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Topic: Just Transition

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[Episode #276] – Electricity Reform in South Africa

May 20 2026

Mini Episode

This is the second part of a miniseries about South Africa's energy transition, based on Chris' travels there in September and October of 2025. The first part was Episode 264, in which we heard how the end of apartheid precipitated reform of the country's energy systems.

South Africa is arguably one of the most exciting places in the world to see the energy transition unfolding right now, because after nearly 150 years of relying almost exclusively on coal for its energy, it is finally implementing reforms that will allow its electricity system to integrate more renewables onto its grid.

Eskom, the state-owned monopoly, has owned and controlled the grid for over a century. Its aging coal fleet still provides around 80 percent of the country's electricity, even though solar power is now far cheaper, and it has been able to block new renewable projects because they threatened its coal business. But now Eskom is being broken up into separate units for generation, transmission, and distribution. And the country is launching its first wholesale electricity market — the South Africa Wholesale Electricity Market, or SAWEM — opening the door for renewables to compete with coal.

At the same time, there is also an enormous and growing informal supply in the form of distributed solar — enough to meet a quarter of the country's electricity demand. Many businesses and residents are installing their own solar and battery systems, often without any kind of permission from or notice to the utility. That is simultaneously creating an entirely new and complex sort of electricity system that's hard for utilities to manage, while also making the system far more resilient. In fact, distributed solar batteries are credited with putting an end to the "load shedding" blackouts that plagued customers for over 15 years.

Formally and informally, South Africa is rushing headlong from its coal-fired past and into the renewably powered future. Clean generation led by solar surged past 30 percent in late 2025, while coal fell to a record monthly low. South Africa's experiment in restructuring a vertically integrated, coal-dependent grid offers an early look at the politics, economics, and surprises that other markets will face as they take on their own transitions to renewables.

In this episode, we'll be hearing from experts who are closely involved with the electricity reforms in South Africa. In the next episode, we'll see how those reforms play an important role in delivering a just transition.

Guest #1:

Dr. Josh Dippenaar is a researcher and practitioner focused on DER grid integration in South Africa. He has published on rooftop PV economics, utility tariff design, interconnection policy, and electricity markets in the developing world. He is currently working on developing new markets with Mulilo, an Independent Power Producer (IPP) in Southern Africa. Previously, he was an energy engineer with Sustainable Energy Africa, and a senior engineer at the Centre for Renewable and Sustainable Energy Studies. He has a Masters of Engineering and a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stellenbosch University.

On LinkedIn

Guest #2:

Keith Bowen is a power systems economist and Senior Manager: Market Operator at the National Transmission Company of South Africa (NTCSA) in the Eskom Transmission Division. He has extensive experience in energy economics and planning in the power sector, and is responsible for developing wholesale pricing mechanisms, supporting internal transfers within the vertically integrated utility, and payments to independent power producers. With the restructuring of Eskom, he is involved in developing future market mechanisms and trading arrangements between the transmission subsidiary and other industry participants. Keith has bachelor’s degrees in computer science and economics, and a master’s degree in economics from Witwatersrand (Wits) University.

On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keith-bowen-9674821a/

Guest #3:

Dr Kenneth Creamer is an academic economist based at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Over the past 30 years, Creamer has published on macroeconomic policy and energy policy, in local and international academic journals and books.

Creamer is a member of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Economic Advisory Council as well as the advisory council of South Africa’s Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition.

In addition to his position at the University of the Witwatersrand, Creamer serves as a Director of Creamer Media, publisher of news and information platforms Engineering News, Mining Weekly and Polity.

On the web:

Guest #4:

Lebogang Mulaisi is the Executive Manager responsible for Policy and Research in the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC). She previously served on the commission as a commissioner representing labour and as Chief Operations Officer in the Secretariat. She was previously the head of policy at the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), responsible for labour market policy and the just transition. Through engagements with labour unions, she has developed a blueprint for workers on the mechanisms to transition to a low carbon economy through collective bargaining.

