Cabinet has approved the Green Hydrogen Commercialisation Strategy (GHCS) for implementation, with the goal of positioning South Africa as a major producer and exporter of green hydrogen.

Government has estimated that the hydrogen economy has the potential to add 3.6% to gross domestic product by 2050 and create 370 000 jobs.

Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni said the draft Green Paper had received extensive feedback from stakeholders and the GHCS would give effect to the Hydrogen South Africa Strategy approved by Cabinet in 2007 to prepare the country for a hydrogen economy.

"It is also framed within the Hydrogen Society Roadmap developed by the Department of Science and Innovation and approved by Cabinet in 2021."

She also said that government had identified possible funding for green hydrogen projects, without offering any details.

However, the approval of the strategy follows on from the the second South Africa Green Hydrogen Summit in Cape Town, where South Africa concluded Heads of Agreements with the intention of launching an SA-H2 Fund that will facilitate the development of the country's green hydrogen sector.

The aim is to attract $1-billion in funding.

The development of a green hydrogen economy is also included in the Just Energy Transition Investment Plan (JET IP), which was endorsed last year by the initial members of the International Partnership Group (IPG), which pledged $8.5-billion in concessional funding to support South Africa's phased transition away from coal.

The Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Kingdom of Denmark have subsequently become members of the IPG, while JET IP pledges have also been made by Canada, Spain and Switzerland.

The Presidency's Rudi Dicks told the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC) recently that that pledges of concessional funding in support of South Africa's JET IP had increased to $11.9-billion.

Most of the funding would be in the form of loans rather than grants and Cabinet said it remained concerned about the non-commitment of developed countries to meaningful grant funding.

Details of the GHCS were not immediately released, but it is understood that the strategy will seek to lock-in price subsidies arising in various developed countries for green hydrogen derivatives exports, support the decarbonisation of domestic hard-to-abate sectors and develop industrial capacity to manufacture components for wind, solar and electrolyser facilities.

Green hydrogen is produced by using renewable electricity in an electrolyser to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The clean energy carrier and the derivative products are seen as becoming increasingly important in assisting those sectors that are unable to decarbonise directly using renewable electricity, such as steel, petrochemicals, fertilisers, cement, as well as long-haul land, sea and air transportation.

Ahead of the endorsement of the strategy, the Eastern, Northern and Western Cape provinces signed a memorandum of understanding to cooperate on the development of South Africa as a global hub to produce green hydrogen and derivative products, as well as to produce the components required in the green hydrogen value chain.

The three coastal provinces are all playing host to potential multibillion-rand green-hydrogen projects and have been working separately on strategies and roadmaps to capture the jobs, growth and industrialisation opportunities that could flow should the projects materialise.

However, opportunities extend beyond these provinces and also include opportunities in territories such as the Free State and Mpumalanga where Sasol is investigating displacing grey hydrogen produced from coal with green hydrogen to produce sustainable aviation fuels and other products.

Eskom insists its systems and strategies are in place to facilitate the seamless operation of the 6.8-million prepaid meters within its distribution areas after November 24 next year - the date by which the meters will no longer be able to accept electricity tokens unless they have been recoded to do so.

All Standard Transfer Specification (STS) meters globally, including those in municipal distribution areas in South Africa, are subject to the cut-off deadline. The reason being that the Token Identifier, or TID, range, which is set against a base date of January 1, 1993, will be exhausted in November 2024 unless reset.

In the absence of recoding, the STS-compliant meters will stop accepting credit tokens.

Eskom's Velaphi Ntuli says all the necessary back-end investments have been made to allow for the implementation of a Key Revision Number Rollover project and that addition staff have been recruited to ensure the rollover deadline is met.

He did not provide an investment amount, saying that the figure was being finalised, including the budget required to communicate the changes to affected electricity consumers using traditional media, social media, as well as Eskom's Alfred chatbot.

The utility is pursuing a free, do-it-yourself (DIY) implementation process, whereby Eskom's normal vending agents will issue affected prepaid consumers with two 20-digit key-change tokens with their normal credit token.

The consumer is then expected to punch in the numbers on the key-change tokens to recode their existing meter, after which they will be able to load the meter with credit as normal.

Eskom insists that the credit in the meter at the time of reset will be unaffected by the recoding.

The key-change tokens will be available only from physical vending agents, as online vendors are not able to generate key-change tokens.

