The City of Cape Town has officially opened its electricity grid to private companies following a year-long pilot phase.
The pilot phase saw South Africa’s first renewable energy being wheeled across the municipal grid from a rooftop solar PV plant at the Constantia Village shopping mall to an office building on the Foreshore in September 2023. In total, 562 800 kWh of renewable electricity was wheeled during the pilot phase, which involved three private traders, three generators and three off-takers .
‘This is an exciting leap forward to diversify our electricity supplier-base beyond [state utility] Eskom to a future of decentralised electricity trading in South Africa,’ says Cape Town’s mayor, Geordin Hill-Lewis.
He says private power trading across the City’s electricity grid will be based on bilateral and multilateral trading agreements.
Wheeling enables electricity users to buy energy from independent power producers across the municipal or national grid, facilitated by private traders
Cape Town expects to earn revenue by charging for the use of its grid, and traders will set the price for the actual power that is sold, reports News24.
