South African terraco The company, which is the largest data center operator, has signed a capacity allocation agreement with Eskom to transmit 120MW of electricity from a solar power plant to be built in the Free State, and to use the generated electricity to supply electricity-intensive facilities. It becomes possible to distribute electricity. Around South Africa.
The signing of the contract greenlights the next phase of the project, which includes the procurement of solar panels and construction of the solar power plant.
“Given South Africa's various energy challenges, this presents an exciting opportunity to meet short-term renewable energy targets while adding additional power capacity to a production-constrained grid.” said Jan Hnizdo, CEO of Teraco.
“This is a unique approach in Africa as Teraco not only owns its own data center facilities, but also significant renewable energy sources to power them, creating a sustainable energy pathway to support growth. I guess.”
In an interview with TechCentral on Tuesday ahead of the announcement, Hnizdo said advances in the policy environment will allow data center operators like Teraco to pursue utility-scale renewable energy projects that will help combat the country's ongoing energy shortages. I explained how I was able to invest.
Key to this development is the loosening of Eskom's monopolistic control over power generation. “It took nearly three years to get to this point, but in that time there have been many changes, mainly policy, that have eased the ability of independent power producers (IPPs) to connect to the grid,” Hunizd said. said.
hurdle
The project is in partnership with IPPs Juwi and Subsolar, but Hnizdo said many administrative and regulatory hurdles had to be overcome before construction of the solar power plant could proceed. .
The company first had to obtain a power generation license, but those rules were only relaxed a year and a half ago.
The second is the wheeling agreement between the municipality and Eskom.
Read: Teraco announces major expansion of Cape Town data center
And finally, there was the allocation of grid access that would pave the way for construction to begin on the solar farm site in the northern Free State. “It's not enough just to find land; the land must have access to sunlight and a high-capacity link to the electricity grid,” Hunizd said.
To reach the operational scale of 120MW, which the solar power plant will generate to meet Teraco's energy needs, it will require 450 hectares of land, or 4.5 million square meters. This is equivalent to 630 soccer fields. Estimates indicate that approximately 40% of Teraco's total energy needs will come from renewable energy sources once the site is operational.
“The idea is that this project will provide enough power for our daytime windows, even though solar power obviously only runs during the day,” Hunizd said.
The project is part of a larger effort to transition all of Terraco's energy supply to renewable sources by 2035. By then, the company plans to have built up excess solar capacity for daytime demand. If the downward trend in battery technology prices continues, Hunizd and his team plan to store the excess capacity created during the day and transport it to Teraco's facility at night.
The introduction of IPP and wheeling concepts has created a platform for industry to work with governments to rapidly add utility-scale capacity to the national grid. However, Eskom has admitted that its transmission infrastructure does not have sufficient capacity to accommodate the next generation IPPs that have applied for access. However, Hunizd said the problem is not as pronounced as it seems because many of the IPPs that have acquired capacity have not built the infrastructure to use it.
Read: How data centers are fighting South Africa's energy crisis
“What Eskom is doing now is basically applying a take-it-or-lose-it approach to grid access. A year ago, there was a huge number of access applications and all the access points were closed. That doesn't mean they went and built factories. We think this process of figuring out who has the power grid and who has access to it and who is actually using it is very beneficial for South Africa. “I am thinking about it,” Hunizd said.
Once fully operational, the 120MW solar power plant is expected to produce more than 338GWh of electricity annually. – © 2024 News Central Media