Engineering News Online Audio Articles

About Engineering News Online Audio Articles

Engineering News Online provides real time news reportage through originated written, video & audio material. Now you can listen to the top three articles on Engineering News at the end of each day.

Publisher

Engineering News

Category

news

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

14 Feb 2024

Latest episode

8 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

490 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   8 Oct 2026

   Seifsa sets sights on unprecedented five-year wage settlement in 2027

   Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of Southern Africa (SEIFSA) president Elias Monage reports that it is aiming to speedily conclude yet another multiyear wage agreement with representative labour unions in the sector during upcoming collective bargaining in 2027. Monage, who served as Seifsa president during the 2024 wage negotiations, was recently re-elected to the role, performed since 2025 by Mervyn Naidoo, who will remain as Seifsa's first VP. Addressing members in Ekurhuleni on Thursday, Monage indicated that Seifsa's goal was to conclude an unprecedented five-year settlement with representative unions, having concluded a three-year deal in 2024. That 2024-2027 agreement was conducted through the Metal and Engineering Industries Bargaining Council and was also notable for the speed at which it was finalised. The settlement was reached following only three meetings and in the absence of any industrial action. It was signed by several unions, including the large National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa, as well as Seifsa-affiliated employer associations that collectively employ about 150 000 people. However, some unions and employer associations in the industry refused to sign the agreement, citing various concerns. Monage said he and the new Seifsa board had agreed that a five-year settlement should be pursued in a bid to create the stability needed to support the country's reindustrialisation. LACK OF SUPPORT However, he also used his address to criticise what he saw as a lack of coordination from government in supporting the stated policy goal of reindustrialising South Africa. Monage was especially critical of Trade, Industry and Competition Minister Parks Tau, who he said had not engaged adequately with the metals and engineering industry on the approach that should be adopted to support the country's reindustrialisation. "We are an authoritative voice of industry, and we want to talk about reindustrialisation," he said, arguing that this required more interactions with the line Ministry than was currently the case. Seifsa, Monage noted, had managed to meet more regularly with President Cyril Ramaphosa in the recent past than with Tau, leading him to pose the following provocative question: "Do we really have a Minister of Trade and Industry in this country?" Seifsa's outgoing president, Naidoo, struck a more diplomatic tone, describing industrialisation as a deliberate policy choice that had to be supported by policy actions. The two central priorities for industrialisation, he added, were to grow demand, including by leveraging procurement to support domestic industry, and reducing production costs caused by rising electricity tariffs, inefficient logistics, unstable municipal services, and regulatory burdens. Naidoo said there was currently a gap between government's stated commitment to industrialise and the practical experience of manufacturing companies, especially in the area of levering industrialisation through procurement.

2. 

   7 Oct 2026

   New determination opens way for public procurement of large-scale battery storage and gas-to-power

   Electricity and Energy Minister Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa says 4 600 MW of battery energy storage systems (BESS) and 5 000 MW of gas-to-power (GtP) have been prioritised in a new Ministerial determination that opens the way for new public-procurement bidding rounds. He has also confirmed that the procurement processes facilitated by the determination will be implemented by the Independent Power Producer Office (IPPO) and be open to all market participants, including Eskom. The State-owned enterprise has hitherto been excluded from bidding in public procurement rounds, but has stated GtP ambitions and is in the process of incorporating Eskom Green as a subsidiary to partner with private entities on new renewables and BESS projects. Eskom is currently in the process of prequalifying partners for a 6 GW Eskom Green pipeline that includes BESS projects with a capacity of 1 000 MW/4 000 MWh. No energy storage figure was immediately provided for the 4 600 MW of BESS outlined in the determination, and no capacity factor for the GtP plants was immediately disclosed. The Section 34 Determination, which is being published in line with the Electricity Regulation Act, also makes no provision for new wind or solar capacity, much of which is currently being procured by private companies on the basis of bilateral power purchase agreements. However, the Minister said there would be a subsequent determination that would include new variable renewables capacity, as well as hybrid renewables-storage projects and pumped storage. SYSTEM PRIORITIES Ramokgopa indicated that the front-loading of BESS and GtP procurement had been informed by priorities outlined by the System Operator, which had identified a need for greater flexibility and for dispatchable plants. It is also a response to a material increase in curtailment, which is implemented by the System Operator when available generation cannot be accommodated because of network constraints or operating conditions, including periods when supply exceeds demand. Ramokgopa indicated that BESS was central to seeking ways to address curtailment and the associated rise in compensation payments by the National Transmission Company South Africa (NTCSA) to renewables independent power producers selected during previous public procurement rounds. Batteries, he said, could charge from electricity that would otherwise be curtailed and discharge during evening peaks or other periods of need. PROCUREMENT TEMPLATE He added that South Africa already had a template for procuring BESS, pointing to the approach taken by the IPPO, which had to date conducted three bidding rounds for BESS based on substation sites selected by the NTCSA. A total of 1 744 MW/6 976 MWh of BESS has been procured to date, and all five projects from the first bidding round, involving 513 MW/2 052 MWh and combined investments of more than R15-billion, have advanced to construction. The 4 600 MW outlined in the determination represents a significant scale-up, however. South African Energy Storage Association (SAESA) chairperson Joanne Dean immediately welcomed the Minister's recognition of BESS within South Africa's future procurement programme. She said that BESS could strengthen grid stability and resilience, defer costly transmission and distribution upgrades, facilitate higher penetrations of renewable generation and create opportunities for manufacturing, localisation and skills development. "Storage is increasingly becoming the infrastructure that connects generation, transmission, distribution and demand into a modern electricity system," she added, arguing that SAESA believed that energy storage should be recognised as a strategic sector in its own right, rather than as a supporting component of wind and solar projects. Meanwhile, Ramokgopa said the 5 000 MW GtP allocation would complement storage by providing dispatchable electricity when renewable output fell or demand rose. He indicated that the procurement design would address ...

