What we are doing
Municipalities in South Africa play a key role in distributing electricity, and electricity sales offer a vital source of revenue. Changes in the power sector are necessitating municipalities' roles in the sector evolve. The aim of JMEG is to assist selected intermediate municipalities in developing solar embedded generation project applications for the DBSA’s project preparation unit. An ultimate destination for these projects is to access funds from DBSA’s Embedded Generation Programme (EGIP). JMEG will be working with six municipalities:
● Three municipalities - Matzikama (Western Cape), King Sabata Dalindyebo and Walter Sisulu (Eastern Cape) - that have been submitted and enrolled in DBSA’s project preparation unit as an outcome of the UKPACT supported Alternative Finance for Municipal Embedded Generation project (AFMEG) and that require additional support within the due diligence phase.
● Three municipalities - Cape Agulhas (Western Cape), Greater Tzaneen (Limpopo) and Ephraim Mogale (Limpopo) require pre-feasibility support to develop project applications, to be submitted to DBSA’s project preparation unit
The JMEG project will provide the critical early stage preparation support and build off the successes and lessons learnt from the AFMEG project. Through AFMEG, four solar-PV embedded generation projects were designed to meet the needs of the participating local municipalities and the requirements of DBSA’s Project Preparation Unit, a feat not achieved by any South African municipality prior to AFMEG.
Read more
Read less
What we are achieving
JMEG is a second phase of support, which has two core objectives: (i) to deepen the support provided to three AFMEG municipalities and provide specific and detailed assistance to enable them to progress further in the due diligence stage; and (ii) to support three additional South African municipalities, harnessing the lessons learnt under AFMEG and adding new and innovative components, with an essential focus on scaling the impact.
By submitting project applications to the DBSA’s Project Preparation Unit, AFMEG municipalities broke new ground for municipal embedded generation projects. In doing so, AFMEG has highlighted the significant amount of detailed work required to navigate the due diligence phase. To leverage this work involves taking these three municipalities further down the project development value chain with support, which includes land use and development analyses, environmental screening, permit and compliance, project implementation and capacity assessment assessments, and revenue analysis.
JMEG proposes to work with three new municipalities to develop solar embedded generation project applications for the DBSA’s PPF, expanding our impact and scaling the learnings gained from AFMEG, enabling a more targeted and efficient approach while incorporating real-life learnings from the JMEG process to drive innovation and impact. As part of this work we aim to build on the work of other organisations currently working on municipal embedded generation, leveraging synergies to achieve maximum collective impact.
Read more
Read less
