South Africa has officially launched its largest operational wheeling project, adding 256 MW of renewable energy capacity to the national grid to power Tronox Mineral Sands’ operations in KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape.
SOLA Group is developing the project in Lichtenburg, North West province, encompassing two solar photovoltaic plants with capacities of 126 MWp and 130 MWp respectively. The solar facilities consist of over 390 000 bifacial solar modules on single-axis tracking systems. They will generate 593 721 MW of clean energy annually.
The power will be transmitted through the Eskom grid to five of Tronox’s sites, covering around 40% of the company’s power requirements in South Africa.
“To date, SOLA Group has delivered the only operational utility-scale renewable wheeling plants in the country, totalling 268 MWp, and has a further 325 MWp currently in construction,” says Ian Burger, Managing Director of Technical at SOLA.
Wheeling allows privately generated power to be transmitted across the national grid to customers through a willing buyer/seller model. It facilitates the delivery of renewable energy from locations with optimal wind or solar conditions to corporate, industrial and residential customers – often at a more sustainable and cost-effective rate than traditional power sources.
“When it comes to renewable energy, wheeling provides an elegant solution to buying cleaner power at a more efficient rate than coal-based power,” says Managing Director of Assets at SOLA, Katherine Persson.
The Tronox project was one of the first major solar projects to be constructed outside of the Northern Cape province, which has traditionally been considered the best location for solar projects. However, grid capacity made it necessary to look for other locations, says Persson.
“The next best province to consider was the North West. Our projects were constructed about 10 km north of Lichtenburg in a province where we benefit from good solar irradiation, suitable land and the grid connection that is needed for a project of this size. When selecting a site, we also identified that there was real benefit that could be transferred to the community in this region,” Persson said.
In another SOLA project, construction is well underway on a neighbouring R1,9 billion facility.
A ‘renewable revolution’
President Cyril Ramaphosa touted South Africa’s “renewable energy revolution” as one that will foster significant growth and job creation during his opening of Parliament address in Cape Town on July 18. “We have seen, for example, how the Northern Cape has already attracted billions of rands of investment in renewable energy projects.”
He cited the Lichtenburg project as an example of government working to “open the door to independent power producers of renewable energy” to take up projects that strengthen the grid and create employment opportunities.
“We already have a huge pipeline of renewable energy projects, representing over 22 500 MW of new generating capacity and estimated to be worth around R400 billion in new private investment.
“We will see more of these projects taking shape across our country in the months and years to come,” said Ramaphosa.
