Electricity utility Eskom announced on Monday that its 100 MW Sere wind farm, near Vredendal in the Western Cape, had entered full commercial operations at the end of March, with all 46 wind turbines having been erected and the construction of the Skaapvlei substation and a 44 km 132 kV distribution line completed.

Acting CEO Brian Molefe, who was seconded to the embattled State-owned company from Transnet on April 17, described Sere as the group’s first large-scale renewable energy project. He added that it would produce 298 000 MWh yearly, enough energy to supply around 124 000 standard homes.
                                                      
Since the energising of the first wind turbine in October 2014, the Sere facility had contributed over 90 GWh of energy to the national power grid.

The announcement of Sere’s completion followed Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson’s recent confirmation that a further 13 renewables projects had been selected under the country’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), raising to 79 the number of projects procured under the programme.

Eskom projects were not able to compete for the allocation, which Joemat-Pettersson aimed to increase by a further 6 300 MW.

However, the utility was the buyer of all the energy produced by the REIPPPP projects and was also responsible for connecting the projects to the grid. The conclusion of both bid window three and four had been delayed as a result of cost and timing issues surrounding those connections.

Separately, Eskom was also developing a 100 MW concentrating solar plant (CSP) project near Upington, in the Northern Cape.

The World Bank, the African Development Bank, the Clean Technology Fund, and Agence Française de Développement were helping fund both the CSP and Sere projects.