Mantashe's energy measure’s too little too late

10 December 2019

Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy, Gwede Mantashe, issued a statement earlier today about government's planned interventions to resolve the electricity crisis. While the Democratic Alliance (DA) welcomes the fact that he has finally stood up, sadly, it is too little too late.

The section 34 determinations are a very welcome announcement, as these have been sitting on his desk for months. This will allow capable municipalities and large power consumers to procure power directly from independent power producers (IPPs).

His comments about the Request for Information (RFI) for new IPP generation, however, leaves a lot to be desired. The IPP Office is set up to do this work and is globally recognised as being one of the best at rolling out procurement of such projects. New IPP projects (particularly in the renewable sector) are ready to go, and merely await the opening of the next bid window to roll out electricity solutions that are more cost effective and environmentally sustainable in a much shorter timeframe than it would take to procure new coal, gas or nuclear plants. Equally, the Minister must ease regulation on the licensing of small scale plants (under 10MW) and residential generation.

The DA remains committed to working with Government in finding solutions to the rolling blackouts that are having a devastating effect on our economy. We are willing to engage further with the Minister in this regard, if he is prepared to listen.

Issued by Kevin Mileham, DA Shadow Minister of Mineral Resources, 10 December 2019