ESKOM
Time to dust off bill’s provisions for an independent operator
As Eskom teeters on the edge of financial disaster, with the Treasury acknowledging that it poses the biggest single risk to the South African economy, the immediate priority for national government is to try to prevent its total failure. The new board will hopefully go some way in turning around SA’s monopoly power utility, but now would be an ideal time to split the power sector into different parts to reduce systemic risk, enable better management and prepare it for future growth. While Eskom remains the main focus of attention, SA has been contemplating its future mix of generation types and capacity for a number of years. To enable a more competitive and transparent power system to deliver this energy mix, it would be appropriate to reconsider the Independent System and Market Operator Bill, which would remove the operation of the electricity grid from Eskom and place it with an independent operator that is still owned by the state. The operator would buy energy from Eskom and ...
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