New renewable company rises in South Africa’s energy mix

With expansion plans into Southern Africa, it is set to become one of the primary vehicles for large-scale renewable energy investment in the region

The South African energy scene is changing as new renewable energy companies launch to help address the region’s just energy transition. 

Another new company is Anthem, following the transaction signatures between AIIM’s IDEAS Fund, the Mahlako Energy Fund and Norfund. The energy developer has launched as one of South Africa’s largest renewable energy companies by integrating sister businesses with a multi-gigawatt and multi-billion rand project portfolio.

With expansion plans into Southern Africa, it hopes to become one of the primary vehicles for large-scale renewable energy investment in the region.

CEO James Cumming said the country and the region’s undersupply of power and overreliance on coal demand a decisive shift to cheaper, clean, renewable power.

Anthem to accelerate energy transition in South Africa

“We exist to keep economies moving sustainably, supplying government utilities such as Eskom and large-scale industrial and private sector customers with energy that drives growth, supports jobs, decarbonises industry and advances the just energy transition.”

As an integrated renewable energy company, the company will supply clean energy to Eskom, medium to large private power users and traders or aggregators, through:

• 17 projects in operation, generating just over 1.1GW,
• 4 projects in construction totalling 445MW,
• 3 projects in financial close totalling 1.2GW, and
• providing operations and maintenance services to nearly 500MW of its own PV projects.

Together, they shared, this represents more than 2.7GW of secured power capacity and an estimated 15% market share in South Africa’s renewables independent power producers (IPP) market.

In addition, the company controls an 11GW greenfield site pipeline across South Africa, with well-developed plans to further its expansion into Southern Africa, beyond Eswatini.

“Anthem represents more than just a business – it is a call to action to deliver impact through clean power, at scale, collaboratively and cohesively,” said Cumming.

Cover photo:  Anthem executives at the launch. Source: Supplied