North Cape Wind Power, South Africa

Coal is the main source of energy for cooking, heating and grid electricity in South Africa. By directing carbon finance to renewable energy projects, like wind farms, the carbon market supports developing economies in building more sustainable infrastructure that is less reliant on fossil fuels.

This project is part of a wind farm in the Northern Cape Province of the Republic of South Africa with around 150 turbines. The project supplies wind-generated electricity into the grid of South Africa from a location where no wind farm was operated prior to carbon financing.

In addition to reducing emissions today, this project increases South Africa’s investment in clean energy, increasing the global share of renewable power and displacing fossil fuels. Wind projects also transfer skills to workers as they learn to construct and operate wind turbines for future projects.

In addition to delivering emissions reductions to take climate action (SDG 13), the project delivers other benefits:

• Good Health and Wellbeing: A mobile health clinic was donated to the Department of Health to screen up to 8,800 people annually on a permanent base, 55,457 people have been screened over the project lifetime. 
• Quality Education: Three Early Childhood Development (ECD) Centers were renovated by this project. 172 underprivileged children attended the ECD from the community thanks to this project.
• Clean Water and Sanitation: The project funded the rehabilitation of the water supply system of Philipstown. Five existing boreholes were cleaned and re-equipped, one new borehole was drilled. Water is provided to 3,251 people due to this project.
  
• Affordable and Clean Energy: Contribute to increasing the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix. Clean electricity generated by these projects displaces electricity which would otherwise be powered by fossil fuels.
• Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure: The total installed capacity of the project is 144 MW. The project has supplied 2,831,440 MWh of wind-generated electricity into the grid of South Africa.