Ensuring affordable energy access for poor households in South Africa's just energy transition

ON 17 SEPTEMBER 2025, the Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) is hosting a Just Energy Transition seminar, where I have been invited to contribute to a panel discussion titled: “Power Talk: Renewable Energy Deployment & Access - Scaling Solar, Wind and Hydro Energy.’ The Just Energy Transition is a significant topic, and in South Africa it is an urgent one.

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The energy transition is accelerating, perhaps too quickly for many of the stakeholders involved. Yet speaking about a “just” transition in a fundamentally unjust society presents a challenge. We cannot expect the energy industry to resolve all of South Africa's deep social inequalities, nor should the industry be blamed for conditions it did not create.

Recent headlines underline the scale of the problem: “973 children die of malnutrition in hospital during the last 18 months in South Africa”

Many more children die unseen, at home. South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) commissioner Philile Ntuli said: “We want to secure accountability... This is not a natural disaster, it is a failure of the state.” Commissioner Sandra Makoasha told Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane: “Children cannot eat policies.” What does this have to do with the energy transition? The Public Affairs Research Institute’s book Hungry for Electricity makes the link clear. It shows the causal chain between electricity access, employment opportunities, rising household income, and food security.

It is no coincidence that the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals include “universal access to affordable, reliable and modern energy services.” Poverty in South Africa is severe.