Bid Documentation for SA’s renewables tender delayed: DMRE

South Africa’s Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) has today announced a delay in release for bid documentation for the Request for Proposal (RFP) for the Renewable Energy IPP Procurement Programme (REIPPPP) Bid Window 5. 

South Africa is procuring 1 600 MW of wind and 1 000 MW of solar photovoltaic (PV) power in the coming months. 

The department says the delay was necessitated by the need to align certain parts of the RFP documents with the feedback from National Treasury on the Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act exemption application.

Government remains committed to the urgent procurement of the much-needed energy to power our economic recovery

DMRE

The Department says it intends to release the documentation for Bid Window 5 RFP not later than 12 April 2021 and that the Registration process for Bid Window 5 will remain open for potential bidders to register.

DMRE extends deadline for bid submission

The process for registration to participate in Bid Window 5 was opened on March 19 with the RFP calling for independent power producers (IPPs) to submit bids for development of new wind and solar renewable energy capacity. The last procurement window for IPP renewable energy in South Africa was in 2014. The new renewable energy capacity is expected to improve the energy supply gap that has condemned Africa’s most industrialised country to persistent electricity blackouts. 

To access the RFP documentation, prospective bidders are required to pay a non-refundable fee of R25 000 for a single project. Bidders that intend to submit more than one project will need to make a supplementary payment of R25 000 for each additional project. The deadline for bid submission is now August 16, rather than August 4 as initially communicated by DMRE.

The project sizes will range from a minimum of 1 MW to a maximum of 140 MW (for Onshore Wind) and 75 MW (for Solar PV).

The DMRE will convene a Bidders’ Conference, to be hosted on an e-platform, during May 2021, to provide more information on the qualifying criteria and bid submission expectations.

The procurement is in line with President Cyril Ramaphosa’s commitment in his 2021 State of the Nation Address (SONA) to increase South Africa’s generation capacity and ensure energy security.