BRIAN KAMANZI: Komati decommissioning: is Eskom’s agrivoltaics pilot a missed opportunity?

Over the past year Eskom, SA’s embattled state-owned electricity utility, has consolidated what it calls a just energy transition (JET) plan to guide its extensive governance and technical reforms over the coming decades. Its stated aim is to shift SA’s historical reliance on its coal-powered generation fleet.

The imminent decommissioning of the Komati power station, a 1960s-era coal-powered plant in Mpumalanga, is the flagship project of Eskom’s JET process. Despite the renewed energy and attention to development at Komati, workers have raised concerns for several months over the lack of consultation about the plans for the station, and for them.

The new activities at the plant appear to form part of the JET Partnership, a “green” financing package now under negotiation with the UK, France, Germany and the US. Waves of local and international high-level delegations, including groupings from the World Bank, have been seen on site.

Eskom has indicated that plans for Komati include repowering the existing infrastructure with the deployment of solar photovoltaic (PV), natural gas and battery storage systems. The extensive plans also include repurposing initiatives that aim to generate employment by establishing agriculture and aquaponic projects.

The first public tender to this end was issued by Eskom on July 3. This was for an agrivoltaic facility — a mixed-use solar PV plant integrated with agricultural production underneath and interspersed by between-panel arrays. The concept of agrivoltaics emerged as an innovative design solution in areas where access to land for productive use is constrained. These systems have found application in rural contexts, particularly where solar power has been used to pump water, allowing small-scale irrigation in the vicinity.

The mounting and layout of traditional solar panel arrays in power plants aims to minimise the size and number of necessary components and cabling while maximising the energy yield. However, for agrivoltaic plants these factors must be balanced with the drive to create conducive conditions for the growth and maintenance of agricultural products. This results in the requirement of more complex mounting structures.

Local content

The shading and spacing between panels and the height above the ground must be carefully determined to ensure the temperature and humidity levels are in an acceptable range. The design must also ensure the layout maintains high safety standards and easy access to electrical components for operations and maintenance activities.

In support of local industry Eskom’s tender process designed local content requirements for qualifying bids from private  developers. The designated list included: laminated PV modules (15%), module frames (65%), DC combiner boxes (65%), mounting structures (90%) and inverters (40%). Additional local content requirements included personal protective equipment and steel components used for construction to all be locally procured, while electrical cables were set at 90%. The local content percentages are represented as a percentage of the bid price for the specific good or service. Compliance is verified by the department of trade, industry & competition and the SA Bureau of Standards, which includes the meeting of approved technical specifications.  

Despite this, in a recent statement to the media Eskom CEO André de Ruyter echoed disappointing statements on local content policy requirements suggesting that aggressive targets slow the speed of the transition and increase the costs of energy production. Taking aim at local solar panel module manufacturers, De Ruyter cited low local capacity as a stumbling block to localisation efforts. This despite exceptionally low levels of utilisation now experienced by SA’s two local PV manufacturers, ARTSolar (KwaZulu-Natal) and Seraphim (Eastern Cape).

Later this year another 500MW per year PV manufacturing facility by African Quartz Photovoltaic is due to come online in the Saldanha special economic zone. Criticism of local content policy requirements can only serve to contribute to further low levels of utilisation of local content, furthering capacity constraints and creating a destructive cycle that fails to serve local manufacturers and their employees.

The process unfolding at Komati offers no assurances to workers, or the broader community that will be affected by the imminent closure and repurposing of the power plant. On July 15 at the Eskom agrivoltaic tender meeting the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ) ascertained from Eskom that bidding companies need not consider any plans to integrate Komati’s existing workforce into their project proposals. This is a missed opportunity and not in keeping with the precepts of a just transition.

Change process

The widespread adoption of the just transition language and framework is a product of efforts from the local and international labour movement to ensure workers and communities are not left behind in ongoing energy transition efforts.

In much of the debate about the need for the energy transition to be “just”, the focus has been on consultation and notions of inclusiveness — how to bring people into a process. Perhaps it is time to think about how putting people, in this case workers, at the centre can change the nature of the process itself.

Small pilot initiatives in projects earmarked for social benefit, like Komati’s agrivoltaic plant, could be an interesting opportunity to explore worker co-operatives, more inclusive design processes and reskilling of existing staff.

The planned pilot projects at Komati, the success or failure of which will have minimal effect on SA’s broader energy crisis, are an ideal opportunity to demonstrate what might be possible if we bet our future on building and using local capabilities. Why not test aggressive use of locally manufactured components? Why not pull in public universities, research units and technical vocational education and training institutions to develop collaborative projects that demonstrate local scientific ingenuity and engineering acumen? Why not consult workers in ways that don’t simply amount to a tick box exercise?

Komati presents Eskom, the Presidential Climate Commission and its just transition framework, local industry and workers with an opportunity to pilot a response to the required energy transition that is ambitious and proudly local.  

• Kamanzi, an energy policy researcher and engineer by training, is an associate with the Institute for Economic Justice.