Households warm up to solar water heating plan
March 16, 2007
By Samantha Enslin
Durban – A pilot project to encourage middle- to upper-income homes to install solar water heaters has sparked interest, with more than 200 inquiries being made in the first week.
Dylan Tudor Jones, the managing director of Solar Heat Exchanges, one of the designated suppliers, yesterday said: “We have had a tremendous response … In three days we have concluded 15 sales in Gauteng. Previously we did one or two a day.”
But the success of the project hinges on 500 homes in three provinces forking out up to R17 000 each for the environmentally friendly geysers.
The R2.5 million project is funded by the Central Energy Fund (CEF), the UN Development Programme and the Global Environmental Facility.
Nadia Moosa, a project manager at the Energy Development Corporation, a division of the CEF, said: “Cost and consumer awareness are the greatest barriers to a widespread roll-out of solar water heaters. If a critical mass is reached, the cost of manufacturing will be reduced, making it more viable for households in the future to install these geysers.”
A solar water heater that costs between R10 000 and R20 000 has a life span of about 20 years. Moosa said the cost of a solar geyser could be recovered through saving on electricity bills in six or seven years.
She said that once the six-month project was complete, the results would be submitted to the department of minerals and energy.
Solar water heater suppliers are not convinced that prices would drop if demand rose.
Tudor Jones said: “I do not think it is realistic that with more demand, the price of solar water heaters will fall. Our product, which is imported, has a full copper body and copper prices have surged 400 percent in the past four years. Price is equal to quality and service. If you drop the price, you jeopardise one of these.”
Jim Hickey, the managing director of Selected Energies, said that because of the increase in the costs of materials such as steel, prices would not drop but might stabilise.
The project is one potential solution to the electricity crisis in South Africa. The average demand for electricity is about 30 000 megawatts during morning peak periods. Households account for one-third of this, total consumption, of which 25 percent of the power is used to heat water.
The project, which was launched last week, offers a subsidy of R6 000 for a 300 litre geyser and R5 000 for a 200 litre one for the first two months on the first 200 systems sold.
Thereafter the subsidy declines by R1 000 a month.
The other designated suppliers for the project are Solardome, Solahart Southern Africa and Atlantic Solar.
