‘Generate your own electricity’
Water and Sanitation Minister Nomvula Mokonyane has suggested that smaller municipalities in the Free State which have been struggling to pay their electricity bills to national power utility Eskom due to limited revenue should consider using conduit hydroelectricity in order to cut costs and sustain service delivery to their communities.
Conduit hydroelectricity or conduit hydropower is the method of harnessing the mechanical energy in the water delivery system to generate electricity.
This is achieved by installing turbines in the high pressure pipelines used to distribute water to and around cities.
When then highly pressurised water moves at great speed through the pipelines it rotates the turbines to generate electricity.
Mokonyane said this on Tuesday when she officially launched the newly installed conduit hydropower plant at Bloemwater’s Brandkop water treatment works in Bloemfontein.
The conduit hydropower plant was built in collaboration with the University of Pretoria, City of Tshwane, Bloemwater, the Water Research Commission and eThekwini Municipality.
The project was developed over a period of about a year and it cost an estimated R3.5-million.
The new hydroelectricity plant will produce 96 kilowatts (kW) of electricity which will power the Brandkop treatment plant which also houses the Bloemwater head offices on the south-western fringes of the city.
Mokonyane urged municipal authorities that have been struggling to pay mounting electricity bills to Eskom to consider adopting conduit hydropower technology to produce their own power.
“I think we should consider transferring this technology to the 11 municipalities struggling to pay Eskom,” said the minister.
At least 11 municipalities in the province are saddled with a combined electricity debt to Eskom of about R2-billion because they have no capacity to collect enough revenue to foot their power bills.
Eskom has on several occasions threatened to turn off supplies to at least four municipalities in the province that owe it over R700-million jointly.
These include Ngwathe, Dihlabeng, Maluti a Phofung and Matjhabeng local municipalities.
The other municipalities are mostly small local authorities plagued with high unemployment rates due to poor economic activities resulting in the residents failing to pay for their electricity to the municipalities.
Mokonyane said now that it was certain that conduit hydroelectricity was practical, it should not be limited to institutions like Bloemwater only but to municipalities and other local communities so that people had ready access to electricity.
She said Eskom on its own would not be able to supply adequate power and it was therefore important to come up with innovations like conduit hydropower plants on a wider scale.
“As you may know, South Africa, like many parts of the world, is in the throes of a very difficult electricity shortage,” Mokonyane said.
“While energy might receive attention as an important economic driver, many of the pressures that drive energy demand also apply to water.”
She said energy was critical at every touch-point in the water delivery chain, starting with energy-driven abstraction, either pumping water for irrigation, domestic or industrial purposes from either surface or groundwater to transporting the water to the point of treatment or direct use.
“This continues with energy-powered water treatment for use, and eventually for wastewater treatment post-use . . . energy is the critical input factor that powers water delivery for all uses and in all environments,” Mokonyane said.
“A shortage of power has the net effect of compromising the entire water services value chain . . .”
The minister suggested that a widespread roll-out of this technology could have an enormous impact on both the water and energy sectors.
“South Africa’s 284 municipalities and several water supply utilities and mines that own and operate gravity water supply distribution systems could be considered for small, micro and pico-scale hydropower installations,” she suggested.
According to the minister, several potential conduit hydropower sites have been identified with some of them already operational.
These include the Rand Water, Mossel Bay, Lepelle Water, Amatola Water, Bloemwater, eThekwini Municipality, City of Tshwane, Johannesburg Water, City of Cape Town, Eskom and Midvaal Local Municipality with a combined power potential of 38.6 megawatts (MW) and possible generating value of R220 million a year.
The larger metropolitan areas excluding mines could produce an additional 59.8 MW valued at R340-million a year.
Premier Ace Magashule embraced the minister’s suggestion to fast-track the implementation of conduit hydropower saying a provincial executive meeting that was set for yesterday would discuss the matter.
“It’s good that we have a (provincial) executive (meeting) tomorrow,” said Magashule in a brief speech at the launch.
“We will certainly discuss this and see how we can move on. We don’t have the money but I am sure we will find the means to raise it. I believe in action.”
Conduit hydropower enables users to generate hydroelectricity for on-site use.
In some cases the electricity can be supplied to isolated users who cannot be on the national grid.
The national electricity grid can also be fed depending on the location, type and size of installation.
