It should come as no surprise that the draft Integrated Resources Plan (IRP) 2023, as discussed by experts in Denene Erasmus’ article, is disappointing, unworkable and borderline useless (“Experts say new energy plan is ‘wishful thinking’ and lacks ambition”, January 8).
The continual growth of private sector contributions to the grid has proven that the state’s role as a provider of electricity is increasingly becoming more of a farce. And so it should be. Eskom’s monopoly has overseen enormous rolling blackouts, corruption, threat of grid collapse, endemic breakages and sabotages, and more.
There is no fixing Eskom, and there is no fixing the government’s role as an electricity provider. The IRP is useless, a vain attempt to pretend the government is still relevant in electricity production. But it isn’t. Unless it goes back on its lifting of the generation cap, which it may well do in a petulant attempt to look like the big kid on the block again, [and] private producers will replace Eskom far before the IRP reaches any sort of reality.
And good riddance! Now we just need to fully privatise Eskom’s assets. Not to mention Transnet, SAA, SABC and all the other zombie parastatals the ANC insists on keeping on life support.
Nicholas Woode-Smith
Cape Town
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