Lebogang was an EXCO and MANCO member at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (NEDLAC). Lebogang has co-authored a chapter in Mistra’s book on a low-carbon future for South Africa. The chapter titled: Democratising a just transition in South Africa Identifies the labour movement as a key lever to build social movements around the concept of a radical vision for a just transition.

Lebogang holds a Master’s degree in Development Economics from the University of Johannesburg (2018) and is completing a PhD in Economics. Her area of focus is climate-induced structural change and its impacts on labour productivity.

On the Web: Profile of Lebogang Mulaisi at the National Youth Development Agency

On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lebogang-mulaisi-a376324

Guest #5:

Dr. Mark Swilling is Distinguished Professor and Co-director of the Centre for Sustainability Transitions at Stellenbosch University. His latest book is The Age of Sustainability: Just Transitions in a Complex World (London and New York: Routledge, 2020). Together with Eve Annecke, he has co-authored, Just Transitions: Explorations of Sustainability in an Unfair World (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2012), co-edited with Adriana Allen and Andreas Lampis Untamed Urbanism (New York and London: Routledge, 2016), co-edited with Josephine Musango and Jeremy Wakeford Greening the South African Economy (Cape Town: Juta, 2016) and was the lead author with Ivor Chipkin et. al. of Shadow State: Politics of State Capture (Johannesburg: WITS Press, 2018). He is a member of UNEP’s International Resource Panel where he was the co-lead author of The Weight of Cities: Resource Requirements of Future Urbanization, published in 2018.

Mark was on the Board of the Development Bank of Southern Africa for nine years and until September 2023 where held the position of Chairperson of the Board. The President of South Africa appointed Mark as a member of the National Planning Commission (2022-2027). In 2024. he was appointed to the Board of the National Transmission Company of South Africa. He has been a visiting Professor at the universities of Sheffield and Utrecht, and Georgetown University in Washington D.C, and in 2018 was the Edward P. Bass Visiting Environmental Scholar at Yale University. As of 2023, he published 20 books, 86 book chapters, 66 peer reviewed articles, 56 reports, 143 presentations, 49 major research projects, and supervised 56 Master’s theses and 27 PhDs (six incomplete as of 2023). His private sector roles include Chair of the Board of Ekapa Energy (Pty) Ltd and Chair of the Board of Creation Capital Investments (Pty) Ltd.

On the Web: Mark’s website

Guest #6:

Megan Euston-Brown is the Director and Project Manager of Sustainable Energy Africa (SEA). Megan has worked in sustainable energy development since 2003, managing multi-year urban energy transition and climate response capacity building programs. This has included State of Energy reporting, city energy strategy development and climate action planning, cost of supply, tariffs and distribution sector reform, green building policy development, energy efficiency, energy poverty and just transition tracking. Megan is an experienced development facilitator and has worked extensively with local level energy data collection, policy and institutional development.

On LinkedIn

On X: @SEA_UrbanEnergy

Guest #7:

Dr Wikus Kruger is the Director of the Power Futures Lab at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business. He is a research lead and lecturer on power sector investment in sub-Saharan Africa. His research focuses on measures to accelerate investment, in particular into renewables, through structured procurement programmes such as auctions. Dr. Wikus Kruger has been working in the African energy sector for 14 years. He holds a PhD from UCT; an MSc from Antwerp University; and MPhil, BPhil and BA degrees from Stellenbosch University.

Geek rating: 7

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[Episode #264] – History of the Transition in South Africa

Dec 3 2025

Mini Episode

South Africa has earned a reputation for having an old, backward, and unreliable electricity system more dependent on coal than any other country with a similarly sized economy. With an aging fleet of coal-fired power plants owned by a century-old utility that has actively resisted the energy transition, its grid is ripe for modernization.

South Africa is also blessed with largely untapped wind, water, and solar resources that could meet all of the country's energy needs several times over. Few countries better exemplify both the challenge and opportunity in the energy transition.

