--- title: R16-billion solar bet exposes South Africa’s grid crisis description: South Africa's energy regulator Nersa has approved generation licences for four solar projects totalling 890MW, representing the R16-billion final tranche of... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/r16-billion-solar-bet-exposes-south-africa-s-grid-crisis-1kwkxaehc twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: R16-billion solar bet exposes South Africa’s grid crisis | daily.dev og:description: South Africa's energy regulator Nersa has approved generation licences for four solar projects totalling 890MW, representing the R16-billion final tranche of... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/r16-billion-solar-bet-exposes-south-africa-s-grid-crisis-1kwkxaehc og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/1KwKxAEHc.png og:image:alt: R16-billion solar bet exposes South Africa’s grid crisis og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # R16-billion solar bet exposes South Africa’s grid crisis **[TechCentral](https://daily.dev/sources/techcentral)** · 3 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary South Africa's energy regulator Nersa has approved generation licences for four solar projects totalling 890MW, representing the R16-billion final tranche of Bid Window 7. The round sought 5GW but awarded zero wind projects because transmission capacity in the country's windiest provinces is exhausted. All 3.94GW across 18 projects is solar, sited in provinces chosen for spare grid capacity rather than optimal solar resources. The situation highlights the urgency of Eskom's transmission unbundling and a R440-billion grid expansion, with new transmission lines not expected before 2028. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. 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