EDF power solutions announced in December 2025 that its Umoyilanga hybrid project successfully reached Provisional Commercial Operations Date (Provisional COD)(5 December 2025) at its Dassiesridge Plant in the Eastern Cape.
Dassiesridge in the Eastern Cape combines 63 MW of wind power and 45 MW of battery storage.
The Umoyilanga project combines solar, wind and battery storage technologies to offer reliable and dispatchable power to the national electricity grid, up to a contracted capacity of 75 MW. When it is fully complete, the project will operate as a virtual power plant, combining generation from two sites which are 900 km apart – Avondale in the Northern Cape, with 115 MW of solar PV and 30 MW of battery storage, and Dassiesridge in the Eastern Cape, with 63 MW of wind and 45 MW of battery storage. The low-carbon electricity produced will match the capacity needs for around 120 000 households, based on the Eskom residential consumption average of 3 319 kWh/household.
The combination of wind and solar resources with batteries will enable Umoyilanga to provide 75 MW on demand from 05:00 to 21:30, in line with the terms of the Power Purchase Agreement, demonstrating that renewable energy can provide reliable, dispatchable power at a competitive price. To achieve this, batteries at Dassiesridge will generally charge from the wind energy at night, discharging power in the morning until the sun rises. The solar installation at Avondale will supply the bulk of the energy during the day, supplemented by wind energy from Dassiesridge. Excess solar energy will be used to charge the batteries at Avondale, which will discharge after sunset. A sophisticated energy management system will give instructions to assets across both sites to optimise the power supply in real time in terms of the PPA, depending on weather forecasts .
The construction of Dassiesridge was completed over a two-year period, with the mobilisation of local workers for close to one million man-hours. This was achieved in partnership with key contractors Power Construction and Adenco (balance of plant), and Vestas (wind turbines). The project has additionally fulfilled its Economic Development commitments, specifically regarding local content and local procurement. Under the terms of the PPA signed with NTCSA, the Dassiesridge facility will now start delivering a Net Dependable Capacity of 55 MW to the grid. This provisional period will continue until Umoyilanga reaches full COD, with the commissioning of the Avondale Plant. Following full COD, local communities and enterprises surrounding the facilities will benefit from an investment of over R200 million committed by the project towards supplier, skills, enterprise and socio-economic development initiatives over the project’s 20-year operating period.
“Our focus now shifts fully to optimising dispatched energy with Dassiesridge, and resolving outstanding issues at Avondale, to achieve full COD as early as possible in 2026,” said Gregoire de Montgolfier, Umoyilanga Project Director.
The consortium of leading international renewable energy supplier, EDF Renewables (now EDF power solutions), and privately held investment company Perpetua Holdings (Pty) Ltd, won the Umoyilanga project bid in the South African government’s Risk Mitigation IPP Procurement Programme (RMIPPPP), in March 2021. The project achieved Commercial and Financial Close on 28 November 2023, after signing the Power Purchase Agreement and the Implementation Agreement on 30 August 2023.
For more information visit: https://southafrica.edf-powersolutions.com
