South Africa is set to add 250MW of clean energy into the national grid following Siemens Gamesa officially starting production of the energy from 110MW Perdekraal East and 140MW Kangnas wind farms.
The Perdekraal East site is located 80km northeast of Ceres in the Western Cape and the Kangnas wind farm is situated near Springbok in the Northern Cape. The wind farms are equipped with a total of 109 2.3MW capacity onshore wind turbines and will help provide enough clean electricity to power a total of 250,000 South African homes. Additionally, wind farms will emit zero carbon emissions using almost no water during the power generation process.
Read:Zambia to partner with WWF to develop clean energy
Bid Window 4”
Despite COVID-19 challenges, the two projects have been completed in line with the original timeline set by Mainstream Renewable Power. Mainstream fully developed the projects, managed the construction process and will manage the operations and maintenance of the plants. The global developer of renewable energy is based in Dublin with offices in Cape Town. Kangana’s wind farm was even completed significantly ahead of schedule.
As part of the “Bid Window 4” of the government’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), both Perdekraal and Kangana’s wind farms will together add to the 1.3GW of the country’s clean energy generation capacity.
In addition the country’s President Cyril Ramaphosa said that that the coal-dependent country will turn to more renewable energy as one way to help ease power cuts that have severely set back efforts to rebuild the weak economy.
South Africans have been outraged by rolling power cuts in the current mid-summer that also have worried investors. The country relies on coal for some 77% of power needs, according to the department of energy.
