Eskom was planning to tap new debt sources to fund two of the world’s four largest coal-fired plants, it said yesterday.

“We really are open to anything,” Caroline Henry, the head of the utility’s treasury unit, said last week.

“It’s about growing diverse access to the market, both internationally and domestically, and making sure you can tap many different opportunities.”

Eskom plans to sell R60 billion of bonds in the next five years to fund expansion to overcome a power shortage that temporarily shut mines and businesses in 2008.

Eskom got its biggest loan from the World Bank at $3.75bn (R30.4bn) to help pay for the Medupi and Kusile power plants, which will each produce about 4 800 megawatts.

Eskom saw a “massive market” for sukuks, or Islamic bonds that pay returns on assets to comply with the religion’s ban on interest, said Paul O’Flaherty, Eskom’s finance director.

For more http://www.iol.co.za/