It is with heavy hearts that we learned of the death of Barry Bredenkamp recently.
He had worked in the energy industry since 1983, first with Eskom and until recently as the general manager (GM) of the South African National Energy Development Institute's (SANEDI's) Energy Efficiency since 2005. He was one of the longest serving GMs at SANEDI. SANEDI is an agency of the South African Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE).
Bredenkamp focused his attention on various aspects of energy efficiency since 1996 and authored and presented many papers and articles on the topic, locally in South Africa and internationally, and served on a number advisory and working groups.
Principal focus areas included energy efficiency tax incentives, energy performance certificates for buildings, cool coating activities in low-income areas, the measurement and verification of energy efficiency projects, as well as other exciting initiatives in South Africa.
His last submission to Energize questioned whether we were to expect load shedding to be a permanent factor in our lives. He wrote that in March 2021. Click here to read that article.
By March 2023, we were experiencing load shedding every day. The current chairman of Eskom calls it "permanent load shedding".
He must have known that sufficient additional generation would not be added soon enough to mitigate the shortage of power from Eskom’s unreliable electricity generators, so he challenged the readers of his articles to reduce the amount of electricity they use.
It was good advice, especially as the electricity tariffs continue to increase at far higher percentages than the national inflation rate.
He was a real asset to the electricity supply industry, and he will be missed by all who had the pleasure of knowing him.
