Only one coal-fired power plant has been closed since the so-called Just Energy Transition Partnership was unveiled to great fanfare at the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow. Now, some South African politicians are pushing to keep others open longer than planned — potentially for years — as the country struggles to end daily blackouts that are angering voters and turning off foreign investors.
It’s little wonder then, that the government plan on which the funding depends is already behind on its own targets, unsettling international partners interviewed by Bloomberg, who are keen to show they’re doing their bit for climate justice. Funders privately describe the current situation as a hiatus.
Climate finance is likely to be a focus of December’s COP28 meeting in the United Arab Emirates, with the oil-exporting host saying it will address ways to fund the energy transition in poorer countries that simultaneously need to expand access to electricity. That adds pressure on industrialised nations and oil producers to step up. While Vietnam’s $15.5 billion and Indonesia’s $20 billion planned JETP agreements are at an earlier stage, they’re also much bigger and potentially more complex.
The coal supply chain also serves as a linchpin of the government’s black economic empowerment drive. The ruling ANC has used it to foster black-owned businesses and provide jobs to its constituents. Closing any large industry is never easy — it requires skill to bring unions, political parties and other vested interests onside. It’s especially complicated in South Africa, where coal is enmeshed with the history of the liberation struggle.
But the terms of a R254 billion debt bailout announced by the government in February prohibit the company from investing in new generation capacity. It can’t take on additional debt without Treasury permission and can only spend within narrow constraints. Meanwhile, worsening power cuts are increasing pressure on Ramaphosa a year before general elections in which the ANC may lose its majority for the first time.Even though they sit on opposite sides of the clean-energy debate, Ramaphosa depends on the energy minister for his political survival. As ANC chairman, Mantashe helped Ramaphosa head off a potential challenge and win an internal vote as recently as December. That makes him impossible to replace.
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