Great News for Solar Power Users in South Africa
Hanno Labuschagne - 21 October 2025
Eskom has scrapped a requirement for households with grid-tied or hybrid rooftop solar power to get sign-off for their systems from persons registered with the Engineering Council of South Africa (Ecsa).
The change forms part of a simplified compliance and registration process for Eskom’s small-scale embedded generation (SSEG) customers.
Effective 1 October 2025, residential SSEG users no longer need a qualified electrical engineer or other Ecsa-registered professional to sign off on these systems before they can be registered.
Instead, they will only need their systems to be approved by a person registered with the Department of Labour (DoL), aligning with the country’s Electricity Installation Regulations.
The installation must have a valid electrical Certificate of Compliance (CoC) and a basic embedded generation installation test report signed off by a registered Installation or Master Electrician.
“This follows a review of compliance and safety requirements as well as a stringent due diligence process, pending the expected changes by the South African Bureau of Standards,” Eskom said.
Eskom acknowledged that requiring systems to be signed off by an Ecsa-registered professional was costly but out of its control.
The power utility said that this change will save customers over R9,000 in connection costs for a typical 16kVA rooftop solar system.
“The aim is to make it easier, safer, and more affordable for households and small businesses to connect legally to the national grid as required by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa),” Eskom said.
The power utility said it has been working on an SSEG framework with industry stakeholders to stay ahead of safety requirements.
“Eskom recognises that many South Africans are eager to participate in the clean energy transition,” the power utility said.
“Our goal is to make it as simple, safe, and cost-effective as possible for customers to connect legally, while ensuring the stability and safety of the national grid.”
Registration is a legal requirement
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Eskom distribution acting group executive Agnes Mlambo encouraged customers to register their systems, in line with Nersa’s requirements.
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“All businesses and households with embedded generation systems of less than 100kVA are required to register with their electricity licensee, even if they do not export electricity to the grid,” Mlambo said.
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“Registration not only ensures compliance and safety but also positions customers to benefit from future programmes that reward clean energy generation.”
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Eskom will also offer benefits to encourage SSEG users to register, including exemption from registration and smart meter fees for households with solar PV systems up to 50kVa.
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“Registered customers are also well-placed to benefit from future tariff structures that make it possible to sign up for demand response products and pay less for electricity by shifting energy use to lower-cost periods,” Eskom said.
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“In addition, those who export power back to the grid benefit from the Nersa-approved Homeflex tariff, which provides credits for energy exported, further improving the return on their investment.”
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Eskom said it is also exploring solutions for prepaid customers as part of enabling safe, affordable, and compliant integration of SSEG systems.
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Pressure from civil society groups
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The change in tune comes after significant pressure from civil society, including the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) and AfriForum.
Outa’s energy advisor, Chris Yelland, EE Business Intelligence MD, previously told MyBroadband that the utility was on the brink of scrapping the requirement.
Yelland and AfriForum’s legal experts had disputed whether Eskom’s Ecsa requirement was lawful and said it made the registration process complex and costly.
Yelland previously said the SABS change Eskom was alluding to was likely the removal of a supplementary note in the SANS 10142-1 standards.
That note excluded non-standby systems, including grid-tied and hybrid systems, from the scope of SANS 10142-1.
Eskom argued this signalled the need for sign-off of such systems by an Ecsa-registered professional. However, notes in SANS are not prescriptive and are for informational purposes only.
“Eskom had no legal grounds for excluding grid-tied or hybrid systems connected behind the meter on a customer’s premises from the regulatory and compliance requirements of the Occupational Health and Safety Act and the regulations thereto,” Yelland said.
The OHS Act and its regulations only require sign-off for grid-tied or hybrid systems by a duly qualified electrician registered with the DoL.
South Africans Say Goodbye to Eskom
https://businesstech.co.za/news/business-opinion/840346/south-africans-say-goodbye-to-eskom/
​Staff Writer - 20 October 2025
Eskom’s steep electricity price increases have gutted demand for its product, and promises of single-digit increases going forward come far too late to stop it from sinking.
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This is according to a new demand analysis from independent energy analyst Pieter Jordaan, showing how the power utility’s price increases and tariff reforms have steered customers away.
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Jordaan looked at South Africa’s electricity expense-to-income ratio, often referred to as energy burden to track the percentage of a household’s income on electricity costs.
