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joining me Now at the Beita Winter Conference, Deepak Paal, head of climate, finance and innovation at the South African Presidential Climate Commission. Welcome.

Speaker 1:
Hello, Thank you for having me.

Speaker 0:
So you've just come off stage delivering an incredible discussion on the just transition. There were three pillars or elements of justice, namely

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restorative justice, procedural, justice as well as distribution justice. How does that fit into the just transition agenda?

Speaker 1:
So let me take a step back and say that the presidential Climate Commission's first objective was to look at what a climate transition would look like in South Africa as we meet our decarbonisation goals. As we looked at the South African landscape, it became very clear to us that this was not only a decarbonisation journey,

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but it is a decarbonisation journey that needs to be accompanied by socio economic development. And at the heart of it is not only a reduction of co two and other greenhouse gases, but in fact the social and economic development of our country's economic competitiveness, accompanied by job creation as well as social and livelihoods. Well being in this context, we coined the term a just transition and gave elaborated

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content to it. Where we talk about three elements of justice, the first one is restorative justice and restorative Justice essentially means that there are already people who have been negatively impacted by climate change. And this is not only a global phenomenon where we say that developing countries bear the brunt unfairly and disproportionately of climate change impact, but also in our own country. With the recent events of flooding

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as well as drought, we are very clear that this transition needs to be accompanied with resiliency for the people who will be impacted by climate change. And that is restorative justice, procedural justice. Because this is not a top down process, it is a process that must carry all of society as we go together into the transition and procedural. Justice refers to effective communication, effective partnering and joint decision making.

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And there is a saying which civil society has coined nothing about us without us. And so if one had to get a strap line for procedural justice, it will have to be that people come along with us as we together make the journey that is procedural justice. Distributive justice means that there are risks and reward to be shared and essentially allocated during this journey.

Speaker 1:
And we are making the point that the awarding of risks and benefits must be proportionate to the outcomes of society as a whole, and not only give us a situation where there are winners on the one side and losers on the other side and so distributive justice is about equity and fairness as we undertake this journey towards a climate resilient as well as a lower carbon economy and society.

Speaker 0:
Absolutely so this distributes of justice that you have referred to, I think from a pension fund angle might refer to this intergenerational equity where the current generation might need to tackle decarbonisation parts for the future generations to benefit. How do you take this into account at the Presidential Climate

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Committee? So for us, distribution of justice is in fact looking forward, and it is talking about sustainability.

Speaker 1:
It is talking about social well being, which is going to be essential to undertaking the transition. But it's also talking about dealing with the issues like job losses by creating new jobs as we undertake a green transition. But importantly in an unequal society, as we have in South Africa and the way the economic benefits and the ownership of economic assets are so skewed towards a certain part of.

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We are saying that distributive justice offers us the opportunity to be more creative about social inclusion not only in poverty alleviation, but also in extending the base of participation in the economy by people who are currently excluded. So for us, the distributive justice elements will require pension funds, asset managers as well as the financial sector to start

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bringing into the equation of asset manager and investment decisions broadened ownership. Here we are talking about the participation of workers in the ownership of renewable assets. For example, here we are also talking about

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social ownership women, younger people and communities as we roll out renewables in the form of solar PV systems. Is there a potential to be creative about the way in which we also afford smaller

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investments in communities who can begin to participate in the ownership structure of the future energy system?

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Absolutely. So Eskom has been on a Decommissioning schedule with Decommissioning the coal fired power plants and as well to move South Africa to a net zero

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future. What drives these Decommissioning of the power

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plants. So I think Decommissioning has become quite a contested topic, unfortunately, sometimes based on either ill information or insufficient information.

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S own Decommissioning schedule is not based on any pressure from anyone else to decommission, but it is based on a real what we call end of life asset situation when it comes to their power stations. So Eskom has always had a Decommissioning schedule of when do you reach end of productive and economic life for a power station?

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What we did as a country was agreed to adopting that Decommissioning schedule in order to get financial assistance if we made that commitment. Now, in the context of the current electricity crisis, one and certainly the Presidential Climate Commission understands full well that you can't simply be shutting down operating power stations. Having said that, we've done a very cursory evaluation.

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If we were to delay the Decommissioning schedule by one or two years, it doesn't massively impact on our decarbonisation commitments. So that's the first point we need to make. And as the presidential Climate Commission, I think we will be agnostic to the question of whether there is a delay of one or two years in the Decommissioning schedule. Having said that, our analysis also shows that renewables in the form of

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wind and some battery storage can be rolled out not only faster than refurbishment of coal fired power stations, but also cheaper. And so we distinguish between the time is Decommissioning and at the end of life of a power station versus massive capital investment to extend the life of coal fired power stations, the former and that is a slight delay in the Decommissioning schedule. We don't have a problem.

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It still meets our dual objectives. If we were to say, however, we need massive injection of capital expenditure to further extend the life of coal fired power stations, our tentative modelling is showing that that does not make economic sense. So

Speaker 0:
I want to get from your perspective and your view. What is your key? Take away from this year's conference with the smart thing

Speaker 1:
for me, I think, and it's my first batter, by the way, so I can't compare it to other bat seaters. But what I am very happy about is the fact that this is a natural segue from E G. And so if There's one message I want to leave pension fund trustees, pension fund executives as well as asset managers with No, this is

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not yet another burden to your already burdened reporting and monitoring and evaluation framework. What this is is something that needs to be included, incorporated, integrated, and so for us. The just transition fits within the framework of. But you have to be very concerted in the South African landscape to ensure that we find the right balance between

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environment, social as well as governance. And we all understand the need for governance because we've seen massive amounts of corruption in the country and we not only want that to stop, we certainly don't want it to proliferate. And so for us, it's the E and the S that need to be harmonised into a clear understanding of what does the just transition mean for the in?

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And so for me, I'm very heartened that we are not adding another burden of things for pension funds and asset managers to consider. But we are asking for a qualitative deepening of S G and all the work that has been done with respect to embedding and taking it forward so that in the South African context, we

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can continue to have investments that are featured or that require not only returns for members, but at the same time start a virtuous cycle of sustainable economic growth, job creation and social development in the country.

Speaker 0:
Absolutely. I want to thank you for your insights. We Since I appreciate

Speaker 1:
your time. Thank you. Thank you very much for having me, Chloe.