Solar energy relevant for S Africa’s energy transition

The pricing of solar systems is continually improving and the technology is expected to be beneficial for South Africa’s energy transition, says solar energy equipment supplier GameChange Solar chief commercial officer Derick Botha.

“Solar energy has often been overlooked, primarily because of the high prices of solar systems.”

He notes that the continued significant improvement in the pricing of solar systems is driven by factors such as addressing commodity prices, more availability of commodities, better manufacturing processes and improved efficiencies of solar systems and solar cells.

Botha says GameChange Solar realised the issue of high costs and has, subsequently, helped drive down the costs of solar systems by addressing the costs of the solar racking and solar tracking portions of the systems.

In its efforts to address the global market for solar trackers, GameChange Solar has established a company in South Africa, through which it hopes to get involved in more solar energy related projects that will be beneficial to South Africa’s energy transition.

To date, the company is deliverying a 8 MW project outside of Johannesburg, and the solar tracking system has been supplied and will be commissioned in the coming months. GameChange Solar is currently in discussions with companies regarding larger projects, including companies that are part of the Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme and other private projects.

He says GameChange Solar is expecting to build its team in South Africa and that the country “has a huge amount of talent available to be used”.

However, Botha says there are challenges such as the issue of project financing and projects being tendered at the dawn of the Covid-19 pandemic, while the pricing of solar modules has increased over the past year owing to shortages and logistical issues.

While these challenges do not directly impact on GameChange Solar, it does affect owners and developers.

Meanwhile, he adds that South Africa has “huge wealth in solar resources, and to a certain extent, wind resources, which should be used”.

“It amazes me that South Africa has been reticent and has come kicking and screaming into the solar age, while many private parties have already accepted and adopted solar energy means.”

Botha notes that most of the country’s power plants are located in one region, thereby polluting the same areas, which has negatively impacted on the local environment.

Coal is a finite resource and renewable energy, including solar, is more beneficial and relevant for South Africa’s transition.

Botha notes that a hybrid energy model would, thus, be most suitable for South Africa’s transition, allow its use of different forms of energy generation.

He says energy storage is expected to play an important role in the future of South Africa’s energy plans, owing to the different types of storage that are being developed, such as battery energy storage.

In the medium term, the company aims to focus on establishing projects in South Africa, and Africa, with projects already implemented on the continent.

In the long term, GameChange Solar aims to enhance its products and is developing solar products to be released soon.