With little or no prospect of cash-strapped Eskom being able to close the country’s emerging supply gap, South Africa’s reliance on independent power producers (IPPs) is undoubtedly going to increase further. Given this background, government’s plan to review the existing IPP contracts appears irrational in the extreme. On the one hand, Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe will be pulling the rug from under existing investors’ feet, while, on the other, he will be expecting many of those same investors to participate enthusiastically in the next IPP bid windows.