Bid to stop Eskom’s green energy deals
THE Coal Transporters Forum, which conveys coal to Eskom, will take the government to court today in a bid to stop it from signing deals with Independent Power Producers (IPPs).
The forum argues that the switch to renewable energy will cause job losses both in the mining industry and in the coal transportation business.
It said that switching to alternative energy would affect the entire coal value chain. The organisation said it was not against renewable energy as such, but it was concerned about the pending massive job losses that could endure if the IPPs programmes went ahead.
It said that there was no consultation between the forum and government regarding this green energy.
The forum will ask the court to interdict Eskom from signing any Power Purchase Agreements with the IPPs until the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) has, among others, also consulted them.
Eskom aimed to sign about 27 renewable energy contracts for the purchase of alternative energy from various IPPs. The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and Transform RSA last year launched an unsuccessful urgent application to halt this process, pending today’s application.
The court at the time dismissed it as not being urgent.
Eskom meanwhile said there could not be an interdict against the signing, as the horse had already bolted and deals had been signed.
The forum said it did not know for sure whether these deals had been signed or not, but if this was so, it then asked that they be overturned.
In their court papers the IPPs confirmed that some of these contracts had been signed. It stated that if the forum succeeded with its application to have the agreements overturned, this could not only result in significant job losses for them, but it could cause billions of rand in losses for IPPs. This is according to Brenda Martin, the chief executive of the South African Wind Energy Association, which represents the interests of wind energy companies.
It was said that Eskom earlier signed the agreements in respect of Bid Window 4 and others.