Five Parties Short-listed for Building Power Plants in South Africa

The Department of Minerals and Energy has announced that it has short-listed five parties, out of 11 applicants, to build new peaking power stations.

The winners of the new peaking power generation capacity will build one or two oil-fired open cycle turbine power stations with a combined capacity of about 1,000 megawatts, operating peaking plants at sites in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.

The two peaking plant power stations are expected to be fully operational by October 2008. "We need to get the new plants up by October 2008 or we will end up with blackouts," the department’s Deputy Director-General for Electricity and Nuclear Energy, Nelisiwe Magubane said.

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