SPECIAL FEATURE
the Minister of Energy and an announcement from the Office of the President) that the REIPPPP was still central to government policy. President Zuma put out a statement to the effect that, "The Presidency wishes to clarify that all the Independent Power Producer Programmes, namely renewable energy, coal and gas and any other determinations made by the Minister of Energy are and remain government policy and are supported by the Presidency." There are some energy planners (including senior Eskom personnel) who think that South Africa needs a new fleet of nuclear power stations. At the moment South Africa has one, at Koeberg in Cape Town, whose two reactors supply about 5% of South Africa's electricity. However, the amount of power produced by the renewable energy programme is growing so rapidly – and prices are coming down so fast – that some researchers are questioning whether coal and nuclear are the only kinds of energy that can supply the so-called "base load" for the national grid. The base load is the permanent minimum amount of power that the grid must be able to deliver at all times. SOUTH AFRICAN BUSINESS 2017
Conventional wisdom says that only coal and nuclear can provide that base load. But a study done by the Energy Centre of the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) suggests that wind and solar power (supported by natural gas, biogas and hydro-electric power) might be up to the task. There is particular interest in natural gas as a source of a very versatile and mobile back-up for the main types of renewable energy: if the sun goes behind a cloud or the wind does not blow, it is very easy to turn on the gas. As it happens, the Department of Energy is very keen to promote gas-to-power. It is targeting the procurement of 3 126MW through its programme and intends spending R64-billion on port, pipeline, generation and transmission infrastructure at three key ports, Richards Bay, Coega and Saldanha Bay. South Africa's long-term energy plan is underpinned by the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) but many industry watchers feel that a new one is due: the latest (published) version of the IRP is dated 2010, and the economic situation has changed quite a bit since then.
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