Jeffreys Bay wind farm project begins to take shape

01 Feb 2016 | Admin Author

Construction is underway at the R2.5 billion rand Jeffreys Bay Wind Farm.

The environmentally friendly commercial project will traverse across eight farms between Jeffreys Bay and Humansdorp and will consist of 60 wind turbines, producing 138MWinto the electricity grid.

Last November, the Jeffreys Bay Wind Farm project signed a 20-year power purchase agreement with Eskom and an implementation agreement with the Department of Energy.

The CEO of Mainstream Renewable Power, Dr Eddie O'Connor says the project will have a dramatic impact on the local community.

"It will benefit the local community above all in terms of jobs. This week we are going to be taking on an extra 100 people, we've probably got 50 people working already," he said.

"Throughout the construction process, which should to on for nine months to a year we'll have 200 people employed which will make a dramatic impact on the local communities."

Meanwhile, Eastern Cape Economic Development MEC, Mcebisi Jonas, says this initiative will see the Eastern Cape developing energy locally.

"It will have a huge impact on economic development both from jobs and the possibility of industrialisation in general. You are talking about 138MW being generated on this project (sic) and if you think about a number of other projects in the Eastern Cape it means that a significant proportion of energy will be generated locally."

"Just through this project you are probably going to touch the lives of more than 200 000 people," Jonas said.

The leader of a local Kouga community that stands to benefit from the project says he hopes it will deliver on its promises.

Chief Michael Williams, of the First Nation Indigenous Koi-Koi people, said they're hoping that the development deliver on its promise to uplift the local community.

"We had meetings with them two years ago and this was the point of discussion that first of all South Africa needs energy and this was one of the projects that will provide that. But, we hope that this project will mean a lot of things to the poor community, for instance uplifting our living standards," he said.

The roots of the Jeffreys Bay Wind Farm project go way back to 2002 when a local company called Genesis Eco-Energy and its development team started work on what was then to be a 15 megawat wind farm on the Sunnyside Dairy farm.

Genesis director, Davon Chown, says the project began at a time when farmers in the area were suffering from a shortage of power.

"The early stage development from 2002 through to 2009 was unique in that the project was cemented by a simple hand-shake between the Genesis team and farmer Mark Holiday on the Sunnyside Dairy Farm. This was a relationship built on the vision of providing secure, clean and reliable power to the greater Cacadu area but more importantly on trust and the promise that the parties would stick together to try and see this through to commercial fruition."

"Financing was scare and the climate for clean energy almost non-existent even though the Renewable Energy White paper had been sign by Government in 2003. The Genesis Eco-Energy self-funded the project, with a small grant from the DBSA to keep the project alive whilst the team worked closely with Government and other key players to develop an environment more conducive to the take up of renewable energy in South Africa."

"In 2009 Genesis Eco-Energy identified Mainstream as co-development partner and funder, and invited the company into South Africa. Together the two companies formed a partnership, Mainstream Renewable Power South Africa and immediately set to work to expand the project."

"In 2010 the Government announced the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme and the 138MW J Bay wind farm was one of the successful bidding projects, thus bringing to the J Bay the opportunity to build one of the largest wind farms in South Africa, if not sub-Saharan Africa (only Lake Turkana in Kenya is bigger being touted at 300MW). Along with this comes a great deal of investment and economic development for J Bay and the greater Cacadu region."

"When Genesis and its Irish partners, Mainstream, signed the final Financial Close documents with the project funder and new equity partners in November 2012, it signaled the next stage in the journey and today?s ground breaking is a significant milestone, especially for the landowners that stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the development team over the years."

Chown said "this bears testimony to the grit and determination of developers, landowners and communities in the greater Cacadu area as the area is set to see three wind farms going into construction over the next year."