Local governments all throughout South Africa are turning to commercial suppliers to assist businesses and people in keeping the lights on as they recover from the country’s worst electricity crisis ever.
The energy crisis, which is predicted to reduce economic growth this year by as much as 2 percentage points, has prompted President Cyril Ramaphosa to proclaim a state of disaster.
The faltering national company Eskom regularly causes rolling blackouts that leave South Africans without electricity for up to ten hours a day. The tourist city of Cape Town wants to reduce its inhabitants’ power outages by half by 2026, according to Kadri Nassiep, executive director for energy.
To meet the city’s yearly electricity needs of 1,500–1,800 megawatts (MW), officials intend to purchase up to 500 MW from commercial power providers by 2026.
Incentives paid to homeowners to reduce their consumption of electricity during times of high demand are another idea they are considering.
According to Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis, the goal of his administration is to close the hole created by Eskom in order to boost the local economy, draw in investors, and generate jobs.