That transition is now under way, both through deliberate official reforms and through an uncontrolled explosion of solar and batteries that customers are installing on their homes and businesses. Over seven gigawatts of behind-the-meter solar and storage now operate in a country whose grid demand rarely exceeds 30 gigawatts, all deployed with zero subsidies.

To explore this story, Chris traveled to South Africa in September 2025 for a six-week research trip. He recorded numerous interviews with people closely involved in the country's energy transition, which we are featuring in a new miniseries.

We begin with Anton Eberhard, Professor Emeritus at the University of Cape Town's Graduate School of Business. For more than 35 years, Anton has worked to modernize and liberalize South Africa's power sector in pursuit of a more equitable, just, and clean energy system. His commitment to justice runs deep: in 1977, he became one of the first white South Africans imprisoned for refusing conscription into the apartheid military. After his release, he pursued a PhD in solar energy around 1980, doing fieldwork in remote Lesotho villages long before renewables were economically viable.

In this conversation, Anton recounts the evolution of South Africa's power sector alongside his own personal history. He explains why Eskom, once named the best utility in the world, saw its energy availability factor plummet from over 90% to as low as 40% at the height of the country's power crisis. He describes the political economy keeping coal interests entrenched, his role in the groundbreaking 1998 white paper whose proposed reforms are only now, 27 years later, being implemented, and why structural changes remain critical for accelerating the energy transition. This will give you the essential context for the rest of our South Africa miniseries, and contains many universal insights that may be useful to understanding the energy transition wherever you live.

Guest:

Anton Eberhard is a Professor Emeritus and Senior Scholar at the University of Cape Town’s Power Futures Lab in the Graduate School of Business. His research, teaching and advisory work focuses on governance and regulatory incentives to improve utility performance, power investment challenges, the design of new power markets, distributed energy resources and linkages to electricity access and sustainable development.  Prof Eberhard was a member of the Global Commission to End Energy Poverty. He has worked in the energy sector across SubSaharan Africa, and other developing regions, for more than 35 years and was the founding Director of the Energy and Development Research Centre. He is a Foundation Member of the Academy of Science of South Africa. He was appointed by the President of South Africa to chair a task team to resolve serious financial and technical challenges in the national utility, Eskom, and to make proposals on the restructuring of the power sector and he currently provides technical assistance to the National Energy Crisis Committee. Previously he has served on the country’s Ministerial Advisory Council on Energy, the National Planning Commission, the National Advisory Council on Innovation, and the Board of the National Electricity Regulator of South Africa. In 2012, he received the SA National Energy Association’s award for outstanding and sustained contributions to the enhancement of the South African energy environment. Prof Eberhard has more than 150 peer reviewed publications to his credit including three recent books: Independent Power Projects in SubSaharan Africa; Power Sector Reform and Regulation in Africa; and Africa’s Power Infrastructure: Investment, Integration and Efficiency.  He has undertaken numerous assignments for governments, utilities, regulatory authorities, donor and multi-lateral agencies, banks and private sector companies.

On the Web:  Power Futures Lab

Geek rating: 3

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[Episode #244] – Rethinking Industrial Strategy

Feb 26 2025

Mini Episode

What makes for effective and enduring green industrial policy? How can public and private investment mobilize to achieve the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C goal? Can Trump undermine climate science and the global energy transition, or will the rest of the world carry on without the US? Which policy designs can drive equitable green growth, ensuring the energy transition benefits economically disadvantaged and indigenous communities?

Today’s guest, Mariana Mazzucato, is a Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London and the Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose. An author of four influential books on shaping capitalism, growth, and economic policy for the public good, she advises governments worldwide on innovation-led inclusive and sustainable growth. She chairs several governmental and inter-governmental organizations and produces reports designed to shape economic policies, particularly in the developing world.

In these challenging times of economic upheaval, Mariana’s ideas offer valuable guidance for policymakers as they craft industrial strategies to advance the energy transition.

Guest:

Mariana Mazzucato is Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London, where she is Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose (IIPP). Her previous posts include the RM Phillips Professorial Chair at the Science Policy Research Unit at Sussex University.

