(Southern Africa) (4 minutes read)
South African Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe has gazetted a new directive enabling municipalities to generate electricity
The government has also put in place internal mechanisms to ensure that these projects are implemented in the shortest possible time
South African Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe has gazetted a new directive enabling municipalities to generate electricity.
President Cyril Ramaphosa committed during the state of the nation address that the government would ensure municipalities of good financial standing to develop their own power generation projects.
The amendments will ensure that such activities will be undertaken only by municipalities, which have good financial standing, with feasible project proposals. The government has also put in place internal mechanisms to ensure that these projects are implemented in
the shortest possible time.
A stable energy supply for the country was one of the key commitments that Ramaphosa made in his economic reconstruction and recovery plan for South Africa to Parliament on Thursday.
Ramaphosa in his economic reconstruction plan unveiled recently said that the government is rapidly accelerating its energy plans to focus on renewable resources, battery power and storage to contribute 11,800MW of new power to the country’s electricity grid by 2022. In the medium-term, the government is looking at the possibility of signing MOUs with independent power producers to generate an additional 2,000MW of power to the group.
