The City of Cape Town has moved a step closer to buying electricity from ordinary residents.
Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis says businesses that can generate excess power will be able to sell it to the City by June 2023.
And by the end of the year, any Capetonian who can meet the technical requirements will be able to generate and sell power.
On Tuesday, National Treasury approved an exemption to normal procurement rules that require any municipal purchase to go through a competitive tender process.
The City has also got permission from the energy regulator, the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa), to pay an extra incentive to businesses to encourage them to get on board and produce extra power.
Hill-Lewis is also excited that the City will be paying actual cash for the power that they buy.
“People with solar panels on their roofs can feed power back to the City and be paid in cash for that power. This is a significant step on our load-shedding journey, and we hope that many Capetonians take up this opportunity to invest in solar so that we can end load-shedding sooner in our City”.