She is winner of international prizes including the Grande Ufficiale Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana in 2021, Italy’s highest civilian honour, the 2020 John von Neumann Award, the 2019 All European Academies Madame de Staël Prize for Cultural Values, and the 2018 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. She is a member of the UK Academy of Social Sciences (FAcSS) and the Italian Academy of Sciences Lincei. Most recently, Pope Francis appointed her to the Pontifical Academy for Life for bringing ‘more humanity’ to the world.

She is the author of The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths (2013), The Value of Everything: making and taking in the global economy (2018), Mission Economy: a moonshot guide to changing capitalism (2021) and The Big Con: How the Consulting Industry Weakens our Businesses, Infantilizes our Governments and Warps our Economies (2023).

She advises policy makers around the world on innovation-led inclusive and sustainable growth. Her roles have included for example Co-Chair of the Group of Experts to the G20 Taskforce on a Global Mobilization against Climate Change, Chair of the World Health Organization’s Council on the Economics of Health for All, Co-Chair of the Global Commission on the Economics of Water, Co-Chair on the Council on Urban Initiatives, Commissioner for the Jubilee Report on Addressing the Debt and Development Crises in Countries from the South, and member of the South African President’s Economic Advisory Council. Previously, through her role as Special Advisor for the EC Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation (2017-2019), she authored the high-impact report on Mission-Oriented Research and Innovation in the European Union, turning “missions” into a crucial new instrument in the European Commission’s Horizon innovation programme, and more recently, authored a report with the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) on Transformational Change in Latin America and the Caribbean: A mission-oriented approach.

On Bluesky: @mazzucatom.bsky.social

On Twitter: @MazzucatoM

On Substack marianamazzucato.substack.com

On the Web:  https://marianamazzucato.com

UCL profile page: https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/61409-mariana-mazzucato/about

Geek rating: 7

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[Episode #231] – Five Times Faster

Aug 21 2024

Mini Episode

Why have our climate policies failed to significantly reduce carbon emissions? What new strategies could help us decarbonize the global energy system five times faster — as is needed to avoid the worst climate scenarios?

Our guest in this episode believes he has some answers to these questions.

Simon Sharpe has been personally involved in the crafting of climate policy in the UK for over a decade. He designed and led flagship international campaigns for climate policy in 2020-2021, when the UK hosted COP26, and has held key roles in the UK Government, including as head of a private office to a minister of energy and climate change. His diplomatic experience includes postings in China and India. Currently, he is Director of Economics for the Climate Champions Team and a Senior Fellow at the World Resources Institute. Simon has published influential academic papers and created groundbreaking international initiatives in climate change risk assessment, economics, policy, and diplomacy.

In his 2023 book, Five Times Faster—Rethinking the Science, Economics, and Diplomacy of Climate Change, Simon lays out why the institutions of science, economics, and climate diplomacy that should be helping us are holding us back. Chapter by chapter, he forensically analyzes why so many of our climate policies have failed to produce the desired results, demonstrating how science is pulling its punches, diplomacy is picking the wrong battles, and economics is fighting for the wrong side. More importantly, he outlines how to develop alternative policies that could actually work.

Guest:

Simon Sharpe is Director of Economics for the Climate Champions Team and a Senior Fellow at the World Resources Institute. He designed and led flagship international campaigns of the UK’s Presidency of the UN climate change talks (COP26) in 2020-2021; worked as the head of private office to a minister of energy and climate change in the UK Government; and has served on diplomatic postings in China and India. He has published influential academic papers and created groundbreaking international initiatives in climate change risk assessment, economics, policy and diplomacy.

On the Web: fivetimesfaster.org

Geek rating: 6

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[Episode #223] – Fiscal Implications of the US Transition

May 1 2024

Mini Episode

The dialogue surrounding so-called 'just transition' initiatives in the US has primarily focused on the workforce: How can communities reliant on well-paying fossil fuel sector jobs find new opportunities for those facing unemployment? Are there state or federal retraining programs available to facilitate their transition into new roles? Moreover, what industries can offer new, equally good jobs?

