The Department of Energy (DoE) has allocated R398-million to deploy an equal number of high- and low-pressure solar water heaters (SWHs) in the 2015/16 financial year, Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson has revealed in a Parliamentary reply.
The DoE, which assumed responsibility for the national SWH programme from State-owned power utility Eskom in February, planned to accelerate the project during the current financial year, and was targeting the installation of 45 141 units in 2015/16, according to the DoE Budget Vote.
This compared with a target of 157 200 installations in 2014/15 and the 46 954 SWHs deployed in 2013/14, which fell short of the 80 000 target, owing to delays in finalising the implementing contract with Eskom and finalising the local content verification outcomes projected by the South African Bureau of Standards.
In 2011/12, 127 000 units had been installed and, in 2012/13 111 188.
However, overall, under the auspices of Eskom, the SWH programme had fallen short of its targeted one-million subsidised installations by 2014, with less than half this target installed by September last year.
Another 38 375 units would be installed in 2016/17, followed by a further 44 771 units in 2017/18.