Page 14 - AfrElec Week 22

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Among these projects, 2.75GW are projects and there is a lot of international and local and the lead author of the study, explained:
taken over by the private sector. interest,” said Wido Schnabel of Canadian “Countries in West Africa now have the
According to Mohamed El-Khayyat, Solar, which hopes to supply new projects. opportunity to plan this expansion according
the director of NREA, the projects include “Why are we still waiting?” to strategies that rely on modern, climate-
250MW wind farms owned by the public When it launched its first renewables friendly energy generation.”
sector and solar photovoltaic plants with a auction in 2011, South Africa was at the He added: “A completely different situation
capacity of 170MW. vanguard of clean energy converts, Anton from Europe, where power supply has been
They also include other wind farms with a Eberhard, a University of Cape Town dependent on polluting power plants for
capacity of 1,950MW initiated by the private professor, said. many decades—which many countries now
sector, as well as solar photovoltaic plants of Six years after the last procurement round, want to rid themselves of.”
800MW. “South Africa is falling behind,” said Eberhard, Solar and wind power generation is
The NREA director added that power who has advised President Cyril Ramaphosa increasing worldwide and becoming cheaper.
generated by 6.34GW of future solar power on reforming Eskom. This helps to keep climate targets in sight but
plants will also be used to operate irrigation also poses challenges. For instance, critics
wells in the country. often argue that these energy sources are too
“The use of solar energy for these wells Hydro can support solar and unpredictable and variable to be part of a
reduces the pressure on the electricity grid, reliable electricity mix on a large scale.
while harnessing the renewable energy wind in West Africa - study “Indeed, our electricity systems will have
available. It also ensures that no wells operate to become much more flexible if we are to
except during periods of sunshine, which will A new study has mapped the potential of feed large amounts of solar and wind power
allow both maximum use of the underground solar-wind-water strategies for West Africa, into the grid. Flexibility is currently mostly
reservoir and its preservation over a long a region where power grids are anticipated to provided by gas power plants. Unfortunately,
period of time”. greatly expand in the coming years. these cause a lot of CO2 emissions,” says Sterl.
The study, Smart renewable electricity “But in many countries, hydropower plants
portfolios in West Africa, published in the can be a fossil fuel-free alternative to support
Global firms attracted by scientific journal Nature Sustainability, solar and wind energy. After all, hydropower
explores how hydropower plants can support
plants can be dispatched at times when
South African renewables solar and wind power’s unpredictable and insufficient solar and wind power is available.”
intermittent nature in a climate-friendly
potential manner.
Sebastian Sterl, energy and climate scientist
Global renewables companies are lining up at Vrije Universiteit Brussel and KU Leuven
to invest in South Africa’s energy sector and
help remedy a chronic generation shortfall
that pushed the continent’s most advanced
economy into recession even before the
COVID-19 pandemic struck, Reuters
reported.
But their investment proposals are on hold
as red tape and political considerations delay
procurement, undermining a government
pledge to prioritise wind and solar generation.
State utility Eskom’s coal-fired stations,
which produce more than 80% of South
Africa’s electricity, have long struggled to meet
demand, culminating in rolling blackouts
that last year hobbled industries central to the
economy.
Power experts say adding renewables
would be one of the quickest and cheapest
ways to end outages and reverse years of
economic decline.
Based on the government’s plan to add
2.6GW of as yet unprocured wind and solar
capacity in 2022, the next auction could
attract more than $2bn in investment, a
Reuters analysis of industry estimates found.
Billions more could flow if procurements
happen regularly, contributing to much-
needed economic development when the
new coronavirus has exacerbated budget
constraints.
“South Africa has a brilliant solar resource,

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