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Motivations for a Socially-Owned Renewable Energy Sector: A South African Case Study

Motivations for a Socially-Owned Renewable Energy Sector: A South African Case Study. Dinga Sikwebu National Education Coordinator. South Africa’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Programme (REIPPP).

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Motivations for a Socially-Owned Renewable Energy Sector: A South African Case Study

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  1. Motivations for a Socially-Owned Renewable Energy Sector: A South African Case Study Dinga SikwebuNational Education Coordinator

  2. South Africa’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Programme (REIPPP) • May 2011: Integrated Resource Plan (IRP); a 20-year electricity plan from 2010 to 2030 • 9% of electricity generated will be through renewable energy technologies (photovoltaic, concentrated solar thermal, biomass, biogas, landfill gas, small hydro and wind) • Renewables will make up 42% of the new build capacity envisaged between now and 2030

  3. IPP-driven REIPPP • Organs of the state in the energy sector -municipalities and parastatals - are excluded from the Renewable Energy Programme • An instrument to introduce renewables is not a RE Feed-in Tariff (REFIT) but a bidding process called REBID

  4. How will the model work? • Calls for tenders will be issued and IPPs will bid in a confidential manner • Winning bidders will then sell electricity to a state electricity utility -Eskom - through 20-year Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) • The basis of bidding will be a price (70%) and other socio-economic developments objectives (30%) • For every RE technology there is an applicable tariff or a “cap”

  5. Govt’s motivation for the model • The model shields the state and taxpayers from all financial risks associated with the programme • The model allows the private sector to take the risks and therefore allows government revenue to go to other areas where there are social needs

  6. Why are we opposed to the REIPPP? • National Treasury stands as a guarantor in case Eskom is unable to pay and that the winning companies do not receive rates stipulated in the PPAs • Eskom as the “buyer” of electricity from IPPs will potential recoup what it pays to independent power producers through electricity tariffs • Bidding makes the exercise expensive & renewable energy less competitive • Opens the development to domination by multinational corporations in the RE sector

  7. The focus on the grid and what this misses out • Provision of energy needs to those who remain off-grid • How RE can be an important lever that women can use in their struggle for equality • RE as non-commercial means of subsistence • RE as part of larger efforts towards energy democratisation, energy equality and a restructuring of societies away from production for profit • RE’s contribution in constructing new egalitarian relations of production and exchange

  8. What extending calls for public and democratic control of energy to RE means • Unions acting as catalysts in the establishment RE cooperatives and other forms of community energy enterprises • Building RE parastatals and municipal-owned RE entities that are under democratic control with a strong social mandate • Bringing sites with the greatest abundance of useable RE sources such as land under public, community or collective ownership

  9. What extending calls for public and democratic control of energy to RE means • Strategic and targeted a local content requirement regime aimed at building a RE manufacturing sector that guarantees jobs and workers rights • A search for forms of cooperation and solidarity around energy that will reduce competition and avoid workers of different countries being pitted against each other.

  10. STOP THE GREEN CAPITALIST GRAB! Build a socially-owned renewable energy sector as a component a publicly-owned and democratically-controlled energy system!

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