The roof that powers two malls and an office park

Redefine Properties has switched on a R106-million solar plant on a warehouse roof in Brackengate, Cape Town, that will wheel electricity through the city’s grid to three of its properties. It comes three years after Redefine announced the project, and R20-million above its first estimate.

The property group this week launched the 7MWp (megawatt-peak) plant on the Massmart distribution centre. It is expected to generate 9.89GWh/year, which will be wheeled – delivered over the City of Cape Town’s network – to Kenilworth Centre, Blue Route Mall and The Towers office precinct, under a 20-year commitment.

For scale, the city’s pooled wheeling programme had moved about 3.1GWh between private generators and customers by September, Engineering News reported. Redefine’s plant alone would produce more than three times that in a year, although the pooled programme only began this year.

When Redefine first announced the project in September 2023, it described a 5.5MWp system producing 8.8GWh/year at an estimated cost of R86-million, Green Building Africa reported. Implementation was to take place during 2024 and take about 60 weeks.

By August 2024, the design had grown to 6.2MW, and the connection had to be moved to another municipal substation because of misaligned design principles between the city’s requirements and those for plants above 5MW, Engineering News reported.

Johann Nell, Redefine’s head of developments and industrial asset management, told the group’s capital markets day that commissioning had been pushed to the fourth quarter of 2025.

The finished plant has 11 691 panels across about 57 000m² of roof space. It connects to the municipal network at the Rubicon substation through a dedicated mini-substation, inverter station and transformer yard, using about 300km of cabling.

Filling the pool

The cost rose by about 23%, but capacity grew by about 28%, so the cost per peak watt has barely moved: roughly R15.60 in 2023 against about R15.10 now, by TechCentral’s calculation.

“The project goes well beyond a conventional rooftop solar installation,” said Leon Kok, Redefine’s chief operating officer. “It reflects the level of engineering and coordination required to make wheeling viable at scale.”

Wheeling in Cape Town began in September 2023, when Growthpoint Properties and trader Etana Energy wheeled solar power from Growthpoint’s Constantia Village shopping centre to an office building on the Foreshore. In April this year, the city’s first pooled allocation, involving the same two companies, spread power from a Free State hydroelectric plant across five Growthpoint buildings.

Pooling lets the city allocate power across many sites rather than matching one generator to one customer, which suits a landlord with a spread of properties. At Brackengate, a large industrial roof generates the power and the malls and offices use it. “By using the capacity of one asset to support others, we’re creating a more efficient and resilient portfolio,” Kok said.

In September, Xanthea Limberg, the city’s mayoral committee member for energy, said the city intends to open pooled wheeling to the market “in the months ahead, if all goes to plan”, adding that “wheeling customers still pay the correct network and subsidy-related charges”.

Redefine has not said what share of the three properties’ electricity needs the plant will cover, or what it expects to save. In 2024, it said Brackengate would offset more than 25% of the combined energy use of Kenilworth Centre and Blue Route Mall. The Towers has since been added to the scheme. – © 2026 NewsCentral Media