The DIY approach means that the recoding is not reliant on contractors or installers and Eskom warns that anyone posing as an Eskom employee claiming to require access to a property should be turned away and reported to the South African Police Service.

Once the meter is recoded customers will be able to use their preferred vending channel, including online platforms.

Eskom's Portia Papu reports that the first phase of the project, which was designed to clear all the initial teething problems, was completed in August and September, with Riverside, in Gauteng, selected as the pilot site.

The second ramp-up phase is currently under way and more than 670 000 meters have been reset across suburbs in all nine provinces.

Papu says customers will be alerted two weeks before the rollout commences in their area through messages in local media outlets and other communication channels.

Municipalities are responsible for the recoding of some 4.5-million meters falling within their distribution areas and the South African Local Government Association has set up a dashboard, at http://www.salga.org.za/event/sts/Home.html, to monitor recoding progress.

Eskom interim CEO Calib Cassim has described unlocking grid connection capacity, using curtailment, as an urgent priority while Eskom and other stakeholders assess funding options to expand the transmission network.

Speaking at a climate conference in Johannesburg, Cassim reported that discussions were under way on how to ensure that more renewable-energy independent power producers (IPPs) were connected to the grid ahead of the large-scale grid-related investment that was being planned.

"While we are still going to take a number of years to expand the grid, we need to connect these megawatts.

"There may be a portion of the year when those renewables IPPs will be curtailed.

"Let's manage that cost - it's a relatively small number - and not wait for a perfect solution," he said at the event, which was jointly hosted by Standard Bank and SOAS University of London.

A recent assessment by Eskom and two European transmission system operators - 50Hertz of Germany and Elia of Belgium - showed that the capacity of the existing Western Cape grid to host variable renewable generators could be doubled under a scenario where no more than 10% curtailment was implemented.

Curtailment involves the active reduction of output from wind and solar plants in response to system security needs or temporary transmission capacity constraints and is widely used by system operators to facilitate the introduction of renewable generators in a context of grid constraints.

The analysis indicated that 4 GW of additional renewables capacity could be connected to the Western Cape grid "almost immediately" and that more than 90% of the electricity that these plants would produce could be safely integrated into the grid.

Curtailment of up to 10% also offered more economic value than new investments, primarily where wind technology is the source of the variable renewable electricity. It also showed that solar typically paired better with batteries than curtailment, because, unlike wind, all solar plants would generally be producing at the same time.

Both Eskom and the IPP Office have confirmed previously that they were assessing a new approach to curtailment to allow for additional generation capacity to be built at points on the grid that had previously been shown as fully committed.

Had such rules been in place ahead of the sixth bidding round of South Africa's public renewables procurement programme, it would have been possible to contract for 3 200 MW of new wind projects in the Western, Eastern and Northern Cape. In the event, no wind projects advanced to preferred-bidder status, owing to claims by Eskom that the grid capacity on which the projects were premised had been absorbed.

It is understood that the curtailment framework could be released ahead of the next public procurement round, which was initially scheduled to proceed in September.

The framework could be unveiled once the updated Generation Connection Capacity Assessment is released; a document which is reportedly undergoing internal Eskom governance processes.

Meanwhile, Cassim also said that Eskom, which is currently being restructured into transmission, distribution, and generation entities, should be "open minded" about future funding options for the grid itself, which could include private sector participation. It is estimated that some R230-billion of investment will be needed by 2032 to add 14 000 km of transmission lines, as well as associated transformation capacity.

However, he stressed that there was also an urgent need for investment in distribution infrastructure and for a national conversation on the future structure of the sector, which is highly fragmented with many of the country's more than 250 municipalities holding distribution licences.

"There are a number of smaller distributors and municipalities that are not investing and if you want to deal with the security or supply and access, we can't ignore that element of the value chain," he concluded.

African National Congress President Cyril Ramaphosa claims that South Africa "has turned a definite corner as far as loadshedding is concerned", adding that the levels and frequency of loadshedding are expected to improve during the fourth quarter.

In closing remarks following the party's National Executive Committee meeting, Ramaphosa attributed this claim to the "return of Kusile units, embedded generation by private households and businesses, and demand management".

Earlier Eskom announced that Kusile Unit 1 had resumed production using a temporary flue a few days short of a year of having been rendered inoperable by the collapse of its flue duct on October 23, 2022, because of an uncontrolled build-up of slurry.

The failure also made two other units inoperable as the Unit 1 flue collapse damaged the unit two and three flues, which share a common chimney with the Unit 1 flue.

