SEA has undertaken energy policy, strategy development and general integrated energy planning work for national governments around Southern Africa, local governments, as well as for various rural areas.

The focus is on sustainability within the energy policies, including environmental, economic and social sustainability. Means and mechanisms for the promotion of energy efficiency and renewable energy is typically a significant component of such work.

City Energy Strategy Development

SEA supports local government in developing sustainable energy plans for their cities. This initiative builds awareness, capacity and support in the local authority for strategy development and implementation. We assist with information gathering and analysis, policy development, project development, building partnerships and, where possible, sourcing funding. We support the networking of cities that are involved in sustainable energy initiatives. We offer energy planning training courses and a variety of support materials including manuals, books, posters and CDs.

City of Cape Town Energy Strategy

SEA developed the Draft Energy Strategy for the City of Cape Town during 2003. Since this time, comments from a range of stakeholders, including an international review team, have been collected. The City asked SEA to finalise the strategy by including these comments, modelling projections for the energy future of Cape Town, and updating it for recent developments in the energy field. A stronger focus on climate change was also developed in the final strategy.

— see relevant documents

Ekurhuleni Energy & Climate Change Strategy

Ekurhuleni is a fast growing manufacturing and industrial hub of South Africa, with a fairly new local authority structure. This project was in response to an invitation from Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality (EMM) for quotes from Sustainable Energy Africa (SEA) for the development of EMM’s Energy and Climate Change Strategy. The draft strategy is complete and has been approved by council. The economic development strategy of EMM was used to underpin the recommendations of the energy strategy.

— see relevant documents

Sol Plaatje State of Energy Report Development

Sol Plaatje is an economically declining town with abundant solar resources. This project was initiated by SEA to encourage and support Sol Plaatje to consider becoming the first Solar City /Solar Plaatje in South Africa and use the natural resources to stimulate a sustainable energy based economic strategy such as manufacturing of solar water heaters etc.

SEA, working with Masters level Environmental Management students from the University of Cape Town, has begun collecting data to develop a state of energy report for Sol Plaatje. The students are developing individual papers on aspects of the project they were involved in as a team. The project was initiated on risk with SEA supporting the students work in Kimberley. The municipality only recently agreed to provide funds to do a resource assessment with some scenario development.

— see relevant documents

Western Cape Sustainable Energy Strategy

The Department of Environment Affairs and Development Planning (DEADP) in the Western Cape Province approached and engaged SEA to help raise the profile of sustainable energy issues in the province. We, together with Incite Sustainability, were appointed to do a Status Quo and Gap Analysis review aimed at informing the development of a Sustainable Energy Strategy and Implementation Plan for the Western Cape as well as to set up a consultative process and interdepartmental team to take the Plan for the Western Cape forward. For more information go to www.wcapeenergy.net.

— see relevant documents

Energy, Gender & Poverty

SEA worked as part of an international team exploring the relationships between energy, gender and poverty, with a view to developing recommendations around implementation for maximizing benefits to this often marginalized population group. The project involved the development, and optimizing through piloting, of a detailed questionnaire for local and international use in this field and undertaking field questionnaire surveys of households in low-income areas.