Confidentiality stands in the way of JET information
Amid new promises from the government to scale up renewables, Andiswa Matikinca tracks our journey to unlock data on SA’s Just Energy Transition
More than a year ago, Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism’s #PowerTracker project rated South Africa’s transparency on renewable power agreements. After spending several months trying to track down data to build our geo-journalism mapping tool, we discovered it would be no easy feat.
Undeterred, we turned to South Africa’s Promotion of Access to Information Act of Information (PAIA) Act 2 of 2000 and submitted information requests to the relevant stakeholders. The Act allows for the right of access to any information held by the state as well as any information that is held by another person that is required for the exercise or protection of any rights; and to provide for matters connected to it.
Eskom, the national power utility, was one of the first entities that #PowerTracker reached out to in our quest to build up the data on our #PowerTracker map, which is a “one-stop-shop” for information on renewable energy projects in Mpumalanga, South Africa’s energy capital. The map includes updates on the Eskom power plant decommissioning process and information related to Just Energy Transition (JET) funding and activities.
From Eskom we requested a status update on the coal power station decommissioning plans taking place alongside the JET, as well an update on its first decommissioning project in 19 years at Komati power station, pioneer of the new era where the country is embarking on a transition from polluting fossil fuels towards renewable energy.
We also requested data on renewable energy capacity installed by the end of 2023, including utility-scale generation (under the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme) and private solar systems. We also wanted details of land lease power purchase agreements and the status of the agreements with different renewable energy companies.
Initiatives for transparency
In response, the power utility indicated that their JET office is playing an active role with different stakeholders to ensure that information and knowledge on the JET is easily available to the public.
“The Eskom JET office engages widely with a multitude of stakeholders including, but not limited to and in no specific order, community forums, prominent local and national stakeholders like municipalities and ward councillors, provincial government departments, national government departments including the Presidential Climate Commission, funders, organised labour and other stakeholder forums,” said the Eskom media desk.
“We have also established a community information centre at Komati power station that allows for easy access to information on the Komati JET initiative and to share employment and training opportunities with members of the Komati community and the general public,” said the media desk.
New PAIA system
Although the normal waiting period for a response after submitting a PAIA request is usually 30 days, we experienced some delays in hearing back from the power utility due to a new PAIA response system it is piloting.
According to Eskom’s media desk, the new system went live on March 1 2024 and entails a call logging system as part of an automated customer relationship management system — as opposed to the electronic centralised mailing system it had previously been using.
However, the new system encountered some teething problems, including a delay in responding to PAIA requests as a result of some mail not being filtered through the system to identify authentic information requests.
“As a result, Eskom has reverted to the electronic centralised mailing system where e-mails are sent by requesters to PAIA@eskom.co.za, which are then assessed and allocated to the relevant division’s deputy information officer for their attention and response,” said the media desk in a response to questions sent on behalf of #PowerTracker.
National regulator
We also reached out to the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA), which publishes quarterly updates on new registered renewable energy projects across the country. The #PowerTracker map currently has 67 renewable energy projects that were sourced from the NERSA database of registered energy generation projects.
We requested more details that were missing from this database in order to build up the quality of the existing projects mapped, and this request was granted within the 30-day deadline. The response to our request included more information such as the exact location of projects, exact dates of registration with NERSA, the distribution network used by the generator as well as the purpose of the energy generation facility which was mostly for commercial or own use.
Ngodwana Energy
At the start of the #PowerTracker data collection process in 2023, we reported that Mpumalanga is being left behind in the race for renewable energy generation as the province still only had one renewable energy project contracted to supply the Eskom grid. The 25MW Ngodwana biomass power plant, located about 50km outside the provincial capital Mbombela, uses biowaste from the adjacent Sappi wood and paper mill to produce steam and cost an estimated US$89-million to set up. It has been supplying Eskom with 25MW of energy since March 2022, in terms of a bilateral power purchase agreement.
As the only existing renewable energy project in Mpumalanga procured through the Independent Power Producers (IPP) office, we were interested to see what the agreement between Ngodwana and Eskom entailed, how much power the plant had generated since it came online as well as the implementation agreements of socio-economic opportunities that support the communities surrounding the plant.
Although our request to Ngodwana Energy was acknowledged, no official response was received following many follow-ups which revealed that the company was dealing with some structural issues internally and could not dedicate human resources at the time to handle the PAIA request submitted by #PowerTracker in March 2024.
Power purchase agreements
Power purchase agreements (PPAs) have remained an important part of the documentation we have pursued as part of the #PowerTracker project because, though the signing of these agreements is often publicised along with basic details, they do not include crucial information on contract arrangements and important details such as shareholder information, funding mechanisms, and social, environmental and governance plans.
In their partially granted response to our PAIA request, Eskom stated it had not signed any PPA contracts with their land lease agreements as the renewable energy companies leasing available land parcels from Eskom were responsible for their own offtake agreements for the energy produced from their operations. Eskom further declined to provide the land lease agreements in terms of PAIA Section 42(3)(b), but shared a proforma copy of what the agreements are based on.
According to the deputy information officer of generation, Brad Ross-Jones, reasons for declining to share the actual agreements were that, “should information such as prices and conditions be publicly known, Eskom would be at a disadvantage in contractual or other negotiations and would be prejudiced in commercial competition as future bidders would know where to pitch their bids in terms of prices and conditions”.
Industrial Development Corporation
Although some information requested by #PowerTracker was received through PAIA, we also reached out to other entities via email to establish whether it was worth sending information requests before spending time putting all of these together.
We reached out to the Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa (IDC) which as part of its mandate is responsible for facilitating the energy transition and ensuring sustainable energy security in South Africa and the rest of the continent through its financing opportunities.
Our request for a list of renewable energy projects funded by the IDC was declined on the basis that the information they have on the individual clients they fund contains confidential client information.
From some of the responses received from the different entities, it is clear that there is still a long road ahead to full transparency around the JET as confidentiality clauses in most instances stand in the way of some crucial information being made public.
#PowerTracker continues to engage different stakeholders and scrape through different sources to enrich our dossier of journalistic investigations and uphold the integrity of the data that can be found on the Mpumalanga #PowerTracker map in the public interest.
Andiswa Matikinca is a data manager and journalist at the Oxpeckers #PowerTracker project in Mpumalanga, which is supported by the African Climate Foundation’s New Economy Hub. Consultations with alt.advisory assisted #PowerTracker’s 2024 PAIA work.
• Find the #PowerTracker tool here
