There are indications that South Africa’s much neglected gas industry may start seeing renewed activity, as Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson on Monday pushed forward her ambitions for immediate focus to shift to the development of gas-sourced power, alongside the successful renewable-energy procurement programme.

Speaking at a media briefing, in Pretoria, on Monday, she said the Department of Energy (DoE) was finalising the Integrated Energy Master Plan and the Gas Utilisation Master Plan (Gump), which would build the backbone of the gas industry.

“We [DoE] have made our commitments. We have committed to [the development of the] gas [industry], and the renewable-energy [sector], which needs to be connected [to the grid],” she said.

“We have paid little attention to gas . . . We have been preoccupied with nuclear [energy],” she added, pointing to the fact that South Africa already had a large nuclear base off which to build.

While the Minister did not provide further clarity, it seemed the country’s nuclear plans would be pushed through as a long-term ambition, with the funding mechanism still to be determined by National Treasury, while the gas-based energy and renewable-energy initiatives would become the more “urgent”, “immediate focus” in a power-constrained economy.

“The South Africa we [are] dealing with now is not the same [as the one we dealt with] in 2013 [when many energy-generation plans were put into play]; the scenarios have changed,” Joemat-Pettersson explained.

In May, the Minister said the Gump, which would take a 30-year view of the gas industry from regulatory, economic and social perspectives, was in the final stage of internal approval and was expected to be released for public comment during the second quarter of the 2015 financial year.

The request for proposals for gas-fired generation through a gas-to-power procurement programme for a combined 3 126 MW allocation was expected to be released to the market in September, with a bid submission phase planned for the first quarter of 2016.

Meanwhile, the DoE’s nuclear plans would be the long-term plug for South Africa’s energy mix, with the required funding framework still being determined and various cost analysis still under way, despite earlier reports that the department would start its nuclear procurement programme by year-end.

“We are not in a hurry … [we are not going] to rush the process,” she said, noting that it would be done with full transparency and stakeholder engagement.

Under the current Integrated Resource Plan for electricity, the department planned to introduce 9 600 MW of new nuclear capacity, or some six to eight reactors, between 2023 and 2030.