Bidding for renewables finally opens as powership-heavy ‘emergency’ projects are unveiled

Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe released the names of the eight preferred bidders – including three powership projects – selected as part of government’s 2 000-MW ‘emergency’ procurement programme and also launched the much-anticipated fifth bid window (BW5) for the procurement of new wind and solar. However, he resisted growing calls for a raising of the licence-exemption threshold for distributed projects at mines, smelters, factories and farms from 1 MW to 50 MW, indicating instead that the cap would be increased to only 10 MW. This despite arguments that a liberalisation of South Africa’s convoluted licencing regime was the cheapest and quickest way to unlock at least 5 000 MW of new capacity within five years.