Chair, Minister, as winter approaches, and with thousands of visitors expected to enter the country for the World Cup, the situation with regard to energy usage in South Africa is of considerable concern. We could, in fact, be looking at regular energy cuts once again on top of our excessive energy bills, as Eskom reserves run dangerously low.
Eskom was granted the increases requested from the National Energy Regulator of SA although their submission maintained that the power mix in the country should be based on an updated integrated resource plan, which we currently do not have. A revised White Paper on renewable energy is also only now being drafted, and this delay has resulted in no more than 5% of the target of 10 000 gigawatt hours of energy from renewable sources by 2010 being generated.
Based on the costing of alternative energies in the Renewable Energy Feed- in Tariff, Refit, guidelines and on the amount of alternative energy that could be easily installed in the near future, certainly within the same timeframe as a new power station could be built, 4 800 megawatts of renewable energy could be substituted. It could comprise a mixture of co- generation, wind, concentrated solar power, landfill gas and small-scale hydro at a cost of an additional R1 per kilowatt hour to the consumer. Eskom's approved increase of 25% will increase costs far more than this and the costs of renewable technologies will decrease over time, while the costs of coal power will increase.
The ACDP understands the use of electricity fees to fund capacity installation at Medupi as a questionable use of taxpayers' money. The increase effectively takes the R335 billion over three years from the energy consumers of South Africa without anyone knowing how Eskom calculates its current electricity price and exactly what the money will be spent on in the future. The ACDP calls on the Minister to demand clarity from Eskom on its past, present and future energy costing so that intelligent energy modelling can be done for South Africa in future.
Currently there is no country energy plan that will decide the way in which Eskom's money is used and, despite President Zuma's commitment to green jobs in his opening address to Parliament, there is no insistence on a certain amount going towards a renewable energy programme.
This amount - the R335 billion - is a top-up on the R282 billion that is budgeted through the infrastructure investment programme. It is equivalent to 11% of the country's total budgetary expenditure for the next three years and is more than the current R165 billion for education. Municipalities will receive R55 billion. So, if only half of the R335 billion were budgeted for municipal energy infrastructure development, a decentralised energy industry could be established providing green jobs, relieving the burden on Eskom, cleaning the environment and encouraging massive investment in the country.
The delay with renewable energy is hard to understand. The Refit phases one and two were drafted in 2009. Thank you. [Time expired.]