Each year April, Eskom increases the price of electricity it supplies across Africa. Eskom’s desperate pleas to the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) appear to have worked well after the organisation gave permission for the utility to jack-up the tariffs of their electricity rates.
- The increases will take effect from 1 April 2019.
- The price structure will change annually over the next three years: Up by 9.41% in 2020, 8.1% in 2021, and 5.2% in 2022.
- That means electricity prices will be 22.7% more expensive in three years’ time.
- This excludes the 4.41% increase over the next three years, which was already approved in 2018.
The power utility has announced that without this big increase, it will not be sustainable, and will not be able to provide electricity in the future.
Unsurprisingly, homeowners and business owners are increasingly unable to afford the rising electricity prices. This drives more and more consumers to look at solar electricity as an alternative.
Fortunately, for South Africans, there is a future that is less reliant on Eskom, and more reliant on renewable energy. Thanks to the abundance of sunshine in South Africa, solar power is a very viable and cost-effective alternative. Integrating energy storage into solar power systems makes it possible to use solar power at night and cloudy days.
Unpredictable electricity blackouts have also increased the demands from energy-intensive and dependent businesses to be able to generate their own energy in order to ensure electricity supply.
Click here to find out how you can move to renewable energy.