Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA), a business lobby group, wants a firm launch date for a new market where Eskom and private electricity producers would compete to sell power.

In a newsletter released on Sunday, BLSA chief executive Busisiwe Mavuso said trading was supposed to open to more companies during September. That target was passing without a revised timetable, following repeated delays.

The proposed market concerns how electricity is bought and sold before it reaches households and businesses. Eskom and private producers would sell power in large quantities to buyers such as electricity traders, which are businesses that buy electricity and resell it to their customers. They would trade through a common system with shared rules, called the South African Wholesale Electricity Market.

The aim is to give those buyers more suppliers to choose from, with producers competing to win their business by offering better prices. Mavuso argues that this competition could help restrain electricity costs.

But buying and selling power is only part of the process. Electricity bought from a private producer still needs to reach the customer. That requires access to the national grid, the main network of power lines carrying electricity from power stations across the country.

This creates a potential conflict when Eskom both produces electricity and owns the network its competitors need to use. The government’s plan would transfer ownership and control of that network to a separate state company, independent of Eskom. The intention is to give competing producers access on equal terms.

Moving the grid out of Eskom also affects the people who have lent it money. Mavuso said some lenders rely on the network’s value as collateral if Eskom cannot repay its debt to them. The lenders’ approval may therefore be needed before the network can be transferred to another company. National Treasury sought advisers in September to help arrange that process.

Mavuso has asked Electricity and Energy Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa to clarify when the market can begin operating. “I hope the minister will give us clear guidance soon,” Mavuso said.