Nelisiwe Magubane was speaking on the sidelines of a bidders’ conference on the IPP procurement programme. The conference gave prospective bidders an opportunity to get clarity on the financial, technical, licensing, environmental and legal aspects of the bidding process.

The department’s insistence that bidders must have environmental compliance authorisation for each project is likely to put pressure on the Department of Environmental Affairs, which will have to process the applications. The bidding process is likely to bring a flood of applications.

The first submission date for projects to participate in the programme is November 4.

Ms Magubane said in the past three months, the environment department had received hundreds of requests for authorisation. "They are snowed under. We will have to fast-track the applications while sticking to the spirit and the letter of the law."

The energy department has insisted that companies without environmental compliance authorisation should not bid.

"If you are not ready, do not bid," the department’s Maduna Ngobeni said yesterday.

However, the department has also said it wants only the most reliable and bankable projects to go ahead. But prospective bidders who were not ready by November 4 could wait for the second bidding phase, which closes on March 4 next year.

Last month, the department invited prospective bidders eyeing a slice of the 3 725MW to be procured under the programme to submit detailed bid responses.

The department has set aside 1850MW for onshore wind energy, 1450MW for solar photovoltaic energy, 200MW for solar concentrating power, 12,5MW for biomass, 12,5MW for biogas, 25MW for landfill gas, 75MW for small hydropower, and 100MW for other small projects.

Karen Breytenbach, senior project adviser at the Treasury, said capacity could be reallocated between technologies. "We do not want to allocate megawatts to a technology if they are not taken up," she said.