Eskom said Unit 1, which has a nameplate capacity of 800 MW but is contracted to supply 720 MW into the grid, had been returned a month-and-a half-ahead of the original schedule.

The utility did not say how much electricity from Unit 1 was currently entering the loadshedding-prone system, but indicated that Kusile Unit 3, which resumed production on September 30, was producing 800 MW consistently and supplying 720 MW into the grid.

The 80 MW difference arises as the station uses electricity, known as parasitic load, to run various systems that do not contribute to electricity yield.

"This signifies that Eskom is on the right path to reducing and ultimately ending loadshedding," Eskom said in a statement.

Kusile Unit 2 is officially scheduled to resume production on November 30 and Eskom did not provide any immediate indication as to whether it was able to beat that deadline.

Before the units could resume production, Eskom sought and received a postponement, until March 31, 2025, to Kusile's compliance with minimum emission standards in relation to its sulphur dioxide emissions, as the temporary flues bypass the flue gas desulphurisation plant.

Currently four Kusile units are on load, including Unit 4, which was unaffected by the flue collapse as its flue duct is in a separate chimney.

Kusile Unit 5, which was damaged by a fire ahead of commissioning, was being prepared for synchronisation to the grid towards the end of December.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) is warning that investment in transmission and distribution infrastructure is failing to keep pace with renewables projects, and is leading to a large and growing queue of projects waiting to be connected to the grid globally.

In a newly published report titled 'Electricity Grids and Secure Energy Transitions', the agency notes that advanced projects with a combined capacity of 1 500 GW, or five times the amount of solar and wind capacity added worldwide in 2022, are currently waiting to be connected to the grid.

The report also identifies a lack of investment in grid infrastructure as one of the reasons for ongoing loadshedding in South Africa currently, noting too that no wind projects were awarded during the country's most recent renewables auction as a result of a lack of grid capacity.

However, a recent domestic assessment indicated that significant grid capacity could still be unlocked in provinces such as the Western Cape under a framework accommodative of less than 10% renewable-energy curtailment, which is a common practice among international transmission system operators.

Nevertheless, there is a growing push for accelerated investment in new grid infrastructure, with government even considering private sector participation models to help fund the estimated R210-billion-plus required to add 14 000 km of new power lines and associated transformation capacity by early in the next decade.

A report on the options is being prepared and will reportedly serve before Cabinet in the not-too-distant future.

Globally, the IEA calculates that 80-million kilometres of power lines will need to be added or refurbished by 2040 to meet national climate and security-of-supply targets - a rollout that is equivalent in scale to all grids currently in operation globally.

It adds that yearly grid-related investment will also need to double to more than $600- billion a year by 2030.

In modelling the carbon impact of failing to scale up such investments, the report outlines a so-called 'Grid Delay Case', showing that cumulative carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions between 2030 and 2050 would be almost 60-billion tonnes higher as a result of a slower rollout of renewables that results in higher fossil fuel consumption.

Under such a scenario, emissions would be equivalent to the total CO2 emissions from the global power sector over the past four years, implying a global temperature rise well above the Paris Agreement target of 1.5 °C, with a 40% chance of exceeding 2 °C.

"We must invest in grids today or face gridlock tomorrow," IEA executive director Fatih Birol argued when releasing the first-of-its-kind global study on October 17.

Anglo American Platinum, BMW Group South Africa (BMW SA) and Sasol have partnered to prove that a hydrogen mobility ecosystem can operate successfully within South Africa.

The three companies on Monday inked an agreement at the 2023 South African Green Hydrogen Summit in Cape Town that will bring hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) and supporting hydrogen refuelling technology to South Africa.

In terms of the agreement, BMW will provide the FCEVs - a fleet of BMW iX5 Hydrogen cars set to arrive next year - while Sasol will supply the green hydrogen and mobile refueler.

The mobile refueler will transport green hydrogen - hydrogen produced from renewable sources - from the Sasol industrial complex to BMW's facilities in Gauteng where the vehicles will be refuelled.

With Anglo American Platinum's platinum group metals (PGMs) already present in the vehicles' fuel-cell systems, the mining group would provide funding towards the project, said CEO Craig Miller, as part of its effort to drive the global market uptake of PGMs.

Miller noted that PGMs demand would increase by five-million ounces a year if FCEVs capture 10% of the global new-vehicle market, at 100 000 units a year.

