Developing an integrated energy plan for South Africa using the energy models LEAP and MARKAL
Master Thesis
2003
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University of Cape Town
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The South African Government has long committed itself to developing an Integrated Energy Plan. The Energy White Paper on Policy since back in 1995 established IEP as being one of the most important tasks for the Department of Minerals and Energy. In the context of today's climate, with South Africa hosting the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002, the development of an IEP has never been more relevant. The development of an energy plan encompasses the development of scenarios to put the utilisation of energy in its proper context. It was felt that there was not enough time and data available to produce results for more than one scenario and as such one scenario was developed for analysis. Four cases were chosen in the scenario to cover a range of important issues currently relevant in the country. These issues include the need for diversification away from coal and to find an economic ground for introducing natural gas into the country. To achieve a base for comparing the different studies, the literature review for this thesis takes the approach of assessing the current status of energy utilisation in South Africa. It looks at new technologies to help the country diversify away from coal. The relevant modelling tools that have been used in the analysis and modelling data that was collected are described. One of the weaknesses in the modelling work is the lack of external cost data to help quantify the impact of burning fossil energy carriers. As such, the foremost conclusion made from the results is that the cheapest strategy for the country is the continued use of coal. Diversifying away from coal to gas was found to be only marginally more expensive than the continued use of coal and even the added expense of switching to gas can be tempered with energy efficiency. Renewable energy technologies for grid electricity generation still remain expensive and the recommendation is made that an effort should be made to investigate ways to lessen the cost of these technologies. The models have found great usefulness and it was found that the expertise that was achieved by the ERI should be sustained with the continued use of these and new modelling tools.
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Solomon, M. 2003. Developing an integrated energy plan for South Africa using the energy models LEAP and MARKAL. University of Cape Town.