Court Ruling Will Determine if South Africa Builds New Coal Plants

South Africa’s Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein heard arguments on Wednesday, 19 August, that will decide whether the government can proceed with plans to build 1,500 megawatts of new coal-fired power stations. Minister of Energy and Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa is asking the court to reverse a Gauteng High Court ruling handed down nearly two years ago, when Judge Cornelius van der Westhuizen struck down the government’s coal expansion plan as unconstitutional and insufficiently attentive to children’s rights.

That lower court decision invalidated the ministerial determination issued under the 2019 Integrated Resource Plan (IRP 2019). Judge van der Westhuizen found that then-minister Gwede Mantashe and the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) had not properly weighed the constitutional implications of new coal generation on young people and vulnerable populations.

Additional reference context is available at https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2026-08-19-cancelcoal-court-battle-threatens-future-of-young-south-africans-say-activists/.

A critical operational complication sits at the centre of the appeal. In 2025, Ramokgopa published an updated Integrated Resource Plan (IRP 2025) that effectively cancels the 2019 version and contains no provision for new coal generation capacity. Yet the original Section 34 ministerial determination has never been formally revoked or repealed. It remains legally active. This means the government retains the authority to pursue fossil fuel expansion under the old framework, even as its stated energy policy has moved away from coal entirely.

The government’s case rests on several operational and constitutional arguments. Ramokgopa contends the high court ruling was premature, since no specific plants, sites or developers have been selected. The government also argues that the increase from 1,000MW to 1,500MW resulted directly from public feedback during the planning process, and that requiring additional child-focused consultations after each draft revision would create endless delays in delivery. The state further claims the court wrongly grouped the flexible 2019 IRP policy and the statutory 2020 determination into a single act, and that the judgment failed to balance environmental risks against the need for grid stability and economic survival. According to the government’s heads of argument, striking down coal would impose an unviable blanket ban that ignores renewable intermittency and the need for a managed energy transition.

Meanwhile, the environmental groups defending the high court decision, represented by the Centre for Environmental Rights, argue that constitutional protections for children leave no room to isolate energy infrastructure choices from their wellbeing. They contend that Section 28 of the Constitution requires the best interests of vulnerable children to be prioritised in all energy decisions. The groups point out that the state offered no feasible studies for clean coal technology, producing only a Wikipedia printout, while experts demonstrate the technology remains polluting and unviable. They argue that adding 289 million tonnes of cumulative CO2 by 2050 would violate constitutional rights without proper scientific justification. Solar and wind energy, they note, are significantly cheaper, with CSIR modelling excluding new coal from least-cost plans.

The health consequences of coal expansion are already documented. Research published in the Journal of Global Health shows children are particularly susceptible to climate-related health issues because of their developing immune systems and greater need for nutrient-rich food and water. A study released by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and Greenpeace Africa in April projected that a delayed coal phase-out would result in approximately 32,000 additional premature deaths, 41,000 preterm births, 17,000 cases of childhood asthma and 370 deaths among children under five.

Sibusiso Mazomba, advocacy coordinator at the African Climate Alliance, framed the appeal in direct terms. “The impression is that government is not just appealing the court case, but they are appealing our rights and our future as young people. It’s really an appeal against a liveable future for young people everywhere in South Africa,” he said. He pressed further on the link between infrastructure decisions and child health outcomes: “With this rising air pollution, children are even more susceptible. There are cases of asthma and children missing out on school, and that affects their quality of life growing up. There has to be more acknowledgement of the fact that energy planning is child rights planning, and those two are not distinct from each other.”

The Supreme Court of Appeal has adjourned to deliberate before delivering judgment. What remains unresolved is whether the ministerial determination stays enforceable and, by extension, whether South Africa’s energy infrastructure can legally expand into coal generation even as the government’s own updated policy framework has already moved on without it.