South Africa will launch three rounds of new renewable energy procurement plans in 2021, totaling 6,800MW, and three new rounds of coal, natural gas and energy storage, totaling 5,000MW.

Announced at the three-day African National Congress (ANC) meeting, these purchase plans are expected to increase the penetration rate of renewable energy in the market and increase power supply to achieve long-term energy security.

ANC plans to start the first round of renewable energy power generation in January or February for 2,600 megawatts of wind and solar power. In August, the second round of 2,600MW; the third round of power generation is 1,600MW, and the third round of power generation is January or February 2022. In addition, it is expected that a procurement round of 500MW energy storage will start in September, and two rounds of 1,500MW coal and 3,000MW natural gas are expected in December.

In addition to increasing the contribution of renewable energy to the national grid (which is a particularly important task given the country’s current power outages), these purchase plans will also help South Africa transition its energy to cleaner fuels. These purchase plans are also in line with the country’s comprehensive resource plan, which is a government plan to improve the development of renewable energy in the country’s energy structure. Editor/Xu Shengpeng