Sunrise through the smoke stacks of the power station near the N3, Sasolburg. Picture: Karen Sandison (ANA)
Construction can finally begin on the the Msenge Wind Farm, located near Bedford, Eastern Cape, which signed a deal in January to supply Sasol with 69MW of renewable energy to the company’s Sasolburg site.
It is the first utility scale private wind farm in South Africa with its power wheeled across the national electricity grid.
In a statement on Thursday, African Clean Energy Developments (Aced) said that the Aced-Ideas-Reatile Consortium has reached financial close with its lender Rand Merchant Bank on the 69MW wind farm and begun construction.
“The project will supply renewable energy to power Sasol’s Sasolburg site, which will be used for green hydrogen production. This comes at a time when South Africa is experiencing the worst load shedding in its history due to a generation gap of between 5000 and 8000MW,” it said.
The Power Purchase Agreement between Sasol and Msenge is the first of several agreements Sasol intends to finalise in the coming months as it secures the renewable energy supply required to produce green hydrogen.
Aced represented a consortium of co-sponsors and equity investors consisting of Aced, African Infrastructure Investment Managers (Aiim) and Reatile Renewables. Aced and Aiim are co-sponsors and the equity in Msenge is owned 62% by Aiim, through its flagship Ideas Fund, and 38% by Reatile. .
The Msenge Wind Farm is the first of several renewables projects that the consortium intends to bring into construction in 2023.
James Cumming, Aced’s General Manager, highlights: “Aced are very proud to have reached financial close and construction commencement on this much needed South African first, and we look forward to getting to the commercial operation date on Msenge for Sasol.”
Sasol has committed to reduce the absolute Green-House Gas (GHG) emissions from its South African operations by at least 30% by 2030, off a 2017 baseline. Renewable energy is seen as a key lever for reducing Sasol’s GHG emissions and moving it towards producing products in a more sustainable manner.
Sasol said previously that the renewable energy generated by Msenge would enable Sasol to produce green hydrogen that could be supplied to customers to enable them to decarbonise their operations or will be utilised within Sasol’s own operations to produce sustainable products such as ammonia or methanol.
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