"Power shortage" crisis intensifies, South Africa speeds up the approval of local solar and wind projects

Recently, the power shortage in South Africa has intensified. In order to deal with the energy crisis, the South African government announced that it will encourage private enterprises to increase investment and promote the construction of renewable energy power generation projects while increasing electricity imports.

It is understood that in the past few years, South Africa has experienced power shortages to varying degrees. In 2022, the power supply situation in South Africa will further deteriorate, and there will be 205 days of power outages of different areas throughout the year, setting a new record for the number of days of power outages in the whole year. This year, South Africa's largest power supplier, the state-owned power company Eskom, has begun to cut off regional power supply in turn, with a maximum power outage of more than 10 hours in a single day.

In order to alleviate the continuous power shortage crisis, the South African government has adopted a series of countermeasures. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa called for a quick response from all walks of life to reduce the impact of the crisis on farmers, small and medium-sized businesses, water conservancy infrastructure, and transportation networks, and proposed to appoint a minister in charge of the Ministry of Electricity to be fully responsible for supervising the response to the electricity crisis. every aspect.

The industry generally believes that the reason for the electricity shortage in South Africa is that coal-fired power plants have been in disrepair for a long time. According to Eskom, recently, more than 10 coal-fired power generating units in South Africa experienced system failure due to aging. In order to avoid more similar situations causing the entire grid to be paralyzed, the company had to cut off power supply every day.

It is worth noting that due to factors such as long-term overruns in engineering projects and rising fossil fuel prices, Eskom has actually fallen into a debt crisis, facing high debts of about US$22.7 billion, and its operating prospects are worrying. According to CNN, as early as 15 years ago, South Africa announced the construction plan of two large-scale coal-fired power plants. After that, the annual power generation is far less than expected.

For nearly half a century, coal has always been the main source of energy supply in South Africa. According to data released by the South African Council of Science and Industry, by the first half of 2022, coal-fired power generation will account for more than 80% of South Africa's electricity supply. Reuters wrote that the delay of new coal-fired power generation projects, insufficient new investment in the power sector, and the untimely introduction of relevant incentive policies have led to a serious energy supply crisis in South Africa.

In order to alleviate the power crisis, the South African National Energy Crisis Committee stated that in the short term, more electricity will be imported from neighboring countries and purchased from private power generation companies; Renewable energy power construction efforts.

As early as July last year, South Africa announced an "Energy Action Plan", proposing measures to encourage private companies to develop clean energy power generation projects, increase the level of energy imports, and strengthen regional cooperation. In addition, the South African government has repeatedly proposed to expand investment in renewable energy power generation.

In January this year, the South African government even announced that it plans to issue the latest laws to promote the growth of local power production capacity. South Africa's National Energy Crisis Council said it will introduce new legislation to speed up the construction of energy projects and add more power generation capacity to solve the blackout crisis. Reuters quoted a document from South Africa’s National Energy Crisis Committee as saying that South Africa is currently accelerating the construction of new power generation capacity and will “develop urgent legislative documents that can be submitted to parliament as soon as possible, so that energy projects can be carried out faster and take coordination and decisive action".

According to CNN, the South African government has also recently accelerated the approval of local wind power generation projects and provided licenses to private energy project developers. The installed capacity of renewable energy in South Africa has shown a steady increase.

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