There is an alternative to Eskom's capital spending plans and the electricity price hike, says an ICT alliance.

Think smarter and don't spend more,” is the message from ICT alliance Smart Grid Consortium to national electricity supplier Eskom and the National Energy regulator of SA (Nersa).

The Smart Grid Consortium consists of US networking equipment maker Cisco, IT groups Fujitsu and IBM, and local telecommunications utility UniNet.

The alliance presented its submission to Nersa yesterday as part of the public process into the call by Eskom to hike tariffs by up to 34% to help fund its capital expenditure programme.

Eskom's application for the electricity tariff hike has sparked the ire of the private and public sectors and organised labour. The electricity utility states it needs to spend R385 billion in the next five years and eventually R1.3 trillion up until 2025, to recapitalise the country's generation capacity.

However, the Smart Grid Consortium, in its Nersa submission, states alternative solutions exist and massive recapitalisation is not the only option. Alternatives are being demonstrated in countries such as the US, to avoid massive infrastructure spend and to minimise carbon footprint, it notes.

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