South Africa made some progress toward adding new generation to its underpowered electricity grid, signing power purchase agreements for 150 megawatts of capacity from private projects by developer Scatec ASA that were selected a year ago.
The government’s emergency power programme, also known as the risk mitigation programme, has experienced multiple delays as the nation heads for a record year of electricity cuts because state-owned utility Eskom is unable to meet demand.
The state signed agreements to buy a total of 150 megawatts of power capacity for three projects from the programme, the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy said on Thursday.
Although Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe in February 2019 predicted that such a programme to source new power quickly could have stations online within two years, none have been added to the grid.
The first projects were picked as preferred bids in March 2021 to source 2,000 megawatts of generation. The
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