Since its inception in 2003, Eskom’s Energy Efficiency and Demand-Side Management (DSM) programme has realised total demand savings of 2 372 MW from the evening peak time, between 18:00 and 20:00.

The demand savings target for the current Eskom financial year is 301 MW, and a budget of R1,23-billion has been set aside for the programme this financial year.

Eskom has a newly established division, called Integrated Demand Management (IDM), which will handle the utility’s demand-side interventions. IDM acting senior GM Corrie Visagie explains to Engineering News that, as at the end of May 2010, R60-million of the budget had already been spent.

The savings target is split between eight programmes in the commercial and industrial sectors. These programmes are lighting and heating, ventilation and cooling; solar water heating (SWH); heat pumps; demand response; compressed air; industrial process options; low-flow shower heads; and other initiatives.

The IDM division explains that the most successful energy efficiency and DSM initiative has been the replacement of incandescent lamps with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). This has largely been through mass roll-outs in residential areas.

To date, over 40-million CFLs have been rolled out, generating a saving of 1 759 MW. Depending on the wattage of the bulbs, this equates to a demand saving of about 43 MW for every one-million bulbs replaced.

A further 3,5-million bulbs will be exchanged this year under the programme, thereby exhausting the opportunity for new savings from this programme.

In the first year of the energy efficiency motor programme (in 2007/8), Eskom collected 164 motors. In the second year of the programme (2008/9), the utility collected 1 080 motors.
The monitored and verified savings for the first 164 motors was 0,120 MW. “We felt that this value was too low and research is currently under way to allow monitoring and verification to better calculate the exact savings that can be generated by replacing old inefficient motors with more-energy-efficient motors,” says Eskom.

Currently, the IDM division is also working with Eskom’s top ten companies – which, together, employ about a million people – to launch some of the DSM programmes, like SWH.

“We haven’t had a big success with these because it still costs the consumer money [to install solar water heaters], and we don’t fund the whole thing. So, if these companies can come on board and leverage some of their carbon funding, and maybe get some additional funding, then it becomes more attractive,” says Visagie, who adds that Eskom is making progress with some large companies, and also municipalities.

The IDM division feels that, in that way, it will be able to make much greater inroads than it would have with just advertising.

“I think everyone sees demand management as the only short-term solution available to us over the next two to three years in South Africa that will actually make an impact in restoring the balance between supply and demand. If we don’t get a reduction in consumption, we are going to run into load-shedding again, and this is something we all want to avoid,” says Visagie.

The IDM division looks at shaping the electricity demand profile nationally. “But our first requirement at this time is to reduce the overall energy consumption in the country,” adds Visagie.

The challenge is that energy efficiency on its own does not necessarily reduce consumption. Consider a household at the lower end of the income scale: if it is energy efficient, it will use the extra power for more appliances. Similarly, if some of the industrial customers are more energy efficient, they create space to produce more.

Thus, the IDM division considers the overall energy profile and the reduction of the energy profile.

Initiatives like the punitive Power Conservation Programme (PCP) are also still on the radar, and Visagie notes that Eskom is continuing discussions with the Department of Energy (DoE) to develop regulations for the PCP so that the strategy can be introduced, if necessary.

Many feel that, unless the reduction in electricity consumption is forced, it will not happen.

The PCP is viewed as too drastic a programme by some members of the Energy Intensive Users Group (EIUG), which continues to work with Eskom and the DoE on various electricity issues in the national interest.

The PCP has been deferred many times, and there is currently no specific programme under way, although an Energy Conservation Scheme (ECS) is mentioned in the DoE’s policy to support the energy efficiency and DSM programme for the electricity sector through the Standard Offer incentive scheme, which was released in May 2010.

The document states that the ECS is a critical part of a contingency plan for the industrial sector to conserve energy in the event that an electricity load-shedding risk materialises. It outlines that key industrial customers with a monthly consumption below a specific baseline would attract the standard offer rebate in respect of the gigawatt hours consumed below the baseline. If the customer exceeds the baseline, a penalty would be applicable.

The National Energy Regulator of South Africa subsequently issued a con- sultation paper titled ‘The revision of regulatory rules for energy efficiency and DSM, including the standard offer programme’, in June.

The regulator invited comments on the paper, and a public hearing on the regulatory rules has been scheduled for August 5.

Engineering News understands that many stakeholders are likely to make inputs to the regulator in the hope of improving the policy and the regulatory rules.