Advances in renewable energy are giving more cities the chance to build their own power supply, but national governments are pushing back. Contact online >>
Advances in renewable energy are giving more cities the chance to build their own power supply, but national governments are pushing back.
Power outages are a way of life in Africa''s most industrialized country. Over the last decade, South Africa''s electricity grid has come apart at the seams and failed to deliver dependable power. As renewable energy gets cheaper, South African cities such as Cape Town have demanded the right to find their own sources.
The primary culprit in South Africa''s power woes is the aging national electricity provider, Eskom. After years of mismanagement of state funds earmarked for critical infrastructure repairs, Eskom''s plants are regularly unable to operate at full capacity. The result is rolling blackouts that last from two to six hours per day. The power cuts have proved disastrous for the economy, with costs estimated at between $4 billion and $8 billion in 2019.
That year, desperate to find a solution, Cape Town announced plans to purchase its own power from independent renewable-power producers. The falling cost and exponential growth of renewable-energy technology have made this possible. Amazon recently announced it will build its own solar farm to power its data centers in South Africa, thereby insulating itself from outages on the national grid. If companies can do it, why can''t cities?
The answer is mired in a complex web of regulations and restrictions. The Ministry of Mineral Resources and Energy, in consultation with the National Energy Regulator of South Africa, has the sole power to decide where South African citizens get their energy, how it is sold, and what source is used to generate it. In practice, this gives Eskom, the state-owned provider, a monopoly over energy production and supply.
Six years ago, Cape Town demanded that the ministry grant it the authority to purchase renewable energy from independent power producers. Those producers would first deliver power directly to Cape Town via the grid, and if they generated more electricity than Cape Town needed, any surplus would flow out to the rest of the country.
Amazon recently announced it will build its own solar farm to power its data centers in South Africa, thereby insulating itself from outages on the national grid. If companies can do it, why can''t cities?
The request ended in a court battle over constitutional questions about who gets to make such decisions. Given the strength of South Africa''s constitution in supporting citizens'' rights, the case has evolved into a larger fight for the rights of citizens to have dependable power.
Cape Town didn''t win that case, but the debate it started created political pressure. In October 2020 the government announced an amendment to electricity regulations that would allow municipalities to find their own methods of generating electricity or purchase it from independent producers.
However, the minister still has the final authority to sign off on any new electricity agreements involving cities. Moreover, President Cyril Ramaphosa underlined his commitment to a "centralized state-owned enterprise" model in February''s state of the union address, in which he outlined various ways his government was going to procure more power for the country. The energy battle between South African cities and the national government is entering a new, and arguably more aggressive, phase.
Satellite imagery reveals how floods are changing and who''s most at risk.
Since the October amendment was publicized, several cities have made plans to go it alone. Durban, South Africa''s third-largest city, announced its plan in January 2021. The city aims to get 40% of its energy from sources other than Eskom by 2030 and wants to use only clean energy by 2050.
And the sleepy university town of Stellenbosch, in the heart of South Africa''s wine country, has submitted a request to the national government to investigate alternative energy sources.
If Cape Town and other cities win the right to purchase their own electricity, rural areas in the country could benefit as well, because private companies will have financial incentives to produce more renewable power. More electricity production should help everyone.
Cape Town''s ongoing battle over clean energy is symbolic of political tensions between national and city governments that green tech is only accelerating.
By and large, city governance models are more agile than their national counterparts. For example, cities have been at the forefront of implementing the Paris climate agreement. Their ability to influence national and international politics will grow as more people continue to move there. Yet as South Africa demonstrates, national governments aren''t going down without a fight.
While the battle over energy sovereignty will almost certainly spread to more cities, not all areas will follow Cape Town''s approach. The Western Cape province, where the city is located, is blessed with ample wind and a relatively high number of sunny days. Renewable energy works well in this part of the world. Other cities may not be able to purchase their own renewable power so easily.
But clearly, the combination of an urbanizing population and the widespread availability of renewable power is challenging the way the modern nation-state controls energy policy. We can expect national-municipal splits like the one driving Cape Town''s energy crisis to become the rule, not the exception.
Joseph Dana is the senior editor of the weekly tech newsletter Exponential View. He lives in Cape Town.
As the climate changes, genetic engineering will be essential for growing food. But is it creating a race of superweeds?
Jennifer Doudna, the co-developer of CRISPR, says there''s a "coming revolution" in climate-adapted crops and animals.
Researchers, farmers, and global agricultural institutions are embracing long-neglected crops that promise better nutrition and more resilience to the changing climate.
The world''s biggest polluters, by the numbers.
Cape Town is South Africa''s second largest economic hub, with a population of around 4.2 million in 2018 and a land area of more than 400 square kilometres. Cape Town contributed 9.8% of the national economic output in 2018 and is dominated by the service sector, with significant finance, insurance, real estate and business activities.
