Despite a national energy crisis in South Africa, the country’s energy-saving strategies remain fractured and lacklustre, several analysts told the Mail & Guardian this week. At a time when South Africans, both in industry and in the private sector, should be working together to save power, there seems to be a fractured response to what needs to be done.
And no one seems to be taking responsibility for streamlining a policy to get South Africans to start saving on power.
Peet du Plooy, WWF South Africa’s trade and investment adviser, attributed much of South Africa’s lacklustre energy-efficiency policies and fragmented approach to saving energy on the conflict of interests inside the department of minerals and energy.
‘Mining and industry — which includes energy-hungry minerals beneficiation — consume 50% of the country’s energy, or three times more than the 16% consumed by households. The idea that the department of minerals and energy is in charge of both regulating energy and promoting our minerals industry is problematic,†he said. ‘As long as our energy department exists to support the mining industry, and the energy department in turn remains reliant on minerals [coal], things will not get better. â€
But he also said that a large part of the problem is that the different government departments are not speaking to each other when developing their separate policies relating to energy.
‘The department of trade and industry has for a long time been attracting investors by promoting South Africa’s low-cost electricity to attract the world’s most energy-hungry investments,†he said.
Du Plooy says as long as the idea of ‘cheap†power is not dealt with, energy efficiency will not gather the impetus that is needed. Eskom sells electricity to industry at a price 74% of that of its closest competitor, Canada.
With cheap electricity driving sharply increasing demand and Eskom’s failure to build more plants, power has now run out in South Africa. The 1998 White Paper on the Energy Policy of the Republic of South Africa, which resurfaced this week, warned 10 years ago that South Africa’s electricity demand would exceed its generation capacity in 2007.
The white paper, which has left the government and Eskom with red faces, warned back then that ‘timely steps†had to be taken to ensure that demand does not exceed available supply capacityâ€.
Du Plooy said in future the demand side of the economy would have to receive more attention, but ultimately for energy efficiency to gain the necessary impetus, people should be paid to save electricity, as Eskom’s energy-efficiency policy dictates.
Energy savings tend to save money over the long run, but Eskom’s demand-side management has been providing additional incentives for energy savings to large consumers of up to R3,50 per watt saved. This makes good sense given that the latest cost estimates for Eskom’s new power plant at Madupi are about R16,40 per watt.
Andrew Kenny, an analyst at the Energy Research Institute at the University of Cape Town, said he was astounded at the energy ignorance in South Africa.
‘There remains a lot of work to be done to educate South Africa. So many South Africans still believe that stoves, heaters and ovens use up the same energy as lights in a house,†he said.
Kenny said it would be ideal for one person to take responsibility for South Africa to become more energy efficient and steer that campaign.
But who that champion should be still remains an open question, Kenny shrugged, though the government should be one of the stakeholders. Du Plooy believes that responsibility should start ‘right at the topâ€, with the president.
‘Energy is a critical issue internationally as well as for the South African economy and society,†he said. ‘The president has the executive oversight to ensure that all government departments work together to deliver much-needed energy transformation.â€
He believes Trevor Manuel would be ideally suited to be a South ÂAfrican ‘sustainable power championâ€. He said the treasury has acknowledged the need for greater uptake of efficiency and renewable energy in its recent framework document, Environmental Fiscal Reform.