The City of Tshwane says having achieved financial stability, it is now focusing on strengthening the capital’s economy by among others creating energy sufficiency in order carry out rollout of massive infrastructure.
Mayor Nasiphi Moya briefed the media in Pretoria and said the plan includes revitalising the city’s own power stations that have been neglected for years.
Moya said among others the city is looking at converting waste into energy to meet its electricity needs.
The Mayor said funding has already been provided for the pilot phase of the project.
“We’re going to take an approach that once this work starts, it won’t stop again. Because we’ve been talking about the Roival Power Station, we’ve been talking about Pretoria West, and we’ve been talking about IPPs, and no work has been done. So what we have done so far is that these, so we’ve got about six strategic assets of thecity.I won’t bore you with the ones that we did not include. The Roival and Pretoria West are part of that. So Pretoria West, we’re going to work with province, because there’s alreadymoney that they’ve invested in the feasibility study, specifically Jeefa, where we’re going touse Pretoria West Power Station for waste to energy.And it’s going to resolve our issue of landfill sites, and also the issue of energy security. So that project is continuing. And there is money that is allocated in the 2025-2026 budget for transitional advisor,” said Moya of the groundbreaking initiative.
The city’s previous DA-led coalition government also had ambitions of getting the capital off the grid but only through reliance on Independent Power Producers. Now in the opposition, the DA has accused the new ANC-led coalition of not prioritising the enlistment of IPPs but Moya denies abandoning that programme altogether saying. “ We do what works and can never abandon anything that works for the people of Tshwane”.
The City of Tshwane is also expediting the clearing of its Eskom debt with over a billion rand having been paid this year alone reducing its account to just under R5 billion.
The mayor said over many years the metro had lost a lot of money on its electricity infrastructure installations while they added no value and vows that will no longer be the case.
“Also, considering that we are busy using money on both power stations, and we’re not getting anything in return. So these are the projects that you will see us intensifying on in the next financial year to implement them,” said the mayor.