Conclusion

South Africa’s electricity crisis is a great threat to economic and social progress, thus resolving the supply shortfall and reducing the risk of outages is one of the most important interventions that will revive economic growth.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has committed to reforms to transform the industry, including lifting the threshold for electricity generation projects for which a licence is not required for projects up to 100 MW, and bolstering energy supply with the ongoing massive procurement of utility-scale power.

While these reforms will take time to bear fruit, implementing some of the ‘quick wins’ that the ISI energy sector roundtable discussion identified, could have immediate positive impacts and provide the economy with breathing space to catalyse some of the more complex opportunities that are presenting themselves.