14 May 2013 - South Africa’s renewable energy independent power producer programme (REIPPP) round two has reached financial closure with 19 projects achieving this milestone on May 9th 2013. These projects which should see a capital investment of R28 million comprise wind, solar and small hydro projects totalling 1,043.9 MW.

There are nine solar photovoltaic (PV) projects totalling 417.1 MW, seven wind projects totalling 562.5 MW, one concentrated solar project (CSP) of 50 MW, and two small hydroelectric projects totalling 14.3 MW.

14 May 2013 - One of the biggest challenges facing the South African and international thermal and coking coal markets is the uncertainty in the global economic situation which has resulted in many capital projects being shelved or postponed, says consulting engineering and project implementation firm Hatch Goba Africa’s director for coal Gerrit Lok. Coupled with the global economic uncertainty are supply and demand factors stemming from major economies such as the United States and China, which has had an impact on coal pricing.

14 May 2013 - A former electrical lineman and electrical accident survivor in the USA has shared six safety tips. "Everything you are going to do is going to affect others for the rest of your life. So if you get injured, it's an impact that's going to affect everybody," says Gary Norland, a former lineman. Twenty years ago, he and his co-workers were discussing weekend plans while working near overhead power lines. He suffered life-changing burns and injuries when he leaned back and came in contact with 12,500 volts of electricity.

By Antonio Ruffini

13 May 2013 - Eskom’s figures from its regular system updates show daily electricity demand in South Africa already reaching a peak of close to 34,000 MW during early May 2013 as wide parts of the country experienced a cold autumn, or early onset of winter.

Power demand on the 7th of May 2013 peaked at 33,980 MW, this compared to below 32,000 MW during the summer months in South Africa. The country’s peak demand trend occurs during the 17:00 to 21:00 period as the residential sector increases use of lighting, cooking, hot water and space heating upon people returning home from work.

13 May 2013 - “Privatisation does not always work in Nigeria. However, our government is not competent to run the energy sector. We tried it for 40 years!” With statements such as these, Nigeria’s coordinating minister for the economy and minister of finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had a packed audience hanging onto her every word at the launch of her book, “Reforming The Unreformable”, in Cape Town in May 2013.  

13 May 2013 - Photovoltaic energy is undergoing an important phase of transition towards consolidation and maturity that will form the basis of a second phase of growth and development at the international level. This was the optimistic statement that ended the second and last day of the Global Solar Summit, the first edition of the international conference staged in Italy, in Milan.

10 May 2013 - Namibia’s government hopes to announce the winning bidders for the engineering and design of an 800 MW gas fired power station to be supplied by the Kudu gas field by March 2014. If it goes ahead the power station could be generating electricity in 2018.

There will be room for the private sector in the project as the country’s state owned electricity supply utility, Nampower, says it will sell 49% of the planned US$$1.1 billion Kudu power station.

10 May 2013 - It therefore really hurts that since 1st of April 2013, large power consumers across South Africa have had to fork out an average monthly 9.6% tariff increase. Although some industry insiders have warned that the tariff increase could lead to 250,000 job losses, Dick Kruger, techno-economic adviser to the South African Chamber of Mines, is more optimistic. “Although 9.6% is high, we are nonetheless thankful that it is less than the 16% that Eskom eventually applied for. This increase will definitely not go unnoticed in an industry which has seen prices doubling over the last three years. However, at this stage we do not foresee any job losses or mine closures directly as a result of the increase. We have known since August 2012 that increases were on the way and mines could figure this into their short and medium plans.”