Solar panels on the roof of Constantia Village in Cape Town.
Against the backdrop this week of protests by coal truckers not having their contracts renewed, it appears that government is finally taking a real stand for renewable energy.
Says Davin Chown, director at Genesis Eco-Energy: “Solar energy is not alternative energy. It is energy — full stop. The solar rooftop market deploying photovoltaic (PV) power is growing at phenomenal rate — faster than most other energy resources.
“PV power is feasible, based on where you are, in places such as in the Northern Cape where farmers and co-operatives are already installing rooftop systems. Other examples include Cape Town’s V&A Waterfront, Vodacom and the Mall of Africa. Their rationale is that they are hedging themselves long-term against price increases. With free fuel, one always knows the price.”
Chown says that in the big urban areas, these systems are already cost-competitive and can generate their own electricity cheaper than municipalities can, with some suburbs looking into going totally off the grid, becoming energy self-sufficient and selling back their excess to their municipalities.
“The rate solar is growing [at] proves that these systems are already cost-competitive, viable and workable solutions — and not just in the commercial, industrial and urban sectors. It is distributed generation that can be deployed by anyone close to a load centre or not part of the national grid. Now municipalities are looking at adopting PV technology.
“The primary driver essentially is that many business and big consumers are saying we are paying too much from the conventional supplier, Eskom. At least with solar, you can predict pricing.”
Playing catch-up
Chown says PV adoption is happening across Africa, with huge uptake particularly in Zimbabwe. South Africa has been slow on the uptake due to the perception that power from any alternate source is somehow inferior, but he says that awareness is growing that you can power your home or business quite adequately with PV power and not be forced to draw from the grid.
“We are now playing catch-up,” he says. “While tariffs may appear higher from an outlay point of view, this will come down as PV distribution grows — and this is happening as we move to distributed and decentralised energy.”
Asked about affordability for the man in the street, Chown says that PV is already affordable, as they have seen from the small-scale uptake in some informal settlements.
“Depending on the intensity of the sun in different areas of South Africa, you would be able to produce electricity at tariffs ranging from 90 cents per kilowatt-hour through to R1.50 per kilowatt-hour, which in many cities in South Africa is cheaper than what you will pay your local municipality for electricity.
“There are multiple factors involved, including PV materials costs and the prices we can procure from overseas suppliers, as well as the type of financing that is opted for,” continues Chown. “However, the opportunities are still growing as we see this energy creating many more jobs. We have seen the entry of the ‘bakkie brigade’ of SMMEs and small community installers that are blossoming in the PV market, both in small, ground-mounted systems and large-scale, roof-mounted systems.
“We are seeing everything, from commercially-owned entities to PV taking root in informal settlements with people renting roof space from residents — using the power to charge cell phones, for example — and also charging municipalities for the excess.
“The barriers to entry are very low and there is still room and massive opportunity for SMMEs to enter the market, get trained and accumulate skills. As PV has become increasingly more affordable it has created a silent revolution happening in neighbourhoods, towns and industrial areas,” he concludes.
The power of Solar PV
The South African Photovoltaic Industry Association (SAPVIA) has made every effort to ensure the future of the industry by both perusing the issues around the outstanding REIPPPP projects and dedicating time and resources to market segments outside the utility scale deployment of the technology.
According to the IPP office, over the last five years, solar-PV has contributed 2292MWs to the South African energy mix. The large majority of this capacity has been in large-scale ground-mounted systems, with small distributed generators like rooftop solar-PV having potential to grow rapidly, as only small financial investments per project are required and project planning can hypothetically be performed quite quickly.
Challenges in the rooftop solar-PV market segment include not having a standard country-wide approach which stems from a lack of national regulations, guidelines and standards governing embedded generation and connecting to the grid, which the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Energy Centre (CSIR) are working on.