3. 

   6 Oct 2026

   Eskom in bid to select renewables partners for 6 GW portfolio amid new procurement moves

   State-owned electricity group Eskom, which is in the process of creating a renewable-energy subsidiary known as Eskom Green, has formally initiated a process to select partners for the financing and implementation of up to 6 GW of utility-scale renewable-energy and battery projects by 2030. A request for qualification (RFQ) invitation has been released as part of a two-stage procurement process, with the second to involve a request for proposals (RFP) process involving the qualifying entities. Released on October 2, the invitation has been issued by Eskom Holdings, but the State-owned enterprise indicates in the document that it intends transferring any transaction agreements to Eskom Green once it is incorporated. Eskom Green, the RFQ states, is designed to operate as a commercially viable and investable renewable-energy platform, capable of mobilising private and public capital at scale through project-financed special purpose vehicles and strategic partnerships. Through the RFQ process Eskom aims to identify entities for the establishment of a panel of pre-qualified co-development and co-investment partners for what Eskom terms the 'Phase 1 Programme or the Projects' with a combined capacity of up to 6 GW. The projects themselves are not identified, but Eskom indicates that they have been drawn from a larger internal pipeline of solar PV, wind and/or battery storage projects with a combined capacity of 14 GW. It adds that the associated sites, land rights, environmental authorisations and grid connection points are at varying stages of maturity. Besides this pipeline, Eskom says it will also offer partners access to decades of power generation skills and expertise, efficient routes to market and offtake structuring, improved bankability, and access to private and concessional capital. "In return, Eskom pursuant to the RFP process in due course, seeks a strategic partner who will bring proven development, financing and construction capability and who will support skills transfer and the building of Eskom's internal capability, once operational." Eskom says the Phase 1 Programme is aligned to the Integrated Resource Plan of 2025 which envisages 105 GW of new generation capacity by 2042, and Eskom's ambition of achieving up to 32 GW of new renewables generation capacity by 2040. Respondents to the RFQ are entitled to participate as a single entity or as a consortium, and Eskom states that it intends to introduce broad-based black economic empowerment participation at the RFP stage. A non-compulsory clarification meeting has been scheduled for 11:00 on October 15, and the closing date for responses to the RFQ is 10:00 on November 16. Procurement Framework? The RFQ indicates that revenue under the Phase 1 Programme will be generated principally through long-term, bilateral private-market power purchase agreements with creditworthy counterparties. However, it adds that revenue may also be derived from electricity sales under procurement programmes established pursuant to Ministerial determinations made in terms of Section 34 of the Electricity Regulation Act and associated offtake arrangements. The RFQ was issued ahead of the release of a new Section 34 Determination by Electricity and Energy Minister Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa that will outline the additional generation to be procured between 2026 and 2037. Under the Electricity Regulation Act, such gazetted determinations enable the procurement of new energy generation capacity. In the renewables sector, the public procurement rounds that have arisen hitherto in response to such determinations have excluded Eskom and focused on opening the market to independent power producers. However, on several occasions, Ramokgopa has argued that Eskom needs to play a role in the renewables sector, while Eskom chairperson Mteto Nyati has described the utility's exclusion from the renewables market as a "wrong decision". Following his recent reappointment, Nyati indicated that, under the so...

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• Isaac Malevu
• Donald MacKay
• Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa
• Simon Baloyi
• Michelle Phillips

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