Ekurhuleni, the industrial hub of more than 3 million people to the east of Johannesburg, may have a head start in the race between South African cities to buy their own power to alleviate crippling outages imposed by the national utility. A program to procure as much as 700 MW of electricity that began in 2016 is coming to fruition, with one funder saying a project to build a 41 MW solar plant at a cost of about R1-billion will begin by the end of this year.
The Belgian government has announced that it will provide funding of €100-million for research into advanced small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs). The money will be given to the country’s SCK-CEN nuclear research centre in tranches of €25-million a year, over four years. The announcement was made at a function marking the 70th anniversary of the SCK-CEN. “In addition to the substantial progress of renewable energy, the government has also decided to study other technologies which could make a contribution by 2050,” explained Belgian Energy Minister Tinne van der Straeten, speaking at the event. “This [funding] should allow [us] to verify whether sustainable nuclear energy is technically feasible. The researchers of SCK-CEN belong to the absolute world best and are now looking for major breakthroughs in both the technological field and in the field of passive safety, non-proliferation, minimisation of long-lived waste and economic feasibility.”
The Green Building Council South Africa (GBCSA) will be moving to a new 330 m3 green office at Growthpoint Properties’ River Park facility, in Mowbray, in Cape Town, on June 1 under a three-year lease.
River Park recently improved its green rating to a GBCSA 5-Star Green Star SA – Existing Building Performance v1 certification, with high scores for its land use and ecology, green transport access and energy and water savings.
Development finance institution the International Finance Corporation (IFC) has signed a collaboration agreement with the Mphanda Nkuwa Hydroelectric Project Implementation Office (GMNK) to develop a 1 500 MW hydropower project and associated transmission facilities to increase access to clean energy in Mozambique and other Southern African countries. The estimated $4.5-billion project will comprise a dam, a power station and a high-voltage transmission infrastructure of 1 300 km from the project site, in the Tete province, to the capital Maputo, and is scheduled for completion in 2031.
Mpumalanga Premier Refilwe Mtshweni-Tshipane has welcomed the participation of mining companies and other local businesses in the two-day Energy Summit held in the province this week, saying it was important that these companies had joined discussions on how to implement a just energy transition. Addressing delegates at the summit, in Emalahleni, she said the provincial government was working closely with stakeholders such as power utility Eskom on a just transition programme. “Our intention is that such partnerships must assist, not only the transition to a carbon-neutral economy but also increase much-needed energy security through fostering renewable energy production, repurposing power stations and explore ways for creating opportunities for small businesses and decent work,” she added. The Premier acknowledged that there was concern that communities in the province would feel the ramifications of the shift away from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources.
The City of Johannesburg will issue a request for proposals (RFP) for the procurement of electricity from independent power producers in three months, Executive Mayor Mpho Phalatse announced in her closing address to the two-day Joburg Energy Indaba. Phalatse said the procurement would be conducted on a phased basis and that she expected the first projects to be rolled-out over the coming 18 to 24 months.
EIMS Africa has appointed Tasneem Khan as its new project CEO for a portfolio of six solar photovoltaic (PV) projects in South Africa. As the former project CFO of the portfolio, she has been managing these projects in a caretaking capacity for the past few months.
Eskom CEO André de Ruyter has highlighted three key resource advantages that he argues could transform the coal province of Mpumalanga into a global “flagship” of the just energy transition. In an address to the Mpumalanga Energy Summit, De Ruyter argued that the province’s skilled human resources, its access to grid infrastructure and its solar and wind resources, which were superior to those in most other jurisdictions, even if not the best in the country, placed it in a strong position to transition to renewables.
South Korean company Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP) announced on Monday that the first reactor at its latest nuclear power plant (NPP) had achieved criticality for the first time. Unit 1 at the Shin Hanul NPP reached this operational milestone on Sunday. “In the future, Shin Hanul Unit 1 plans to produce electricity for the first time early next month after undergoing a performance test of the power plant system with safety as the top priority,” affirmed KHNP in its statement. The reactor has a generation capacity of 1 400 MWe.
Eskom has approached the Constitutional Court to argue that it should not be compelled to provide two of South Africa’s most indebted municipalities with more electricity than provided for in supply agreements. The power utility is seeking leave to appeal a high court ruling from August 2020 that directed it to increase the amount of electricity it provides to the struggling Ngwathe Municipality in the Free State and the Lekwa Municipality in Mpumalanga.
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