New rooftop solar rules for South African households come with a big catch
South Africans with rooftop solar have welcomed Eskom’s move to scrap the requirement for an engineer’s sign-off on small-scale solar systems—but there’s a big catch.
The new, simplified rules only apply to Eskom Direct customers, leaving those connected through major municipalities still facing expensive and complicated approval processes.
Eskom recently announced that residential customers no longer require a professional engineer or engineering technologist registered with the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA) to approve their installations.
Instead, only a professional registered with the Department of Labour, such as an Installation Electrician (IE) or Master Installation Electrician (MIE), needs to sign off on the installation. Single-phase testers, however, are excluded.
The change is significant for households directly supplied by Eskom, as it eliminates the need to pay thousands of rands to an ECSA-registered professional, often one of the biggest hurdles in the compliance process.
The utility said the move “greatly simplifies” registration for customers who generate their own electricity through Small-Scale Embedded Generation (SSEG) systems, which include rooftop solar.
“Eskom recognises that many South Africans are eager to participate in the clean energy transition,” said Eskom’s Acting Group Executive for Distribution, Agnes Mlambo.
“Our goal is to make it as simple, safe, and cost-effective as possible for customers to connect legally, while ensuring the stability and safety of the national grid.”
Mlambo said the power utility has worked closely with industry stakeholders to ensure safety remains a top priority and urged customers to register their systems as required by law.
“Registration not only ensures compliance and safety but also positions customers to benefit from future programmes that reward clean energy generation,” she added. However, the registration process remains mandatory.
Even with the relaxed rules, Eskom stressed that households and businesses must still register their systems to be legally connected to the national grid in line with the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA)’s regulations.
Major metros still require professional engineering sign-off
Under NERSA’s framework, all embedded generation systems under 100kVA—including residential solar installations—must be registered with Eskom or the relevant licensed electricity distributor, regardless of whether they export power to the grid.
Only customers who are completely off-grid and can prove their systems operate independently of Eskom’s network are exempt from registration.
While this marks progress for Eskom Direct customers, those in South Africa’s largest metros remain bound by far stricter requirements.
The four biggest municipalities—Johannesburg, Cape Town, Ethekwini (Durban), and Tshwane (Pretoria)—still demand professional engineering oversight under their latest SSEG policies.
Johannesburg and Ethekwini both require that a PV commissioning form be signed off by a professional electrical engineer (Pr Eng) or engineering technologist (Pr Tech Eng) registered with ECSA.
These are highly qualified professionals who typically hold BEng or BEngTech degrees.
The City of Tshwane also requires approval from an ECSA-registered professional, though its SSEG application form provides little detail about which specific qualifications are accepted.
Despite reports that Tshwane had approved a formal SSEG policy, no official version could be found online.
The City of Cape Town is only slightly more lenient. For residential installations, it allows sign-off by a professional engineering technician registered with ECSA—a category of professional who typically holds a B.Tech qualification rather than a full engineering degree.
Despite this, it is still a higher qualification level than Eskom’s new requirement, which accepts the more accessible IE and MIE qualifications.
Municipal authorities argue that higher qualification requirements ensure safety and quality in complex urban networks. However, critics argue that it hinders the transition to renewable energy and discourages homeowners from investing in solar power.
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