GRAY MAGUIRE: Eskom, lack of policy the biggest roadblocks to electric vehicle transition
It is crucial to facilitate growth of the domestic EV market and improve our export position on EVs
Last week the British high commission announced the allocation of R64m in grant funding to 10 climate change mitigation projects under its UK Partnering for Accelerated Climate Transitions (UK Pact) programme. Two of the key projects are focused on developing the electrical grid’s readiness for electric vehicle (EV) charging and understanding the infrastructure needed for this growing load. This includes projects in Johannesburg and Nelson Mandela Bay aimed at understanding such needs for home charging of personal EVs, as well as public fast chargers for buses and taxis.
While the inevitability of the long-term migration to EVs seems pretty clear at a global level, recent announcements from Eskom indicating the likelihood of sustained load-shedding would suggest the grid is anything but ready here at home. This synopsis fails to take into account movements in the municipal small-scale embedded generation space, where the number of municipal distributors has grown from 10 in 2...
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