Black Friday solar and battery deals

South African online shoppers can expect big discounts on solar and backup power products for Black Friday 2024.

Several energy solutions providers and retailers have confirmed to MyBroadband that they would offer deals on solar panels, inverters, and batteries this year.

These products are already at their lowest prices ever in South Africa, making it more affordable for households and businesses to increase their energy independence than in the past.

Suppliers and distributors brought a flood of solar and backup products into the country in 2023 amid severe load-shedding.

Even though demand was high, the imported stock ended up outstripping the addressable market.

Rubicon’s head of energy and e-mobility, Greg Blandford, recently told MyBroadband that the current environment of high stock levels and cooled demand made for a prime buying opportunity.

Blandford also cautioned that pricing is expected to increase slightly from mid-2025 with the introduction of new products and supplier shelves expected to be much emptier than in 2024.

Black Friday presents an ideal opportunity for solar and backup power providers to offload older stock.

Among those offering deals will be online tech retailer Rugged SA, who will run a big special on its Rizzen 5kW/5.12kWh hybrid inverter and battery combo.

For those unfamiliar with electricity terminology, this type of system is capable of supporting most small and medium-sized households’ demands for three to four hours of power cuts at a time.

Rugged SA will also be discounting select solar panels and portable power stations as part of its Black Friday sale.

These will include deals on the Trina Solar 545W panel and the Rizzen 500W/512Wh power station.

Multi-national energy solutions provider Vestwoods will also be offering a big discount on its sleek battery system coupled with an inverter.

The Vestwoods battery comes with either 5.12kWh or 14.33kWh storage.

Another retailer well known for its wide range of backup power products — GeeWiz — recently told MyBroadband it would be offering “huge” specials on backup power stations, lithium batteries, and inverters.

Its most heavily discounted products will see 80% price cuts over Black Friday.

Even without load-shedding, solar and backup power is a good idea

The appeal of solar and backup products has waned greatly in the past few months, as Eskom has kept load-shedding at bay for well over 200 days.

However, electricity minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa has warned that some municipalities are staring down another type of power crisis that could increase the frequency of localised power cuts.

Ramokgopa has pointed out that government investment in local electricity distribution infrastructure took the back seat while the focus was on improving Eskom’s generation.

That means that many substations and transformers are in a dismal state, which makes them susceptible to more frequent faults.

The cities of Joburg and Tshwane have intensified load reduction in the past few months to mitigate against overloading of their electricity networks.

This issue is particularly prevalent in locations with high numbers of illegal connections, which disregard distribution capacity.

However, because infrastructure is shared between larger areas, paying residents often get punished for the criminal behaviour of their neighbours.

The City of Joburg has also implemented load limiting on smart meters in areas without high rates of illegal connections.

This is due to no fault of the residents themselves other than using an undefined “excessive” amount of electricity during certain periods.

In these cases, the authorities’ failure to upgrade distribution infrastructure to keep up with property developments and expansion is the cause of the problem, not criminal or irresponsible electricity use.

Eskom also wants to hike electricity tariffs by roughly 36% for its direct customers, and 44% for municipalities in 2025, followed by further above-inflation increases over the next two years.

Relying solely on the utility for electricity supply could, therefore, result in a much bigger electricity bill.

Considering all these factors, an investment in self-generation and backup power is still a sensible choice.