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Trade union Solidarity has initiated legal action against the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa).
The aim of the lawsuit is to remove all bottlenecks in the way of private energy suppliers.
The union said South Africa’s future in generation capacity cannot be solely entrusted to the state.
“The first step is to force Nersa through a disclosure process to disclose information about why so few licenses have been awarded to private generators of power and so few private generation licenses have been granted,” explained the union.
“Based on this information, it will be possible to determine where the bottlenecks lie and what further steps need to be taken to remove these bottlenecks,” said Solidarity Chief Executive Dr Dirk Hermann.
Solidarity wants information about the number of applications for private power generation the energy regulator has received and wants to know how long approval of such applications takes.
Additionally, Solidarity is demanding that Nersa account for why no guidelines on feed-in and wheeling tariffs have been published to date.
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“The most significant protest action against the current power situation in the country lies in generating power oneself.
“Through our application we want to enable everyone, especially entrepreneurs who want to generate power, to do so,” said Hermann.
” However, we cannot expect entrepreneurs to make huge investments if they do not have the ability to estimate the return on such investments. We therefore lack clear, reliable guidelines that make it possible to calculate such risk,” Hermann said.
Solidarity is adamant that the country’s power supply future lies in decentralisation.
“Eskom will always be part of the South African power supply mix, but the private sector’s share in power supply will have to increase drastically to ensure a sustainable power supply.”
“We will do everything possible to stabilise Eskom but will apply ourselves just as much to increase the private share,” Hermann concluded.
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Solidarity is not the only body seeking information through the country’s courts.
Civil rights organisation AfriForum is suing Eskom in order to obtain information regarding the power supplier’s controversial deals with its service providers.
The group is taking legal action to compel Eskom to provide details of the contracts such as those involving coal supplies and transport companies.
This comes as the country battles chronic load shedding which is crippling individual households and businesses across the country.
Compiled by Narissa Subramoney
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