Dominovas Energy Corp. (fka DNRG)

[Alinea818]

IPP growth thriving in South Africa

http://www.esi-africa.com/ipp-growth-thriving-in-south-africa/

South Africa has added more than 90 independent power producer (IPP) driven projects to the national power grid over the last five years. According to Minister of Energy, Tina Joemat-Pettersson, the department had a vision of including a large potion of renewable energy to the power generation capacity through private producers.

Joemat-Pettersson was addressing about 3,000 delagates from private, public and academic sectors at the South Africa Internationl Renewable Energy Conference (SAIREC) in Cape Town where discussions in driving the use of renewables are under way. The conference will run until Wednesday reports Cape Argus.

According to the Cape Argus, the minister also noted that renewable energy IPPs, part of the department's Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme, were aimed at promoting socio-economic and enviromentally sustainable growth. She added that the initiative has contributed 4,294GWh to the national grid, with the IPPs receiving a total of R9.2 billion in payment.

Department of Energy IPP department head Karen Breytenbach also commended: "our IPPs have become more innovative and we can see how this initiative is growing from programme to programme."

New IPP consortium
In other IPP news, in Johannesburg South Africa, a consortium of IPPs and sponsors including ENGIE (formerly GDF SUEZ, France), Legend Power Solutions, Mitsui and Peaker Trust announced on Friday that commercial operations of the 335MW Dedisa Peaking Power Project in Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape have commenced.

The power produced by the Dedisa IPP project will be sold to Eskom under a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) over a 15-year period.

PPA benefits

According to the release, since the construction of Dedisa in September 2013 the project has created work employment opportunities — with 70% of construction workers from local black communities and 57% in management. A surplus of 23% of payroll was spent on skills development initiatives.

Peaking Power CEO, Amaud de Limburg said “Looking ahead, I am confident that in the frame of South Africa’s Gas Master Plan we will be able to convert the Dedisa facility to baseload and combined cycle as envisaged by the Department of Energy.”