Municipalities central to resolving energy security issues, says panel

DURING the closing panel of the Electricity Forum, Manufacturing Circle executive director Philippa Rodseth said municipalities were the missing piece of the energy security puzzle and an elephant in the room in terms of South Africa achieving a just energy transition.

From an industrialisation perspective, she said, the rubber hits the road when municipalities start being engaged – they either enable power to operations or compromise on business’ ability to operate, owing to either a lack of electricity infrastructure and maintenance thereof, or mismanagement of administrative matters.

With more than 280 municipalities in the country, it becomes a problem if they are not aligned in terms of markups applied and tariffs asked, for example.

“We need a model whereby investors, suppliers, municipalities, businesses, communities and Eskom work together to get, monitor and maintain infrastructure,” Rodseth suggested.

Eskom CEO André de Ruyter agreed, stating that many municipalities contributed to interruptions in