Civil Engineering October 2021 | Vol 29 No 9

Civil Engineering October 2021 29 SA HYDROPOWER POTENTIAL While the government is committed to providing universal access to electricity, the reality is that many isolated com- munities will not be connected to the national grid for the foreseeable future due to the high cost of transmission and distribution infrastructure to the more remote parts of South Africa. However, Van Dijk says there are several areas in the comparatively water-rich Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga provinces where the Kwa-Madiba standalone scheme could be replicated or adapted with little dif- ficulty, while other types of innovative small-scale hydropower schemes can be established in other provinces. Van Dijk noted that South Africa has almost 4 500 registered dams and several weirs, transfer schemes and pipelines, many of which could be retrofitted to accommodate small-scale turbine systems nationwide – without reducing water yield or reliability of water supply. The Hydropower Research Group at UP is also compiling a national hydropower atlas for the country as part of another WRC- funded project. This atlas, the first of its kind in South Africa, will help to identify areas where hydropower projects of different sizes can potentially be implemented. It will also provide information on the different technologies available. The researchers hope their efforts will provide policy- makers with a way to address the current slow pace of small-scale hydropower development. Researchers have indicated that there are several opportunities for retrofitted hydropower schemes across the country. Another advantage of retrofitted hydro- power is that no new major infrastructure is required for energy generation. “What we are saying is, let’s harness the water resources that we have responsibly, for the benefit of all. Small-scale hydropower pro- jects like Kwa-Madiba have the potential to be integrated into a number of our river systems,” concludes Van Dijk. An aerial overview of the small-scale hydropower scheme