In November last year, President Ramaphosa unveiled South Africa’s 5-year Just Energy Transition Investment Plan (JET-IP) and requested the Commission to consult stakeholders on the plan and provide feedback on their views. In addition, the President also requested the PCC to critically appraise the JET-IP and produce its own recommendations.
The PCC has subsequently conducted consultations on the JET-IP with stakeholders, including with youth, business, civil society, local government, organised labour, and the faith community including community consultations in Mpumalanga, Limpopo, and Northern Cape provinces, concluding with a national multi-stakeholder colloquium.
In concluding this process, the PCC submitted to President Ramaphosa the final recommendations for consideration by government on areas of consensus by the social partners on the implementation of the JETIP underpinned by a core message from the social partners that the JET-IP remains an important platform for advancing the energy transition.
Throughout the engagement process, the PCC has taken account of the key messages and recommendations that stakeholders have articulated. These perspectives have had a direct influence on the PCC’s recommendations on the JET-IP and has been summarised in the report, “Just Energy Transition Investment Plan – Stakeholder Perspectives” and the PCC’s own recommendations have been developed into a Report -: “A Critical Appraisal of the Just Energy Transition Investment Plan – Recommendations of the Presidential Climate Commission.
In outlining key issues from the stakeholder perspectives, Shamini Harrington PCC Commissioner and Chair of its Finance Working Group stated that the justice, or just transition aspects of the PCC’s recommendations came under significant scrutiny.
“Although the social partners raised different issues pertaining to justice in the transition, many were concerned with issues of energy affordability, access, and security, incentives, the pace and extent of decarbonisation, and the role of the state. Other issues that concerned many stakeholder groups were the nature of private investment, the inadequate quantum of grants in the package, skills development and employment, and corruption, theft, and vandalism”. said Harrington.
“Our recommendations once more call upon the need of a ‘transition-capable’ developmental state to navigate the complexities of transition and further underscored the urgency of capacity building at local government level, including funding to support electricity supply investments and mandates, and integrated development planning and budgeting processes” said Dr Crispian Olver, Executive Director of the PCC.
The PCC further calls for governance and oversight mechanisms for all transition funding and climate finance to oversee and track international commitments and an impact response investment plan through the development of an adaptation and resilience investment plan focusing on issues such as water & food security, agriculture, and tourism amongst others.
We concur with many stakeholder views on the need to remain prudent on the scale of the country’s foreign and domestic debt, the call for increases in grant and concessional finance; scaling up sustainable social ownership in renewable energy; and a coordinated industrial and financing policy” said Dr Olver.
The commission acknowledges the valid concerns by stakeholders and committed to hold all partners accountable in addressing such in the process of implementation, including conduction further work in areas such as the overall quantification of just transition funding and the integration with National Treasury budget process, and the development of government led industrial policy in emerging areas such as green hydrogen and electric vehicles.
The commission welcomes government’s reaffirmation that our future energy mix will be aligned with the Just Transition Framework and geared at sustaining investments including those prioritised under in the Just Energy Transition Investment Plan and confirms the PCC’s support for the implementation of the plan, while dealing with the legitimate issues raised in both reports as submitted to the President.