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“A household is considered to have a high energy burden if this ratio exceeds 6% of their income, and severe if it exceeds 10% of their income,” he said.
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“Beyond a 6% burden, households start to limit their electricity consumption to match their income growth, or look for cheaper substitutes such as wood, paraffin, gas or solar power.”
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He assessed the energy burden between 1996 and 2025 using two profiles:
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Low-income Households (LIH), with an income of R5,000 per month, consuming 150 kWh/m on Eskom’s HomeLight 20A tariff.
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Middle-income households (MIH), with an income of R22,500 per month after tax, consuming 600 kWh/m on Eskom’s HomePower 4 tariff.
According to Jordaan’s calculations—based on Eskom’s own data and official figures from Stats SA—up to March 2008, LIH carried an energy burden of ten basis points higher than MIH.
In 2008/9 and 2025/6 Eskom restructured its retail tariffs so aggressively, that by 2025/6 MIH now carry a burden that is 340 basis points higher than LIH.
By 2020 the energy burden for MIH had escalated from 3.5% to 6.2%, which is considered a high burden.
Eskom restructured its fixed charges substantially in 2025/6, having the effect of increasing the energy burden for MIH by 22% from 8.9% to 10.9%, creating a severe burden.
Jordaan warned that this will only get worse.
Because Eskom’s tariff restructuring in 2025 is phased—with only 20% of the change kicking in this year—the tariffs will escalate steeply in 2026/7 and 2027/8 as more fixed charges are phased in.
Based on the Nersa-approved increases, the MIH energy burden is set to reach 14.7% by 2027/8.​
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​​Empty promises as Eskom sinks
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Energy minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa last week promised that the government had found a “path forward” on electricity pricing in South Africa, stating that the days of double-digit increases for Eskom are over.
While the minister’s statements make for great headlines and media clips, they effectively amount to nothing.
After its latest MYPD6 approvals by Nersa, Eskom had already indicated that it was on a single-digit tariff increase path.
Even with Nersa’s R54 billion blunder factored in, increases for 2026 and 2027 were single digit (circa 9%)—with no intervention from the government.
However, the real issue is that even with inflation-tied increases, the damage has already been done. Without a massive reduction in electricity prices, Eskom is already in what Jordaan calls “demand quicksand”.
After two consecutive 30% price-shocks in 2008/9 and 2009/10—exacerbated by the global financial crisis—demand stopped growing for five years.
“Eskom seemingly realised that the increases stifled demand and slashed its tariffs by 10% in 2011, which only marginally stimulated demand. Economic growth returned in 2014-16, so did demand and load shedding,” Jordaan said.
As South Africa’s energy burden increased, demand started tanking. Recent spikes in demand are due to load shedding effectively ending, but remain far from that seen in the past.
In fact, “from 2019 onwards, Eskom residential demand started to freefall,” Jordaan noted, with Eskom’s residential demand being in decline at a compound rate of 5% per year.
In 2025 a “spike” of less than 0.1 GW was observed and overall demand has not yet bottomed out.
“This is a clear indication that demand for Eskom’s power has taken a severe hit; and historic data shows that demand losses are permanent from 2018 onward due to the overpricing of its product,” Jordaan said.
Jordaan said that this is the ‘demand quicksand’ that Eskom finds itself in, where its inability to operate efficiently and continued price increases are killing its business case.
“It is unable to rectify the crisis with a competitive pricing strategy,” he said.
Even with promises from government that electricity price increases will be single digit from here on out, the fact is that prices have already increased far beyond affordable.
Eskom electricity prices have increased by 937% since 2007, while inflation over the same period was 155%.
By using the pricing signal at a 5.6% energy burden in 2018, Jordaan said it is possible to mathematically extrapolate the “fair maximum price point” for HomePower 4 in 2025/6 at R2.11 per kWh.
At the current rate of R4.11 /kWh, this charge is 95% overpriced, he said.
Similarly, the pricing signal for LIH was at 4.7% energy burden in 2018, and indicates a maximum price point for LIH at R1.57 /kWh. The current tariff of R2.49 is therefore 58% overpriced.
At these levels, there does not appear to be any way for Eskom to climb out of the demand quicksand.
“(Eskom) appears to be doomed to chronic hand-outs for its survival by its single shareholder – the South African taxpayer,” Jordaan said.
