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The Department of Energy published an RFP on the 3rd of August 2011 requesting Independent Power Producers to submit proposal for the first window on the 4th of November 2011. All bidders intending to bid for the first and the second window were required to attend a compulsory Bidders Conference held on the 14th of September 2011.
The conference was compulsory for all bidders intending to submit their bids on the first and the second window as per the provisions of the RFP. Most bidders were aiming for the first window but some were not ready given the readiness criteria outlined on the RFP.
In accordance with the provisions of the RFP, all bidders intending to submit for the first window were requested to submit their bids as from the 3rd whilst the closing date was on 12h00 on the 04th of November 2011. The Department managed to receive about 53 bids and the received bids cut across all the different technologies. It appears these projects cut across all the different provinces whilst provinces such as the Northern Cape, Western Cape and the Eastern Cape were the main beneficiaries.
Bids received cover different technologies as per the determination by the Minister but wind and solar take the lead. It was expected that wind and solar will dominate the bids given the South African environment. You will notice that even the determination gave wind and solar more MW allocation compared to the other technologies.
It is too early to tell you about the content of the bids or the evaluation outcome but we can indicate that we have different teams looking at different aspects of the bids. The teams are divided into legal, financial, technical and economic development. Each and every aspect of each bid is receiving special attention. As you may be aware, the scoring is divided into 70 percent price and 30 percent economic development as per the exemption from the PPPFA.
With regards to the 30 percent for economic development, bidders are required to comply with different minimum thresholds per technology for BEE ownership, job creation, local content and socio-economic development.
The Department is using transactional advisers to assist with the evaluation of the bids and we all are working hard to ensure that the evaluation is finalized on time for the announcement of the preferred bidders before the end of this year.