The development process of renewable energy (RE) resources in South Africa was spearheaded by the White Paper on Renewable Energy in November 2003. This document established a generation target of 10 000 GWh per annum from available non-coal energy resources by 2013.

The generation output had been envisaged to be extracted primarily from the RE resources namely biomass, solar radiation, wind and small-scale hydropower (<10 MW). The ocean energy exploitation had not been considered at the time. None of the desired RE technology means and products were readily available in South Africa at the time of the WP on RE introduction.

The Electricity Regulation Act (Act 4 of 2006) led to the dissemination of the Regulation on New Generation Capacity. In November 2010 the Department of Energy (DOE) together with NERSA and National Treasury introduced a new Integrated Resource Plan (IRP 2010-2030). The Government promulgated new IRP in May 2011 endorsing thus widely diversified South Africa’s future energy generation mix aiming at reducing dependency on the coal-fired energy generation over the next twenty years. At the end of 2011 the DoE and NERSA issued the first order of a 3 725 MW renewable energy capacity, this time entirely allocated to the Independent Power Producers (IPPs).

The RE Independent Power Producers Procurement (REIPPP) programme replaced the internationally adopted REFIT procurement programme, excluding all RE projects below 1 MW in capacity. The REIPPP has been subsequently implemented in three bidding windows and by now the whole RE capacity allotment is fully allocated primarily to the wind, solar PV and CSP large projects. To date the development of RE small-scale projects are not supported by any particular incentives.

The banks are reluctant to support small-scale development below 1 MW in capacity. However, so-called embedded generation of hybrid configuration (typically of solar, wind and hydropower) small projects is taking place around South Africa mainly by private developers from their own resources. The research, assessment studies and training in development of embedded generation small-scale projects and technology implementation – specifically focusing on hydropower – are conducted at the University of Pretoria. The university is engaged in the small-scale hydropower research in collaboration with the Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality, Bloem Water and South Africa’s Water Research Commission (WRC).

To date the local government authorities and water boards, due to their extensive and demanding functions within the water supply and sanitation chain (i.e. a complex urban water services system), find themselves lacking on the development of renewable energy resources and application of modern technology in their disposal. However the small-scale renewable energy technology options are rather plentiful for most municipalities and water boards as well as interested IPPs.

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