Energy security and water resilience targets remain firmly on course in the Western Cape

On Monday, 15 September 2025, the Western Cape Government’s (WCG) Integrated Energy and Water Council held a meeting.

The council received an update on the work of the provincial government and its stakeholders in ensuring the province and its residents are energy and water-secure.

Changes to Eskom tariffs

The council expressed its deep concern over the blunder made by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) in the determination of electricity tariffs. The incident will result in tariffs being increased by 8.76% in the next financial year, instead of the 5.36% which had originally been granted, and by 8.83% the year after, compared with 6.19%.

The council noted that while the matter is being investigated by NERSA, the mistake will have a catastrophic impact on residents, especially the poor, who are already struggling amid the high cost of living. 

The Western Cape Government maintains that this is patently unfair to the residents of the province and has called on NERSA and Eskom to find ways to mitigate the impact on already hard-pressed residents.

Update on progress of Western Cape Energy Resilience Programme (WCERP)

The council noted and welcomed further progress made through the Western Cape Energy Resilience Programme (WCERP) in reducing the province’s dependence on Eskom for its power needs.

The WCG is steadily advancing toward its energy security objectives with:

• A total estimated installed capacity of 819MW of rooftop solar power has been installed in the province to date.

This has been achieved through the WCERP’s efforts in supporting municipalities to enable rooftop photovoltaic (PV) installations and encourage uptake of solar power by suppliers and consumers.

Mr Alwie Lester, Special Adviser to the Premier on Energy, stated that most Western Cape municipalities are far ahead of the rest of the country in terms of small-scale embedded generation (SSEG) readiness, with most local governments having adopted the SSEG framework developed by the provincial government.

Other notable progress of the WCERP that has been made so far includes:

• The distribution of more than 90 000 load-shedding relief packs to school learners and Western Cape Department of Social Development-funded facilities, among others; and
• Solar PV installations have been completed at 17 provincial buildings, and energy programmes introduced at 142 health and education facilities.

The WCERP is ultimately targeting 5 700MW of municipal and private generation power by 2035. The province is well on track to achieve this target. Mr Lester added, “Up until and including bid round 6 of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), there was close to 6 000MW of applications for IPP projects that came from the Western Cape alone. Not all of those were approved within REIPPPP. But the balance of those is now moving to the private sector. What we see is that there is an appetite in the province for over 6 000MW worth of projects. If those materialise, it will get the province to its target of 5 700MW far sooner than 2035.”

Independent power producers (IPPs) in Western Cape lead the way in energy security

To see for himself the encouraging work IPPs are doing in the province, Premier Winde recently visited the 36MW CPV1 solar power project in Touwsrivier, developed by the Pele Energy Group, a leading IPP in the country.

Construction of this project started in 2013. The plant reached its commercial operating date in late 2014 and has been supplying power to the national grid ever since. At the project, the Premier engaged with a group of Cape Peninsula University of Technology students. “Among you may be the future IPP leaders our province and country need,” he said as he interacted with the students in the shadow of thousands of solar panels sprawled across the Karoo landscape.

Apart from its renewable energy projects, the Pele Energy Group invests in local communities and helped to establish the Touwsrivier Commercial Hydroponics Farm (TCHF), where at any given time around 10 000 lettuce plants are grown. This project also sustains 15 permanent jobs.

At another project funded by the company, “Four Rooms For Freedom”, budding entrepreneurs from the area attend programmes on how to set up their own businesses and are given practical electrical skills training. Resident, Luke Sampson, told the Premier, “It has been an honour to be a part of this programme. I have learnt so much. It has been a privilege.”

Premier Winde said, “This is a beautiful example of an energy project that is giving back to local communities in different ways. We need as much green energy in our power system as we can enable and develop. But we also need community-driven projects where our residents receive training and the expertise they need to get jobs, particularly in this sector.”

Update on Western Cape Water Resilience Strategy

The council was then given an overview of the progress in implementing the Western Cape Water Resilience Strategy, which aims to achieve water resilience through the implementation of numerous programmes:

• Water Conservation & Demand Management;
• Augmentation;
• Infrastructure Development; and 
• Governance.

The overarching priority of the plan is to secure a target of more than 300 million cubic metres of water per year for the residents of the province by 2035.

The strategy has been aligned with and will bolster the Western Cape 15-year Integrated Drought and Water Management Programme. The strategy will be officially launched at the end of October 2025.