Italian renewables firm starts work on latest solar plant for South Africa

EGP said the 82.5 megawatt (MW) plant will be able to generate more than 150 gigawatt hours of electricity each year when fully operational, which EGP said is “equivalent to the annual consumption needs of around 48,000 South African homes”.

Electricity generated by Pulida (26-page / 1.12 MB PDF), 35 kilometres southeast from the town of Kimberley, will be sold to South African national utility Eskom under a 20-year power supply agreement awarded to EGP in October 2013. The agreement was reached as part of the government-backed ‘renewable energy independent power producer procurement programme’ (REIPPPP).

In addition to Pulida, EGP has already been given the go-ahead to build the Gibson Bay (111 MW) and Nojoli (88 MW) wind farms, as well as the Aurora (82.5 MW), Paleisheweul (82.5 MW) and Tom Burke (66 MW) solar power projects – all in South Africa. The company, which already owns and manages the country’s 10 MW Upington solar facility, said on 21 May that it was also recently awarded a further 425 MW of South African wind power projects in the fourth phase of the REIPPPP.

Four large scale solar plants went online in South Africa in the first-half of 2014, including two 66 MW plants at Lesedi and Letatsi developed by US-based SolarReserve and South Africa’s Intikon Energy. In June, the Herbert and Greefspan project, built by the US Sunpower Corporation, also came on line. All four projects were part of the first round of the REIPPPP programme.

According to a study published last year, South Africa moved into the top 10 rankings of countries harnessing renewable energy from the sun, having connected more than half-a-gigawatt of utility-scale solar power to the national grid.

Figures released by Wiki-Solar (2-page / 608 KB PDF), a leading authority on the deployment of utility-scale photovoltaic power stations of 5-10 MW and above, said South Africa had 15 solar plants connected to the national grid as of June 2014.

A study published this year by the South African government-owned Council for Scientific and Industrial Research said renewable energy from South Africa’s first wind and solar plants generated a “net financial benefit” of around $702,000 for the country in 2014.

Last February, UK-listed private equity group Actis announced the launch of a new $1.9 billion “pan-African renewable energy generation platform”, which aims to boost electricity production across the region within the next three years through investments in new wind and solar plants. Actis said the launch of Lekela Power, in partnership with global wind and solar developer Mainstream Renewable Power, will provide between 700 and 900 MW of new generating capacity by 2018.