE-listed energy storage and automotive components company Metair rose by more than 26% on March 11, after the company announced that it expected to report earnings a share of 44c to 53c and headline earnings a share of 128c to 140c for the 2023 financial year. This compares with the loss a share of 21c and the headline loss a share of 17c reported for the 2022 financial year.
Curtailment framework in play for current renewables bidding round, Ramokgopa confirms
Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa and the Independent Power Producer Office (IPPO) have both confirmed that the curtailment framework outlined by Eskom in January is immediately available to wind IPPs preparing to bid under Bid Window Seven (BW7) of South Africa’s public renewables procurement programme, launched in December. Published as an addendum to the latest Generation Connection Capacity Assessment (GCCA 2025), the framework states that 3 470 MW of additional grid capacity to connect wind generation will be made available by accepting a “reasonable share of no more than 10% of curtailment”.
GDP figures cap decade of negative GDP per capita growth – BLSA
While the gross domestic product (GDP) for the fourth quarter of 2023 was 0.1%, growth was negative in terms of GDP per capita, given that population growth is outpacing it. “We have been trending lower since 2013, and have now crowned a decade of negative per capita growth. South Africans now earn, in real terms, on average, what they earned in 2006,” business organisation Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA) CEO Busi Mavuso points out in her latest weekly newsletter.
Eskom reaches three-million milestone on prepaid meter recoding project
State-owned utility Eskom reports in a statement that it has achieved a significant milestone in its key revision number, or KRN, rollover project, having successfully recoded three-million prepaid meters as of March 1. As previously communicated by the entity, Eskom and all electricity distributors in South Africa have the responsibility to recode prepaid electricity meters.
Business, govt meet to discuss electricity, logistics reforms
Engineering News editor Terence Creamer discusses the latest meeting held between senior business leaders and President Cyril Ramaphosa and his Cabinet; the feedback provided on efforts to tackle loadshedding; and a report back on the Transnet Recovery Plan and the reforms in the logistics sector.
Trading, transmission key factors in a liberalised South African electricity market
With the liberalisation of the South African electricity market, energy trading will become increasingly important. So highlighted Investec Project Finance Director Franca Sandham. She was participating in a panel discussion organised by energy transition financial consultancy Green Giraffe Advisory, on the fringe of the African Energy Indaba, in Cape Town, on Thursday. “Energy traders are essential to a more deregulated market,” she affirmed. “It’s inevitable. We’ll see more and more traders.”
Pele Green Energy looking beyond R2.5bn funding innovation as it hastens towards ‘South …
Following its recent success in securing new public and private power purchase agreements, Pele Green Energy (PGE) is already having to consider additional funding options beyond the pioneering R2.5-billion Sithala facility concluded in November with Nedbank, Norfund and the Industrial Development Corporation. The facility has, for the first time, provided the black-owned independent power producer (IPP) with a consolidated funding platform designed to enable a competitive expansion in its operating portfolio from about 1 GW to 5 GW by 2027, as well as the capital needed to develop a project pipeline. It has also enabled PGE to refinance its existing group funding with a platform facility at the holding company level.
