Eskom won\'t give answers on Alcan

Tristan Tayler, of Earthlife, said the organisation had applied in mid-December to Eskom, via the Promotion of Access to Information Act, for information on the price it had agreed to charge Alcan for its 25-year 1 355MV/A Coega smelter deal and the conditions of the deal. Tayler said the amount of electricity the utility would be supplying to Alcan, in terms of the deal, was roughly half of what the whole of Cape Town required – a significant commitment of SA\'s total supply to just one company. He said one of the most important conditions Earthlife wanted to know about was whether Eskom would have to pay a penalty if at any point it could not meet its supply commitment. When questioned by The Herald, Eskom spokesperson Carol Allers said the deal was approached in terms of its developmental electricity pricing programme and the tariff offered in terms of this programme ‘shall not exceed the percentage notional tariff discount relative to Eskom‘s standard tariffs requested by the applicant’. Full report in The Herald