Eskom Green is here

Eskom has launched a renewable energy business, called Eskom Green, and a go-to-market customer strategy to support 24/7 supply and decarbonise the grid.

Eskom Green plans to accelerate the development of utility-scale renewable energy projects in South Africa.

It will also support larger power user customers in achieving their decarbonisation and energy transition objectives.

Eskom said the development of renewable energy projects requires agile decision-making and access to diverse sources of capital.

They are built on partnership-based models and bankable project structures which differ materially from Eskom’s legacy vertically integrated generation model.

Eskom Green is part of Eskom Holdings. However, in time, it will be separated from Eskom to become a wholly owned subsidiary.

Eskom Green aims to be a primary energy provider where customers contract it for their core renewable energy requirements.

“The pricing will be clear and transparent, where the wholesale tariff is passed through to the customer at cost,” Eskom said.

The network, wheeling, and other regulated wholesale charges will be levied by transmission and distribution operators.

“These costs will not be absorbed by Eskom Green and will not be marked up,” the power utility said.

The charges will be presented as a distinct line item separate from the price of energy that Eskom Green generates and sells.

This way, the customer has full transparency on what is paid for energy and what is paid for network use.

The foundation phase of the offering will target companies with great industrial demand in mining and manufacturing.

“Under a take-or-pay structure, the customer commits to a fixed volume and pays the agreed price whether or not the energy is consumed,” it said.

This gives Eskom Green the firm revenue base that anchors Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) that will be entered into to finance the projects.

As the Eskom Green Portfolio scales, aggregation, ancillary services and wholesale market participation will be added to the service offering.

In terms of technology, the pipeline is weighted to solar PV with supporting Battery Energy Storage System (BESS), pumped storage, and wind.

The second phase of the offering will serve the Eskom Distribution market, leading the customer network through the eDX Edge offering.

Eskom Green will have 6 GW of electricity available by 2030, as a result of Eskom’s pipeline of renewables and storage initiatives currently under development.

17 high-priority projects have been identified for implementation across Eskom’s existing coal-fired power station footprint.

It will leverage existing infrastructure to deliver approximately 6 GW of additional capacity by 2030.

This includes at least 2GW of renewable energy and pumped storage projects expected to advance from 2026.

This approach of co-locating renewable and conventional generation will be extended to additional sites, with the next project planned for the Komati Power Station.

These projects leverage existing infrastructure to support faster deployment, improve cost efficiencies, and strengthen grid resilience.

Eskom Green will advance a further pipeline of up to 32GW of renewable energy and storage projects by 2040.