It was blatantly obvious at the start of Eskom’s demise that there was no quick fix. It became clear that as more residential and commercial customers purchased less power from errant Eskom (and their municipal leeches), that Eskom’s income stream would diminish at a disproportional rate.
There have been quite a few horror stories (unverified), possibly urban legend, that Eskom and municipalities are cracking down on unregistered solar systems (SSEG).
It IS the responsibility of the property owner to ensure that their system has been registered either through Eskom, or their provider via an SSEG application process. In an ideal and well run municipality, you would apply prior to the actual installation. We are not in an ideal world and government organizations are not known for their sterling administration skills. This is strange because this is their primary function….
The vast majority of solar systems have NOT been registered and given the vast number of small “bakkie brigade’ operators, are probably not compliant either. There is definitely a gap in the market for companies to provide a SSEG application service.
The crystal ball is predicting that as the income stream from electricity dries up, the more the institutions suffering those losses will revert to bullying tactics to try and recoup some of these losses. Expect the SSEG compliance sector to become a major sore point. Electricity will be cut, threats will be made and the pool of extremely dissatisfied ratepayers will grow and become more belligerent towards their respective municipal disservice providers.
The likelihood that this will be done in a professional manner is unlikely, it is a time consuming and costly exercise. The regulations around solar have been progressing and morphing quite dramatically since solar became more popular. An installation done 3 years ago and found to be compliant then, may well not be complaint under newly released and up[dated SANS regulations.
You can disconnect yourself from the grid completely, or you could submit your SSEG. The first is expensive to achieve, the second is much more of a frustration. Practically, the best, most cost effective system consists of solar, storage (battery) and utility, being Eskom.
So between the cost of a structural engineer, electrical engineer, some compliance adjustments to your existing systemΒ and a 3rd party SSEG admin application assistant, it could be a >R7000 exercise.
It has to be done and at least if you have submitted your application (and keep the proof thereof) you may be ok. Don’t expect a response before 3 months in a relatively well run operation.
While you’re at it check what the water regulations are because that’s next on your list of crumbling services.
https://www.energize.co.za/article/eskom-finds-itself-undesirable-situation-says-cfo?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news-edition-2023-11-03&utm_content=article-title