BARBARA CREECY | Plans in place to ease power cuts, climate change

As our country faces severe loadshedding, steps are being taken by the department of forestry, fisheries and the environment to ensure speedier approval of environmental impact assessments (EIAs) for renewable energy projects.

As a result, the department is working hard to cut the red tape and get these projects finalised. In this regard, we have reduced our decision-making timeframe from 107 days to 57 days.

The department’s EIA section is presently dealing with renewable energy applications for projects that will deliver 9,789 megawatts of electricity. This is made up of 2,899 megawatts for solar PV, 6,890 for wind energy facilities and many of these applications include battery energy storage systems and associated transmission and distribution infrastructure.

Grid capacity is a major constraint to scaling up the energy transition and that is a view across the board with consensus from stakeholders, government, business, labour and civil society. Grid capacity is a national priority to solve, not only for our transition needs but also for our short-term emergency to solve loadshedding. We have 15 EIA applications relating to transmission and distribution infrastructure, which we are also prioritising for decision-making.

In recent times concern has been expressed that as we battle loadshedding we are considering delaying the decommissioning of aging coal-fired power stations. Government is clear that we must battle both loadshedding and climate change. It is not a one or the other decision.

Current modelling will advise how we balance our decommissioning schedule so we can achieve energy security within the context of our climate change commitments and air quality improvement.

The sixth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change confirmed the world has already warmed at an unprecedented rate and that Africa is already experiencing widespread losses and damage due to climate change. Nationally, carbon budget regulations are being developed to address the submission and processing of industry climate change mitigation plans. Regulations for implementing and enforcing priority area air quality management plans have also been published for public comment.

To ensure that our people are able to adapt to climate change, we will continue to roll out the local government support programme. In addition to assisting 44 district municipalities to develop their climate change plans, we are working in all provinces to review their existing climate change plans and align with the draft Climate Change Bill that parliament is finalising.

Work by the South African Weather Service is also being continued to automate and modernise its observations infrastructure so that the public are warned timeously of extreme weather events. This will save lives and livelihoods.

But, climate change and air quality issues are not stand-alone concerns that we need to address. Our country’s significant waste management challenges include poor landfill practices and sporadic household waste collection as well as unacceptable levels of illegal dumping in many parts of the country.

Through the department we are also supporting municipalities and residents to improve the cleanliness of the country using innovative, labour intensive, delivery mechanisms that crowd-in private sector technical expertise and funding. The focus is on the smaller metropolitan municipalities and provincial capitals. Thus, our efforts are being intensified to improve cleanliness levels in Mahikeng, Mangaung, Bhisho, and the other provincial capitals as part of the re-invigorated Presidential Good Green Deeds programme.

The Expanded Public Works Programme supports the cleaning and greening initiative by assisting in litter picking in prioritised streets; clearing illegal dumps; planting trees and promoting recycling services.

Their efforts are being complimented by the 32 waste enterprises that have been supported to increase recycling of construction and demolition waste, plastic, packaging, and other waste streams.

It is worth noting that over the past two financial years, the department spent over R168m to assist 58 municipalities to purchase the yellow waste collection fleet. Besides the extended producer responsibility schemes for paper and packaging, electrical, electronic and lighting sectors starting to show success as more waste is diverted from landfill sites, the department’s recycling enterprise support programme has, in the past six years, supported 56 start-ups and emerging SMMEs and cooperatives operating within the waste sector providing more than R300m in financial support, creating 1,558 jobs and diverting over 200,000 tonnes of waste from landfills. 

Barbara Creecy is the minister of forestry, fisheries and the environment