{"id":828888,"date":"2025-06-21T07:18:03","date_gmt":"2025-06-21T05:18:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=828888"},"modified":"2025-06-21T07:18:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-21T05:18:09","slug":"residential-solar-in-south-africa-hits-a-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/828888\/residential-solar-in-south-africa-hits-a-wall\/","title":{"rendered":"Residential solar in South Africa hits a wall"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>While industrial solar demand in South Africa is stable, the residential sector has diminished amid a more stable power supply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>China\u2019s Trina Solar expects to annually supply South Africa with solar panels and equipment that can generate a gigawatt of power due to ongoing demand for large-scale projects, according to its regional director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The company has supplied technology for photovoltaic\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sapvia.co.za\/trina-solar-powers-groundbreaking-mooi-plaats-283mwdc-photovoltaic-power-plant-in-south-africa\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">projects<\/a>\u00a0with partners including EDF Renewables. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It imported more than a gigawatt of equipment in the last 12 months, though demand has shifted among consumers in the most industrialized nation on the continent, Zaheer Khan, Trina\u2019s southern Africa director said in an interview in Cape Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>South Africa suffered record power outages for two years before state-owned Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. stabilized supply in March last year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The improved reliability\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2024-06-12\/solar-installments-slow-in-south-africa-after-blackouts-ease\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reduced<\/a>\u00a0demand by homeowners to install rooftop solar panels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe residential sector in particular has diminished,\u201d Khan said. Commercial and industrial use is still at a stable level as firms focus more on emissions and Eskom\u2019s electricity prices increase. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cHow would you not want to have a cheaper plant if you\u2019re also getting a better carbon profile?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>South Africa will require more renewable energy capacity as a number of coal plants that generate most of the nation\u2019s electricity are retired over the next decade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Its energy\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2024-01-04\/south-africa-blueprint-sets-out-options-to-tackle-energy-crisis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">plans<\/a>\u00a0have considered adding nearly four gigawatts of solar projects by 2030.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trina Solar is involved in a number of projects between 500 megawatts and a gigawatt that it\u2019s shortlisted for this year, according to Khan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While industrial solar demand in South Africa is stable, the residential sector has diminished amid a more stable power supply.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":758981,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[1164,8540,22912],"class_list":["post-828888","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-eskom","tag-solar","tag-trina-solar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828888","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=828888"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828888\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":828889,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828888\/revisions\/828889"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/758981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=828888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=828888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=828888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}