spoke with 702\u2019s John Perlman<\/a> regarding the procurement plan and its issues.<\/p>\nThe first point of contention is the current 20-year term of the present contract on the table, as Ramaphosa initially described the option as a temporary solution.<\/p>\n
\u201cKarpowership is only a viable solution if it entailed a short-term contract (five years maximum) to get us over the hump, as it were, and if the costs weighed up against the potential loss to the economy due to worsening load shedding,\u201d said Duvenage.<\/p>\n
He further noted that a 20-year contract would cost the country R200 billion. However, with the rise in costs and drop in rand value, it will more likely cost around R500 billion.<\/p>\n
Setting aside whether or not South Africa can afford to pay for the ships, Duvenage said that the time it takes for them to come online is an issue \u2013 especially if this is an emergency procurement option.<\/p>\n
\u201cRemember, Karpowerships is not going to just come and dock and start providing electricity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He added that these ships would take roughly a year before they started generating electricity and adding supply to the grid.<\/p>\n
Responding to Perlman\u2019s questions regarding the contract period, Karpowership SA said that\u00a0a 20-year contract was not their choice and that they have \u2018nothing against\u2019 shorter contracts.<\/p>\n
However, Duvenage added that at the cost of R500 billion for a 20-year contract, the set-up costs and margins to make a short contract viable for the power producer would likely render the price unaffordable for South Africa.<\/p>\n
Additionally, Duvenage said that viability and environmental studies that not been completed, raising concerns as to why Ramaphosa supports such an option without \u201call the boxes being ticked\u201d.<\/p>\n
Duvenage plans on challenging this in court for the sake of transparency. He said South Africans should know how Nersa and Karpowership arrived at their decisions and the financial implications.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will continue to defend the public\u2019s rights so that there is absolute transparency. This is a decision in the country’s best interests and not only in the interests of Karpowership SA and the government,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Whether or not Karpowerships will be a reality has been questioned over the course of the last few years.<\/p>\n
The proposed power ships have faced major backlash from environmentalists as they would have dire consequences on marine life. This backlash ultimately led to multiple delays to Eskom’s plans to use gas-fired plants on ships.<\/p>\n
One of the most notable developments, giving the ships a second chance, was made on 5 May, when the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment dismissed a complaint by a nonprofit against Karpowership\u2019s plan to moor a similar plant at Saldanha on South Africa\u2019s west coast – indicating a further push for the emergency power.<\/p>\n
\nRead: South Africa\u2019 unintentionally\u2019 beats climate goals due to load shedding<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Karpowership is moving ahead but its viability raises questions. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":644989,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[7339,26],"class_list":["post-688327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-702-talk-radio","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=688327"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":688365,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688327\/revisions\/688365"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}