{"id":640688,"date":"2026-04-28T10:59:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T08:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=640688"},"modified":"2026-04-28T11:00:22","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T09:00:22","slug":"amazon-helps-with-electricity-prices-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/cloud-hosting\/640688-amazon-helps-with-electricity-prices-in-south-africa.html","title":{"rendered":"Amazon helps with electricity prices in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The world’s largest cloud computing service, Amazon Web Services (AWS), is investing significantly in new carbon-free energy projects and promoting grid modernisation in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By spending substantially on its own generation, the tech giant is helping to mitigate against potential broader electricity tariff hikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AWS has a long history in South Africa, dating back to the development of its core Elastic Compute Cloud component by a Cape Town team in the early 2000s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the years, it has established three cloud availability zones across two data centres in Johannesburg and Cape Town to meet demand for its cloud computing and hosting services across the region. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the past few years, the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) has raised concern among energy and economic experts about rising power consumption in data centres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The significant electricity demand may necessitate substantial investments to increase generation capacity across the grid, thereby increasing electricity prices for many other users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amazon is also investing significantly in AI technology, with roughly $200 billion (R3.27 trillion) in capital expenditure earmarked for AI infrastructure, data centres, and custom chip development in 2026. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recognising this impact, Amazon recently told MyBroadband it was directing its energy investments to regions where the grid was more carbon-intensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is also operating its data centres more efficiently and incorporating sustainability practices into its building construction. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“AWS data centres are up to 4.1 times more energy efficient than on-premises facilities,” the company said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Accenture research from 2024, the associated carbon footprint of cloud workloads can be reduced by up to 99% with optimised use of AWS. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even before the surge in AI workloads from recent years, Amazon had set itself the goal of reaching net-zero carbon across its operations by 2040.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Globally, the tech giant is one of the world’s leading corporate purchasers of carbon-free energy. According to BloombergNEF, it has the largest carbon-free energy portfolio of any corporation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“These investments add new sources of carbon-free energy to the power grid that everyone uses, the same grid that powers homes, hospitals, and schools,” AWS told MyBroadband.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two private solar power plants in South Africa<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Amazon’s first utility-scale solar power plant in the Northern Cape, launched in late 2021. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In South Africa, Amazon has invested in two utility-scale solar projects with an estimated 28MW of combined capacity used by the company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first was a 10MW ground-mounted solar plant in the Northern Cape, which was installed by SOLA Group and launched in late 2021<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, the installation was the first major private power project in South Africa with a corporate offtaker. The plant consists of more than 24,000 bifacial solar panels across 20 hectares of land. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By tracking the sun’s position throughout the day, it can generate up to 28,000 megawatt-hours of clean energy per year, equal to the demand of roughly 8,000 homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The facility’s electricity is used to power AWS data centres in South Africa and avoids roughly 25,000 tonnes of carbon emissions per year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second utility-scale solar power plant from which Amazon is buying electricity is another, much larger SOLA Group project, which came online last year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 195MW Springbok solar power farm in the Free State can generate around 430,000MWh of clean energy per year, sufficient to power 150,000 homes and offset 399,999 tonnes of carbon dioxide. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major deal for multi-buyer wheeling<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
The Springbok Solar Power Plant in the Free State sells electricity to several major corporations. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Amazon is the anchor buyer at the facility, which began commercial operation<\/a> ahead of schedule in October 2025, becoming the first operational energy wheeling facility with a flexible multi-buyer model. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It illustrates how cheaper power from larger facilities, benefiting from lower construction costs enabled by greater economies of scale, can be shared across multiple entities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aside from Amazon, the other companies buying electricity from the plant are Vodacom, Sibanye-Stilwater, Old Mutual, Sasol, Rio Tinto, Afrimat, and BRM Brands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

SOLA Group CEO Richard Stewart said the model opened a way for buyers which could not previously access cost-effective bulk clean energy and had already saturated their on-site generation opportunities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amazon said the project showed that renewable energy investments can help spur the modernisation of the energy infrastructure that communities rely on every day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The multi-buyer model could potentially be implemented to provide stable, affordable renewable energy to households and small businesses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Long before the immense energy consumption of AI in data centres became a hot topic, Amazon was one of the world’s top corporate investors in carbon-free electricity generation. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341042,"featured_media":640713,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[92837,25,27995],"tags":[100381,104507,723,27543,35793,727,22807],"class_list":["post-640688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ai","category-cloud-hosting","category-energy","tag-ai-data-centres","tag-ai-energy-consumption","tag-amazon","tag-amazon-web-services-aws","tag-artificial-intelligence-ai","tag-cloud-computing","tag-data-centres"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640688"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341042"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640688"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":640989,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640688\/revisions\/640989"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}