Eskom awards contract to develop a Virtual Wheeling platform amid regulatory tensions

[Jan]

Eskom awards contract to develop a Virtual Wheeling platform amid regulatory tensions

Eskom has quietly taken an important step in the rollout of its long-awaited Virtual Wheeling product, awarding a significant contract in the past few weeks to Johannesburg-based Enerweb to build a software platform that will automate and scale the utility’s new wheeling model.

The appointment represents the most tangible move yet toward operationalising the Virtual Wheeling initiative, viewed as central to unlocking wheeling of electricity from independent power producers (IPPs) to smaller and low-voltage customers connected either to the Eskom distribution network or embedded within the distribution networks of municipalities in good standing with Eskom.

 

[Fuzzbox]

Wordpress template should suffice.

 

[TrueSeeker]

And look here at this...

Battery storage hits $65/MWh – a tipping point for solar

Battery storage costs have fallen to $65/MWh, making solar plus storage economically viable for reliable, dispatchable clean power.

electrek.co

As Ember global electricity analyst Kostantsa Rangelova put it, after a 40% drop in battery equipment costs in 2024, the industry is now on track for another major fall in 2025. The economics of battery storage, she said, are “unrecognizable,” and the industry is still adjusting to this new reality.

“Solar is no longer just cheap daytime electricity; now it’s anytime dispatchable electricity. This is a game-changer for countries with fast-growing demand and strong solar resources,” Rangelova added.

And with known actively developed up and coming cheap material battery chemistries hitting the market through the latter part of the decade and the following one, basically it's a safe bet that the economics will be getting better and better for at least another decade. The progress won't end with what is already known though. What has not been conceived of yet is obviously not known, but it's a safe bet that this industry will be actively advanced... forever. Regardless of how electricity is generated - There is just no downside to the ability to store it economically. It's still merely the start. The future is a long time.

So yeah, why I posted it here is because obviously this trend brings closer to home the increased viability of making full use our frankly ridiculous renewable energy natural resources. Especially solar. And not even just by the biggest players, or worse, a state owned monopoly. With systemic shifts like this, it will be an accessible industry for investors.

In a mere few years, possibly before the 2030s but definitely not later- IPPs will dominate the SA electricity generation game, and electricity shortages will sound like a weird bad dream we once had.

 

[Herr der Verboten]

Eskom awards contract to develop a Virtual Wheeling platform amid regulatory tensions

Eskom has quietly taken an important step in the rollout of its long-awaited Virtual Wheeling product, awarding a significant contract in the past few weeks to Johannesburg-based Enerweb to build a software platform that will automate and scale the utility’s new wheeling model.

The appointment represents the most tangible move yet toward operationalising the Virtual Wheeling initiative, viewed as central to unlocking wheeling of electricity from independent power producers (IPPs) to smaller and low-voltage customers connected either to the Eskom distribution network or embedded within the distribution networks of municipalities in good standing with Eskom.

 

[HAL 9000]

Reinventing the Wheel...

To reinvent the wheel is to attempt to duplicate—most likely with inferior results—a basic method that has already previously been created or optimized by others.

The inspiration for this idiomatic metaphor is that the wheel is an ancient archetype of human ingenuity (one so profound that it continues to underlie much of modern technology).

As it has already been invented and is not considered to have any inherent flaws, an attempt to reinvent it would add no value to it and be a waste of time, diverting the investigator's resources from possibly more worthy goals.

Reinventing the wheel - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org