BMW SA CEO Peter van Binsbergen explained that the iX5 Hydrogen refuels in three to four minutes, providing 500 km range on its 6 kg tank.

"FCEVs benefit from short refuelling times and long ranges, similar to using a diesel or petrol vehicle, but with the added benefit of zero emissions," said Miller.

While the battery electric vehicle (BEV), with its generally shorter range, may currently be winning the new-energy-vehicle race, as it was cheaper than a FCEV, Van Binsbergen expected the price gap to start closing significantly by the end of the decade.

FCEVs also required less critical minerals than BEVs, he said, "and I'd rather support the PGMs industry in South Africa".

China has, to date, secured a significant chunk of the global BEV battery value-chain.

Sasol Energy Business executive VP Priscillah Mabelane said Sasol was currently producing 150 kg of green hydrogen a day, but that this could soon go to 3 t or 4 t a day as the energy group expanded its renewable energy production.

She said Sasol was targeting the electric mobility; chemicals; steel and sustainable fuels sectors with its production of green hydrogen.

"We produced our first batch of green hydrogen at our Sasolburg facility in June, and in 2024 we will ramp this up to commercial scale when a 69 MW wind farm, situated in the Eastern Cape, comes online."

When asked at what point South Africans could expect to see the first FCEV sold in the domestic market, Van Binsbergen referenced the development timeline for BEVs, noting that the first BMW i3 was on the market in 2013, with BEVs now in production and readily available all over the world.

"As a versatile energy source, hydrogen has a key role to play on the road to climate neutrality," he added.

"We believe South Africa - with its abundance of raw materials and sound infrastructure base - is ideally placed to deliver on the green hydrogen economy's promises."

The Eastern, Northern and Western Cape provinces have agreed to team up in a bid to position South Africa as a global hub for the production of green hydrogen and derivative products, as well as to produce the components required in the green hydrogen value chain, ahead of the finalisation of the long-awaited Green Hydrogen Commercialisation Strategy.

The three coastal provinces are all playing host to potential multi-billion rand green-hydrogen projects and have been working separately on strategies and roadmaps in an effort to capture the jobs, growth and industrialisation opportunities that could flow should the projects materialise.

However, the three provincial administrations have also decided that there is greater potential to advance the opportunity through cooperation rather than competition, particularly in the areas of infrastructure, skills development, trade and investment promotion, as well as on the development of supportive policy and regulation.

They are also open to extending this cooperation into the region, including to green-hydrogen aspirant Namibia, in an effort to create a Southern African Development Community hydrogen corridor.

The areas of collaboration have been formalised into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) that will be signed at South Africa's second Green Hydrogen Summit under way in Cape Town.

The trilateral MoU follows on from a similar agreement announced in 2022 between the Western Cape and Northern Cape governments, which have both since also advanced with their individual strategies.

The Western Cape government is aiming to developed Saldanha Bay, which is an established deep water port and industrial hub, into a production centre for green hydrogen and derivatives such as green direct reduced iron, which could be manufactured at the currently mothballed Saldanha Steel Works, as well as bunkering fuel for the shipping industry.

The province also envisages the Atlantis Special Economic Zone becoming a key production centre for components used in the green-hydrogen value chain, including wind, solar and electrolyser components.

Green hydrogen is produced by using renewable electricity in an electrolyser to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The clean energy carrier and the derivative products are seen as becoming increasingly important in assisting those sectors that are unable to decarbonise directly using renewable electricity, such as steel, petrochemicals, fertilisers, cement, as well as long-haul land, sea and air transportation.

The Northern Cape has also finalised its Green Hydrogen Roadmap, which indicates that between $300- and $500-billion of green hydrogen production and value-chain investment could be directed the way of the province, which has abundant sun, wind and land, by 2050.

There are several projects already being progressed in the province, which also views the proposed greenfield port of Boegoebaai, located just south of the Namibian border, as potentially emerging as a flagship future production and export hub.

In the Eastern Cape, the strategy will be implemented primarily in the Coega Special Economic Zone, where Hive Hydrogen is considering a 1.07 GW investment to produce green hydrogen and green ammonia for export.

The MoU and the provincial strategies are said to be in line with the draft Green Hydrogen Commercialisation Strategy, which has been under development since 2021 but which has not yet been approved by government.

Speaking at the launch of the summit, Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa indicated that he did not expect the strategy to meet with any resistance from Cabinet once it was presented for approval, but provided no definitive timeframe for its consideration by the executive.

