Lethabo, Kendal, Tutuka, Majuba, Matimba and Medupi plants were given a five-year exemption, while Duvha and Matla were given extension until 2034, Environment Minister Dion George said at a briefing in Cape Town. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Five other plants run by Eskom, the nation\u2019s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, were granted exemption until 2030 in June.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The most industrialized nation in Africa relies on coal for more than 80% of electricity generation. The exemption will help Eskom extend the time it spends running its plants in a country that\u2019s suffered from rotational blackouts for decades. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eskom\u2019s plan to stabilize supply relies on extending the decommissioning dates of some coal stations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
South Africa must roll out renewable energy plants \u201cwith urgency\u201d along with other measures to accelerate transition, George said, adding that Eskom wanted longer extensions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI did not give them what they wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eskom\u2019s plan to transition to cleaner sources of energy has hit multiple delays, from grid constraints to court battles that slowed a program to build renewable plants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa this month warned that the system remained vulnerable because of delays in the procurement of more generation capacity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The nation\u2019s sole nuclear power station, once regarded as Eskom\u2019s most-reliable plant, has been among the units that have broken down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The health effects of running coal plants for longer could take a bigger toll than the economic constraints of load shedding.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Delays to the planned closures of coal-fired power plants alone could result in thousands of deaths from air pollution and lead to billions of dollars of health-related costs, the Helsinki-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air said in a report<\/a> last year. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Eskom has been granted exemptions to breach emissions rules, at the cost of South Africans’ health and the environment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":802845,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[1164],"class_list":["post-818917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-eskom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818917","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\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818917"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":818920,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818917\/revisions\/818920"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/802845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Eskom-emission.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n