President Cyril Ramaphosa says the energy action plan is underway and the country will see lesser stages of load shedding.
He said there were currently a number of renewable projects being implemented and this will reduce the severity of load shedding in the country.
Ramaphosa said the fact that more generators of electricity are coming on board this was a significant step in dealing with the energy crisis.
Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa said two weeks ago that there were currently 60GW of renewable projects in various stages of implementation.
These projects were in various parts of the country.
Ramaphosa, who was making closing remarks at the ANC’s provincial conference in the Western Cape on Sunday, said they were making strides in dealing with the power cuts.
He said the work that the government was doing to revive the economy and create jobs was undermined by the energy crisis.
However, they were making interventions that will reduce the severity and frequency of load shedding.
“Now we are poised to go beyond load shedding. We are poised to have many more generators who are going to make sure we do have sufficient energy. We have revived the renewable energy producers programme, which was stuck. We have even removed the licensing threshold for further generators and therefore unlocking massive investment in generation capacity,” said Ramaphosa.
He added that most of these projects were in the Western Cape, Northern Cape and the Eastern Cape.
“We are going to see much more activity that will bring on board more electricity generation. Our immediate task is to reduce the severity of load shedding and in the near future to end it all. The plan we announced a year ago is beginning to take shape and in time we will be seeing less and less load shedding,” said Ramaphosa.
He said the government now has a clear plan of dealing with the energy crisis.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
Politics