What hasn’t been studied nearly as much is the fiscal impact of losing industrial activity related to fossil fuel extraction, processing and delivery. How much public revenue is really at stake in the energy transition? Which states face the highest jeopardy? And how can communities dependent on fossil fuel revenues navigate their transitions while continuing to support essential public infrastructure, such as schools and libraries, once these funds dry up?

In today’s conversation, we speak with an expert who has studied the fiscal impact of the energy transition extensively: Daniel Raimi, a fellow at Resources for the Future (or RFF), an independent, nonprofit research institution based in Washington, DC. Daniel shares with us the results of his extensive, on-the-ground research into the fiscal implications of the energy transition for communities that derive a large share of their public revenue from fossil fuel industries. We also talk through a number of ways fossil-fueled revenues could be replaced by clean energy industries and other policies. We consider the importance of green industrial policy in the equation, and we wrap it up with a speculative discussion about the destiny of fossil fuel communities in the net-zero world of 2050 that we’re striving to reach.

Guest:

Daniel Raimi is a fellow at RFF and a lecturer at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. He works on a range of energy policy issues with a focus on tools to enable an equitable energy transition. He has published extensively in academic journals and been quoted in national media outlets. He has presented his research for policymakers, industry, and other stakeholders, including before the US Senate Budget Committee and the Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee of the US House’s Natural Resources Committee. He is also the author of The Fracking Debate (2017). He cohosts Resources Radio, a weekly podcast from RFF.

On Twitter: @danielraimi

On the Web:  Daniel’s page at RFF

Geek rating: 2

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[Episode #201] – India Update Part 2

Jun 28 2023

Mini Episode

This is part two of our interview with Mohua Mukherjee, a Senior Research Fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies. Previously, she was a development economist and project manager with the World Bank, working in over 40 countries.

In this second part, we dive into India’s use of oil and natural gas, and why it has continued to purchase these fuels from Russia, even as the West has implemented trade restrictions. We go on to explore India’s unique approach to transitioning mobility to vehicles that run on electricity and CNG. We highlight India's strategy for developing domestic industries in battery manufacturing, solar energy, hydrogen electrolyzers, and other clean technologies. We also take a closer look at India's astonishing progress in expanding electricity access to its vast population. We examine the challenges faced by electricity distribution utilities in the country, and their efforts to enhance efficiency. Finally, we address India's progress on its climate initiatives and the importance of ensuring a "just transition" as the nation reduces its reliance on coal-fired power.

Be sure to check out part one of this interview in Episode #199 for a review of India’s overall energy mix, including a close look at its use of coal, solar, and wind.

Geek rating: 5

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[Episode #196] – Unglamorous Solutions

Apr 19 2023

Mini Episode

Most energy transition reporting narrowly focuses on technology stories. When journalists do occasionally write about energy transition policy and politics, they tend to limit the framing to a particular type of energy technology, such as drilling for oil or putting up a new wind farm.

What if this technological tunnel vision is causing us to overlook the most important aspects of the energy transition? If the most transformative and enduring aspects of transition end up being policy and investment, especially at the local level, these topics rarely get the discussion they deserve. Instead of focusing on flashy technologies like hydrogen and nuclear power, should we also give equal attention to unglamorous solutions like insulation and wider sidewalks? What if the things we need most have no natural champions in industry or political leadership? If so, who will advocate for them?

Our guest in this episode is a researcher who has thought deeply about rebalancing the energy transition conversation. Dr. Marie Claire Brisbois of the University of Sussex draws from her work on power, politics and influence to suggest important changes that we need to make to our institutions of governance and our investment strategies to realize the energy transition’s full potential. It’s a thoughtful, out-of-the-box discussion that will give you much to think about!

Geek rating: 2

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[Episode #192] – When is Hydrogen ‘Clean’?