Industrial Development Corporation COO Joanne Bate, who is also leading the panel established by Trade, Industry and Competition Minister Ebrahim Patel to oversee the finalisation of the strategy, indicated that its formulation was well advanced.

Bate reporte...

The National Treasury has confirmed that the collective debt owed to Eskom by the 28 municipalities approved for participation under the Eskom Municipal Debt Relief Support Programme represents R26.69-billion of the R58.5-billion owed to the utility as of the end of March.

Eskom has confirmed that the arrears debt has since climbed to above R65-billion.

In response to questions posed by Engineering News, the National Treasury also confirmed that collective debt owned by non-applicants stood at R31.81-billion.

However, it reiterated that the deadline for applications had been extended until October 31, from an initial deadline of the end of September to allow for further voluntary applications.

It also expected to finalise assessments of a further nine applications by October 16, having indicated in a previous statement that 25 possible additional applications were currently serving before respective provincial treasuries.

The programme, which was announced during the February Budget, is designed to enable Eskom to write off municipal debt, with 136 of the country's 257 municipalities having been in arrears to Eskom at the end of March.

The National Treasury also provided Engineering News with a list of the names of the successful applicants, including five municipalities that owe more than R1-billion: the Emalahleni municipality (R7.4-billion), the Emfuluni local municipality (R5.9-billion), the Govan Mbeki local municipality (R3.7-billion), the City of Matlosana local municipality (R1.4-billion) and the City of Mbombela local municipality (R1.1-billion).

The other municipalities named as having applied successfully for the programmes are Enoch Mgijima (R991-million), the Rand West City (839-million), Modimolle-Mookgophong (R832-million), Victor Khanye (R637-million), Nketoana (R620-million), Walter Sisulu (R537-million), Mkhondo (R431-million), Mangaung metropolitan municipality (R387-million), Msukaligwa (R333-million), Siyancuma (R228-million), Mogale City (R216-million), Nama Khoi (R210-million), Ulundi (R143-million), Emakhazeni (R142-million), Matzikama (R113-million), Renosterberg (R108-million), Beaufort West (R77-million), Endumeni (R76-million), Dawid Kruiper (R65-million), Richtersveld (R53-million), Cederberg (R45-million), Kannaland (R45-million) and Mthonjaneni (R7-million).

The writedowns will be implemented over three financial years should the participating municipalities meet the scheme's 14 conditions, including minimum collections stipulations, a ringfencing of the Eskom account which should be paid first and a restriction on borrowings.

There is also the potential for a revocation of a municipality's electricity distribution licence should it fail to comply with the conditions.

Requests for proposals (RFPs) to redevelop the Tygerberg Hospital in Cape Town are expected to go out next year, says Western Cape government Department of Health and Wellness communication deputy director Mark van der Heever.

"This megaproject aims to improve health infrastructure for the people of the Western Cape by replacing the current inefficient and ageing Tygerberg Hospital - which has become increasingly costly to maintain - with two modern, efficient facilities equipped with 21st century technology."

Tygerberg Hospital is a tertiary hospital located in Parow.

The hospital was officially opened in 1976 and is the largest hospital in the Western Cape and the second largest in South Africa.

It acts as a teaching hospital, in conjunction with Stellenbosch University's Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences.

The decision to redevelop the hospital was made by the provincial cabinet in 2009 already, at a then estimated cost of R5-billion, excluding equipment.

"Due to the size and complexity of the hospital, its redevelopment is classified as a megaproject, and the support of not only provincial, but also national stakeholders is required," says Van der Heever.

The feasibility study of the project was approved in November 2022, and is currently "in the procurement stage of the public-private partnership (PPP) cycle", he adds.

"This stage involves determining the output requirements to formulate the request for proposals, which is expected to be advertised in 2024.

"Should all things go according to plan, the new Central Hospital is expected to be operational by 2031."

The new Central Hospital will be a new 893-bed tertiary facility on the Tygerberg Hospital estate, "thereby maintaining the facility's close linkages with higher education institutions for training health professionals and technologists", says Van der Heever.

A second facility will be a new 596-bed Regional Hospital, offering Level 1 and 2 services on a site procured for this purpose at Belhar.

Tygerberg Hospital will be maintained, and will remain operational until the new Central Hospital and the Belhar Hospital are operational, says Van der Heever.

Engineering News Editor Terence Creamer discusses Eskom's plans to roll-out a new virtual wheeling platform that could unlock renewables supply to companies with operations spread across the country.