Cape Town - The provincial government is setting up an energy council as part of its efforts to mitigate the impact of load shedding following Eskom’s announcement that the power cuts are “set to continue until further notice”.
The energy council follows consultation by the province’s internal energy team, which met last week following Premier Alan Winde’s November 10 announcement of the setting up of a task team to combat load shedding.
Winde said a committee of the executive council would be receiving an update “in the next few days”.
He said: “ We are spending R36 million over the medium term on the municipal energy resilience programme, which aims to support municipalities, and the private sector, to generate, and to procure, and to sell their own power so that we can beat load shedding in the Western Cape.
“We are also in the process of procuring extra expertise and looking at partners to help with the energy council’s advisory role.”
Winde said he had briefed the province’s mayors and municipal managers at a provincial session held on the matter.
“I asked that they apply their minds and that, as a province, we share how we support our residents and businesses in responding to the energy crisis,” he said.
The energy crisis has forced municipalities across the province to start investing in alternative energy sources.
The City allocated R15million in this financial year to pay for energy generated by small-scale embedded generators through the feed-in tariff incentive offered for them.
Meanwhile, Stellenbosch municipality has installed solar panels at several key municipal properties.
In George, the municipality’s wheeling project, where energy is delivered from a generator to an end-user located elsewhere using an existing transmission, hopes to provide an opportunity for more renewable energy sources to be introduced to the municipal grid.
mwangi.githahu@inl.co.za