Energy

South Africa’s biggest shopping malls are dumping Eskom

Jonathan Hoyle

 ·13 Aug 2026

Resilient Estate Investment Trust (REIT), a major South African property and mall owner, says it is increasingly trying to reduce its reliance on the country’s national electricity grid.

The group owns several large malls across South Africa, including the Galleria Mall in KwaZulu-Natal, and the Irene Village Mall and Grove Mall in Gauteng.

In total, Resilient owns 28 retail spaces across South Africa, with a cumulative lettable area of 1.2 million square metres.

In its interim financial results for the six months ended June 2026, the group said it had continued to work to reduce its reliance on Eskom’s national energy supply.

“Resilient has continued with the implementation of its strategy to reduce reliance on grid-provided electricity,” it said.

It said this has been done to reduce the cost of electricity supply across its stores, while it waits for Eskom to move towards a more cost-efficient pricing model.

The price of electricity has nearly doubled over the last decade, as the compounding effect of steep tariff increases has put pressure on households and businesses.

Resilient has responded to these challenges by increasingly moving towards renewable energy options for its properties.

The group reported that by the end of the current financial year, it hopes to meet approximately 43.2% of its energy needs through renewable electricity.

This includes solar projects at several large retail spaces, with plans to increase its total solar energy capacity to 94.4 MWp.

The group has also installed several Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) to improve its ability to respond to outages in its retail spaces.

This includes installations at the Mams’ and Jubilee Malls, increasing the group’s energy storage capacity by 10.0MWh to 30.7MWh.

Resilient plans to expand its BESS systems to several other retail areas, including the Brits Mall, Limpopo Mall, and the Crossing Mokopane.

Despite the move away from the national grid, the group noted that further changes to electricity tariff structures could put pressure on its operations.

This includes the ability of the retail owners’ tenants to absorb the rising utility costs and municipal rates.

A growing trend

Resilient’s move towards renewable electricity options follows a growing trend in South Africa of reducing reliance on the national grid.

The move away from Eskom was previously prompted by load shedding, where the national energy supply could not sufficiently meet demand.

While there has been no load shedding for 450 days, the shift away from Eskom has continued due to the country’s high electricity costs.

Electricity consumption in South Africa has been consistently declining in recent years, dropping by 5% year-on-year in April 2026.

Year-on-year electricity consumption also showed consistent declines over the five months leading up to April 2026, indicating a waning reliance on the national grid.

The reduction in electricity consumption has eased pressure on Eskom, but the national energy supplier has still struggled with declining production volumes.

April 2026 saw the largest year-on-year drop in production, with electricity generation down 9%, compared with a 6.9% year-on-year drop the previous month.

While Eskom has historically been South Africa’s sole energy provider, the country is currently breaking the electricity giant’s monopoly.

The government plans to unbundle Eskom into three distinct entities, each operating as an independent business.

This plan is intended to create a diversified open energy market in South Africa, encouraging competition and reducing electricity costs.

Eskom has repeatedly pushed back against this plan, particularly in ceding control of the country’s energy transmission infrastructure.

The transmission section of Eskom accounts for a large share of its earnings, and unbundling plans propose introducing an independent Transmission System Operator (TSO) in the country.

The plan to create a TSO has recently been shown to be feasible by the Eskom Restructuring Task Team (ERTT) in a report delivered to the presidency.

Resilient financial results in South Africa for the six months ended June 2026