Despite Eskom retiring coal-fired power stations to expand renewable energy generation, South Africa’s energy future will still rely heavily on coal, according to the Minister of Electricity and Energy, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa. Meanwhile, there is growing concern that building AI data centres could further increase the country's already high electricity prices.
Arnot Power Station in Mpumalanga is one of Eskom’s coal-fired power plants. Image credit:
Gerhard Roux ,
CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
SABC News reports that Ramokgopa visited the power utility’s Research, Testing and Development (RT&D) Centre in Johannesburg to explore technologies that can reduce harmful emissions from current coal operations.
“Several projects are active and live in this facility, but what is more important is for us to experience for ourselves how we are going to reduce emission levels at our power stations,” said Ramokgopa.
“The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment has issued those regulations, and we have every intention of complying.
“Other jurisdictions, like China and Japan, are far advanced with (emission-reducing) technology, but we are happy to have experienced first-hand that, in fact, we are also doing it. We have not reached commercial scale, but they are getting there slowly.”
However, the country’s energy mix won’t be rid of coal just yet, and Eskom’s plans reflect that reality.
“The positive outcome of this is that we will be able to continue to exploit our natural endowments, which is coal as part of the broader (energy) mix and that we can meet our obligations about emission standards, and we can protect lives in the immediate footprint of our various coal-fired power stations,” the minister said.
With the establishment of its renewable energy division, Eskom Green, the utility aims to blend traditional coal with renewable potential while the debate over AI data centres grows.
The price of AI data centres
Meanwhile, non-profit organisation Open Secrets is sounding the alarm about the risk of higher electricity prices as more AI data centres pop up around the country.
According to Brutus Mogotlo, investigations intern at Open Secrets, high-intensity AI workloads require massive amounts of electricity to train and run AI large language models.
Mogotlo writes in GroundUp that these new hyperscale data centres planned in Durban, Cape Town and Johannesburg will have a combined electricity capacity of over 1,000MW.
As Eskom is currently in an energy surplus, the Financial Times reported that it’s been in discussions with major tech companies like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft to offload the surplus at data centres in South Africa.
“We love those discussions because those are power-hungry sectors — that’s exactly what we need right now,” Eskom chairperson Mteto Nyati told the publication.
However, there are concerns that these could overpower the electricity grid.
“If electric power demand from data centres starts exceeding national capacity, there will be a need for new generation.
“The construction of new and improved transmission and distribution may affect rate design changes and defer data centre operator costs to residential customers through special contracts and incentive packages,” says Mogotlo.
In light of this potential effect on South Africans’ pockets, Mogotlo is calling for more scrutiny of the role of data centres in shaping the country’s energy landscape.
“The public must have more of a say in developments that affect their communities. The state must develop a regulatory framework for data centre developments that puts people and their rights before the interests of major technology companies.”
