Namibia’s independent power producer Arandis Power has shown strong interest in entering the South African power market by offering the country’s state-owned power utility Eskom 120MW.
The offer to aid Eskom in power generation follows South Africa’s Request for Information (RFI) made by its Department of Mineral Resources and Energy, in accord with the country’s “Risk Mitigation Power Procurement Program.”
As envisaged by the 2019 Integrated Resources Plan (IRP), the Program serves to alleviate current supply constraints in the short to medium-term future. Issued in December, the RFI evaluates the options for generating electricity power between 2,000 and 3,000 MW that can be connected to the grid in the shortest possible time and at minimum cost.
Arandis Power’s Managing Director Ezio Vernetti said that the 120 MW of flexible power generation delivered by the company falls within the framework of the RFI.
“Namibia’s electricity regulatory authority, the Electricity Control Board (ECB), has shown vision and leadership in the Southern African Power Pool by opening up the local market and the national grid to Independent Power Producers for the generation and trading of electricity, both locally and internationally,” said Vernetti.
The Arandis Power project is fully developed and ready to be implemented, and could take place within four months of signing a power purchase agreement with Eskom or any other off-taker in the Southern African Power Pool.
“The Arandis Power plant is capable of supplying cost-effective power in a flexible operational mode from peaking to base load energy,” said Vernetti. “This operational flexibility, more competitive than Eskom’s diesel-driven open cycle gas turbine peaking plants, caters for unlimited starts and stops, and makes the plant an enabler of renewable energy projects in that it contributes, through its flexible operational capability (load following, voltage and frequency regulation), to compensate grid instability challenges created by intermittent solar PV and wind generators.”
