Additional power stations, major power lines and substations are being constructed urgently to meet rising electricity demand in South Africa. The approved capacity expansion budget is R343 billion¹ up to 2013 and is expected to grow to more than a trillion rand by 2026. Ultimately Eskom will double its capacity to 80 000MW by 2026.

The budget, approved by the Eskom board and our shareholder, is designed to meet the challenges of electricity reliability and availability and is aligned with government’s target of a 6% GDP growth between 2010 and 2014. We will now deliver an additional 16 304MW in generating capacity by 2017. Generation projects will take up 73% of the budget, with transmission investment accounting for another 13%. The rest of the budget will fund improvements to the distribution network and efforts to diversify our energy mix.

¹ This is nominal rand, and based on 2007 financial assumptions.