The financing promises that SA has received from countries in Europe and the US is increasing pressure on the government to align plans for the country’s future energy mix with carbon emission reduction commitments it made in 2021.
SA’s revised nationally determined contribution (NDC) submitted at COP26 in Glasgow last year committed the country to reduce domestic carbon emissions within a target range of between 350-million tonnes and 420-million tonnes of CO2 equivalent by 2030, and to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. That would be a reduction of about 20%-33% from current emissions by 2030.
However, current energy planning and policies would make it very difficult for these targets to be reached. The Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) of 2019, which the department of mineral resources & energy has indicated is up for review, includes an additional 1,500MW of coal-fired power generation in the energy mix by 2030. This would be over and above Eskom’s new coal-fired power stations, Medupi and Kusile, which will lock in about 9,000MW of coal-fired power for the next 50 years.
At a media briefing in Pretoria on Wednesday, the UK’s COP26 envoy and chair of the international partners to the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP), John Murton, said the partnership was conceived in light of SA’s “very ambitious and commendable nationally determined contribution that was set out before COP26”.
The JETP was launched at COP26 when the UK, the US and EU members undertook to mobilise an initial $8.5bn over the next three to five years to support SA’s transition to a low-carbon economy.
“The Just Energy Transition Partnership is about how we [as partners] can support SA to achieve its NDC and also how to do so in a way that not only benefits the climate but stimulates the growth of the SA economy, creates employment and does so in a way that just leaves no-one behind,” Murton said.
John Morton, the US treasury’s climate counsellor, expressed similar sentiments at a media briefing on Thursday.
Morton said at a conference in Cape Town earlier in June that any new investment by SA in coal-fired power generation would be “inconsistent with the spirit and intent” of the $8.5bn funding package.
At Thursday’s media briefing he said he wouldn’t call new investment in coal-fired power by SA a “red line”, but “new coal certainly didn’t make [achieving SA’s NDC] easier”.
The JETP supported SA’s ambition to achieve the “lower end of the NDC” and an “expedited energy transition in SA away from a high coal and carbon [intensive energy] toward a clean air and greener energy mix”, Morton said.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.