‘High priority’ IRP update to be published soon
Department of Energy (DoE) director-general Thabane Zulu says the updated Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) is undergoing a final set of processes and consultations, as stipulated by Cabinet in December, before being published in the Government Gazette.
Speaking at the Africa Power Roundtable in place of Minister Jeff Radebe on Tuesday, Zulu indicated that the DoE would provide the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Energy with an update on the IRP next week.
Without providing a specific timeframe, Zulu indicated that he did not anticipate that it would be long before the final document was published, as public consultation on the IRP update had taken place in 2016 and 2017.
“Cabinet has looked at the matter and has made certain recommendations and requested certain processes be further engage upon, and we are busy with those engagements,” Zulu said in Sandton.
The meeting with lawmakers on the IRP, which guides the Ministerial determinations required for all power generation investments in South Africa, is currently set down for April 17.
“This is a high priority [for us],” the director-general added, linking the finalisation of the IRP to Radebe’s promise that policy certainty would be restored in electricity sector.
The signing of 27 renewable-energy independent power producer (IPP) project agreements on April 4 should be an indication, Zulu added, of government’s resolve to deliver that certainty investors required.
However, the message would be further “entrenched” by the finalisation of the IRP, which should also bring an end to the era of “stop-start” policy implementation, which has characterised the sector for more than two years.
At present, investment decisions are based on the 2010 version of IRP, which assumes far higher demand and materially different technology costs than is currently the case and which have not been updated, despite two separate attempts to do so in 2013 and 2016.
Zulu said the coal and gas IPP programmes had been placed on hold to ensure full alignment with the updated IRP. However, he stressed that both the coal and the gas-to-power programmes had not been abandoned and would resume once there was policy certainty. Again, he was unable to be precise on timeframes.
Likewise, government was keen to finalise the so-called renewable-energy “expedited” bid window, before initiating the next round of auctions under the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme.
The DoE, he argued, had learned lessons from the recent delays, as well as the court actions taken in an effort to prevent the signing of the 27 IPP contracts and would be making policy decisions to respond to the concerns raised over jobs and transformation in the renewable-energy sector.
Zulu said the issue of black ownership in the IPPs, as well as in the energy supply chain, from manufacturing and construction to operations and maintenance, was receiving serious and urgent policy attention.
However, the DoE was also keen for legislative certainty on the issue of ownership and transformation so as to ensue that the ownership policy integrated into the IPP programmes was not vulnerable to legal attack.
“We don’t want to make decisions only to spend a lot of time in court trying to justify those decisions.”
Comments
Press Office
Announcements
What's On
Subscribe to improve your user experience...
Option 1 (equivalent of R125 a month):
Receive a weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine
(print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
Receive daily email newsletters
Access to full search results
Access archive of magazine back copies
Access to Projects in Progress
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
Option 2 (equivalent of R375 a month):
All benefits from Option 1
PLUS
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports, in PDF format, on various industrial and mining sectors
including Electricity; Water; Energy Transition; Hydrogen; Roads, Rail and Ports; Coal; Gold; Platinum; Battery Metals; etc.
Already a subscriber?
Forgotten your password?
Receive weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine (print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
➕
Recieve daily email newsletters
➕
Access to full search results
➕
Access archive of magazine back copies
➕
Access to Projects in Progress
➕
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
RESEARCH CHANNEL AFRICA
R4500 (equivalent of R375 a month)
SUBSCRIBEAll benefits from Option 1
➕
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports on various industrial and mining sectors, in PDF format, including on:
Electricity
➕
Water
➕
Energy Transition
➕
Hydrogen
➕
Roads, Rail and Ports
➕
Coal
➕
Gold
➕
Platinum
➕
Battery Metals
➕
etc.
Receive all benefits from Option 1 or Option 2 delivered to numerous people at your company
➕
Multiple User names and Passwords for simultaneous log-ins
➕
Intranet integration access to all in your organisation