IPP Office head Bernard Magoro
The Independent Power Producer (IPP) Office has confirmed it will soon launch a bid window round for 513 MW of battery storage capacity and hopes to procure another 1 200 MW later this year.
IPP Office head Bernard Magoro confirmed during a webinar hosted by Creamer Media and titled 'South Africa’s Energy Outlook for 2023', that the country could see a total 1 700 MW of battery storage procured in 2023.
He also assured that the IPP Office was preparing to release Bid Window 7 of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), which followed on what was an oversubscribed Bid Window 6 at 9.6 GW with offers from 56 wind and solar bids.
However, government ultimately selected only five solar plants with a combined capacity of 860 MW in the auction, and no wind projects, despite 4.1 GW of bids having been submitted and despite government originally planning to allocate up to 1 GW of solar and 3.2 GW of wind power in the auction.
The IPP Office also plans on releasing a 3 000 MW gas-focused bid window and is working closely with Transnet to position the ports to be able to deliver the gas to the country.
During the webinar, Standard Bank renewable energy, power and infrastructure head Rentia van Tonder warned, however, that the REIPPPP needed a “rethink” as soon as possible and referred particularly to its format, refrencing Bid Window 6, and how procurement was undertaken.
She referred to certain sites requiring different procurement processes to fully unlock the dormant potential in those areas.