The Renewable Energy Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme's seventh round has received 48 bids for 10.1GW of renewable capacity across onshore wind and solar.
Preferred bidders on 3.2GW of wind and 1.8GW of solar will be announced by mid-November. Forty solar bids totalling 8.5GW were received for the 1.8GW capacity tendered and eight bids totalling 1.6GW came in for 3.2GW of wind.
The main bidders are Red Rocket, Mulilo, Scatec and ACWA Power on solar and Abo Wind and Mulilo on wind.
South African IPP Red Rocket bid for at least 2.6GW of solar capacity across 12 projects. The schemes include the 240MW Dwaalboom 2, 180MW Dwaalboom 3 and 180MW Dwaalboom 4 solar projects in Limpopo, as well as the 480MW Buffalo 1 and 2 projects in Limpopo, each with a capacity of 240MW, and the 240MW Rondebosch scheme in Mpumalanga. It has bid for the 240MW Springhaas 1, 240MW Springhaas 6 and 150MW Springhaas 8 solar projects in Free State and the 200MW Florida project in Free State. Red Rocket's bids also include the 210MW Virginia 4 solar park in Free State and the 240MW Dominion solar project in North West province.
Mulilo has placed bids for at least 1.6GW of solar capacity comprising seven schemes of 240MW each. The 240MW solar projects are the Mercury 2, Corona, Quagga/Indus, Litha, Phemelo, Middlepunt and Indlovu schemes, all in Free State.
Scatec has bid for at least 700MW of solar projects – the 240MW Oslaagte 2, 240MW Oslaagte 3 and 220MW Leeuwspruit 1 solar projects in Free State.
ACWA Power has bid for 515MW across three solar projects, the 240MW Dorado 1 and 75MW Dorado 2 schemes in Limpopo and the 200MW Project San PV in Northern Cape.
Among the wind bidders is Germany's Abo Wind with 720MW of onshore wind bids across three wind farms of 240MW each in Aberdeen in Eastern Cape and the 240MW Pienaarspoort wind farm in Western Cape. Mainstream has bid for the 140MW Sutherland 2 wind farm in Northern Cape and Mulilo has bid for the 240MW Newcastle wind power plant in KwaZulu-Natal.
All bids are placed under the names of special purpose project companies and it can be challenging to trace them back to the developers. Except for two 91MW and 75MW solar bids, all other 46 projects submitted exceed 100MW individual proposed capacity.