Coal contributed 83% of South Africa''s electricity generation capacity in 2016 (latest available data), with nuclear power and natural gas representing 4% and 5% respectively and renewable energy making up the remaining 8%. The government aims to increase the renewable share in the generation mix to around 40% by 2030 through various policy instruments, as promulgated in the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP)i of 2019.
The City of Cape Town has taken an active leadership role in renewable energy deployment, emphasising not just technology change but also the need to improve governance and institutions and to engage key players in the energy transition, from national government to business and civil society. The decoupling of electricity demand from economic growth in the Metropolitan Municipality over the last decade is attributed to energy efficiency and renewable energy interventions in the face of soaring electricity prices and insecure electricity supply in South Africa.
The transport sector, which relies almost exclusively on petrol and diesel, accounts for 62% of Cape Town''s total final energy demand and contributes a third (32%) of the Metro area''s greenhouse gas emissions. The sector''s high energy use is largely a result of the city''s sprawling and segregated form, which reflects the legacy of apartheid''s spatial planning. The commercial sector is the second most energy-intensive sector (14% of total final energy demand) followed by households (12%) and industry (12%).
Electricity is the main energy carrier in Cape Town''s non-transport sectors, and because most of the electricity in South Africa comes from high-carbon coal-fired power plants, the built environment accounted for 55% of the city''s greenhouse gas emissions in 2018. Residential electricity use in Cape Town is split largely across cooking, lighting and space heating applications, while in the commercial sector electricity use is dominated by lighting, heating and ventilation in office buildings.
The city benefited from learning by doing. Catalysed by the Energy Efficiency and Demand Side Management Programme, launched by South Africa''s Department of Mineral Resources and Energy, Cape Town began an extensive and ambitious drive in 2008 to improve the energy efficiency of municipal operations, saving a cumulative ZAR 225 million (USD 16 million) through 2019. The City began supporting small-scale "embedded generation" in 2011, making it South Africa''s first city to develop tariffs and rules for distributed renewables and serving as a blueprint for the rest of the country.
In 2013, when South Africa had no national standards in place for solar PV on buildings, Cape Town published guidelinesii promoting the safe and legal installation of distributed renewables in commercial and residential settings. By 2019, the City had the highest concentration of registered rooftop solar PV systems nationwide. In total, between 2011 and 2020, Cape Town approved the installation of nearly 42 MW of rooftop solar PV and installed 0.6 MW on City buildings through its rooftop PV programme. These systems feed into the local electricity distribution network, helping to reduce reliance on coal-fired power from the national grid. Similar processes, guidelines and tariffs have since been adopted in more than 40 other South African municipalities.
Building on earlier roll-outs of solar water heaters in low-income communities, in 2013 Cape Town implemented a programme to promote this technology more widely, helping to reduce energy from one of the highest electricity-consuming end-uses for city households, water heating. By 2015, some 46,000 solar water heaters had been installed city-wide, saving 128,000 MWh per year, creating employment equivalent to 1,300 job-yearsiii, contributing more than ZAR 380 million (USD 27 million) to the local economy and reducing more than 132,000 tonnes of carbon emissions per year.
In 2015, the Cape Town Energy 2040 Vision, developed through an extensive process of energy modelling and stakeholder engagement, set ambitious city-wide targets for increasing energy access, improving energy efficiency and reducing carbon emissions. It also set a target to achieve at least 500 MW of renewable and clean energy capacity by 2040. To help achieve this ambition, the City of Cape Town elevated the role of energy institutionally, combining its two energy-related divisions (one focused on energy and climate change and the other on electricity generation and distribution) into a single new Energy and Climate Change Directorate.
The City of Cape Town has begun laying the foundations for supplying renewable energy at scale. Based on a legislative change in late 2020, the municipal government is exploring the commercial, legal and technical aspects of a municipal-level Renewable Energy Independent Power Procurement Programme (REIPPP) and is developing a guide on how to engage with industries in procuring energy from IPPs. As of 2020, the City was working on a Zero Carbon 2050 action plan (and related policies) as well as developing low-income energy services, a framework for electric vehicles and innovative financing opportunities for engaging households in small-scale rooftop solar PV.
About Renewable electricity cape town
As the photovoltaic (PV) industry continues to evolve, advancements in Renewable electricity cape town have become critical to optimizing the utilization of renewable energy sources. From innovative battery technologies to intelligent energy management systems, these solutions are transforming the way we store and distribute solar-generated electricity.
When you're looking for the latest and most efficient Renewable electricity cape town for your PV project, our website offers a comprehensive selection of cutting-edge products designed to meet your specific requirements. Whether you're a renewable energy developer, utility company, or commercial enterprise looking to reduce your carbon footprint, we have the solutions to help you harness the full potential of solar energy.
By interacting with our online customer service, you'll gain a deep understanding of the various Renewable electricity cape town featured in our extensive catalog, such as high-efficiency storage batteries and intelligent energy management systems, and how they work together to provide a stable and reliable power supply for your PV projects.
