De Ruyter says immediate renewable energy investment should focus on Mpumalanga

State-owned utility Eskom CEO André de Ruyter wants Mpumalanga to be the focal point for investment in renewable energy generation capacity to leverage the province’s well established transmission grid and to mitigate the potential for mass unemployment in the province as coal-fired power stations are systematically decommissioned over the next decade. While it has been well-established that the best naturally-occurring wind and solar resources in South Africa are located in the Northern Cape province, the region is poorly served by the existing transmission grid.