Feb 22 2023

Mini Episode

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 introduced two tax credits to encourage the development of a domestic clean hydrogen industry in the United States. These tax credits can potentially be worth billions of dollars and are based on a sliding scale, depending on how ‘clean’ the hydrogen production is. The less greenhouse gas emitted during production, the larger the tax credit.

However, measuring and accounting for the greenhouse gas emissions from a hydrogen production facility can be complicated, especially when the electrolyzer producing the hydrogen is in a different location on the power grid from the renewable power plant that powers it. So complicated that you pretty much have to be a grid power expert to even begin figuring these calculations out.

To address such sticky questions of hydrogen production tax credit eligibility, the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requested comments to shape how they will measure and account for related emissions. One of the respondents was the San Francisco-based clean energy think-tank Energy Innovation, which submitted a very thoughtful, 25-page response outlining some of the key issues the IRS should understand, the criteria it should consider, and some policy recommendations, as well suggestions for preventing attempts to game the tax credit system.

In this highly technical episode, we welcome back to the show Eric Gimon, one of the Energy Innovation authors, to review their response to the IRS. And this discussion reveals not just how to ensure that the billions of dollars of tax credits will go to projects that actually reduce emissions, but also important insights about everything from how we go about building new renewable power plants, to the varying carbon intensity of the power grid, to the business case for building electrolyzers to produce green hydrogen.

Geek rating: 10

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[Episode #190] – Financing Utility Scale RE in Developing Countries

Jan 25 2023

Mini Episode

Multilateral development banks (MDBs) like the World Bank are increasingly under pressure to invest more in renewable energy projects in emerging markets. The lack of financing for such projects is a problem at the small, distributed scale as we discussed in Episode #189, and it’s also a problem for utility-scale projects as we discuss in this episode.

In this conversation, Brad Handler, a Program Manager and Researcher at the Sustainable Finance Lab of the Payne Institute at the Colorado School of Mines who tracks various such projects and initiatives, walks us through some recent Energy Transition Mechanisms (or ETMs) and Just Energy Transition (or JET) refinancing projects that aim to close coal plants in the developing world long before the end of their expected lifespans, and replace their generation with renewable power. A former Wall Street Equity Research Analyst with 20 years of experience covering the oil sector, Brad has a deep understanding of how finance in the traditional energy sector works, giving him an excellent perspective on how energy transition financing could work. He does a wonderful job of explaining the oftentimes opaque and complex world of sustainable finance so that it’s comprehensible.

Closing coal plants remains the number-one priority globally for reducing carbon emissions. So although these are still very early days for refinancing projects, it’s worthwhile to examine how and where development banks are finally taking some real steps to accelerate the energy transition in emerging economies, derisking the sector and motivating much more conventional private sector capital to participate.

Geek rating: 5

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[Episode #172] – IPCC AR6 Part 1

May 11 2022

Mini Episode

The IPCC published the final part of its Sixth Assessment (“AR6”), the Working Group III report, on April 4, 2022. The IPCC's Working Group III report contains assessments of how the energy transition can reduce emissions in the context of an updated outlook for global warming. Together, the three reports of AR6 comprise over 6,000 pages of material, so we have chosen to focus our coverage on the Working Group III report, which we present in two episodes.

In this first episode on AR6, we speak with one of the lead authors of the Working Group III report, energy researcher Benjamin Sovacool of the University of Sussex. We discuss some major advances in AR6 over the AR5 report of eight years ago; the gaps between our national climate action ambitions, what is really needed to limit warming to 1.5 or 2°C, and some ways that those gaps can be closed; how market-based financial approaches can be harnessed to reduce carbon; the importance of equity and “just transition” strategies; the challenge of path dependency and technology lock-in; how political economy can inhibit taking action on climate; the roles that non-government actors and individuals can play in the transition; and the various ways of decarbonizing transportation and providing better low-carbon mobility.

Our second episode on AR6, Episode #173, will review the updated figures for the remaining carbon budget, and consider the pathways and probabilities for limiting warming to 1.5 and 2°C.

Geek rating: 5

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