Power Grid

French energy company TotalEnergies, together with its partners, has commissioned a 216 MW solar photovoltaic (PV) plant integrated with a 500 MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) in South Africa.

The Hydra project, located in the Northern Cape province, is being hailed as Africa's largest hybrid renewable energy facility, combining large-scale solar generation with battery storage to deliver reliable and dispatchable electricity.

Under a 20-year power purchase agreement with state-owned utility Eskom, the Hydra facility will supply up to 75 MW of dispatchable electricity to the national grid between 5:00 a.m. and 9:30 p.m.

The project was developed by a consortium comprising TotalEnergies and South African independent power producer Hydra Storage Holding, each holding a 35% stake, alongside Reatile Renewables, which owns the remaining 30%.

The hybrid complex is expected to produce more than 400 GWh of clean electricity annually, enough to power approximately 200,000 households across South Africa. Selected in 2021 under the government's Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme, the project is designed to strengthen electricity supply while reducing reliance on costly diesel-fired peaking plants. Construction of the facility commenced in late 2023.

According to TotalEnergies Southern Africa Managing Director Magali Pailhe, the Hydra project strengthens the company's renewable energy footprint in South Africa, the continent's largest electricity market. As of April 2026, TotalEnergies had nearly 36 GW of global renewable generation capacity and aims to exceed 100 TWh of net electricity production by 2030. The company has also recently divested its distributed solar portfolio in Europe to concentrate on developing large-scale wind and solar projects.