Will 2015 be the year of solar power across Africa?

Posted on : Friday, 9th January 2015

In January 2015, South Africa’s Minister of Energy will announce another doubling of the renewable energy capacity in the country. The Republic is struggling with regular blackouts due to breakdowns in its aging fleet of mainly coal power plants. The Government has decided to accelerate and expand the solar and wind programs for two reasons: Wind and solar photovoltaics (PV) are not only competitive with coal and gas in terms of price, but they can also, and particularly PV, be built and scaled up rapidly to meet electricity sector needs. No other power generation technology shares this flexibility.